On the other hand DD's psych. said she recommends a social skills group for DD, and she feels that there isn't reason to assess DD
I would listen to your gut feeling about whether or not a further assessment would be helpful. I've found in the experiences my kids have had with assessments and counseling that (in our area) psychs who are not neuropsychs but specialize in other areas tend to see what they see through the lens of their specialty. There may be many different reasons that a child is challenged with communication skills (or whatever) and would benefit from a social skills group, and different children with different reasons for the need may all equally benefit from the same type of social skills practice - so it's possible that perhaps it doesn't matter from the perspective of having your dd benefit from the social skills group her psych is suggesting.
On the other hand, when you don't know what the root cause of a behavior or challenge is, treating one thing at a time when it's recognized, while it will help that one thing, doesn't help illuminate why the thing is happening, or help you or your dd understand the larger picture of how the real challenge might be impacting her overall functioning or might impact her later in life. I hope that doesn't sound dry or depressing - it's not meant to. From my experience, the more knowledge you have, the better. You're in a wonderful position to be able to have your dd evaluated at no cost... and as blackcat mentions, the school won't have to know about it unless you share the eval, so if you're not convinced after it's complete that it's correct or helpful, it's just something that you've pursued, taken into account, discounted, and you move on. OTOH, if you learn from it, you'll most likely be really *really* thankful to have the information that helps you understand your dd and understand how to help her. So there's a tremendous potential upside to doing the eval.
she then mentioned something about "labeling", and she stated that DD did so much better this session with her social skills.
We've had concerns expressed to us about labeling, but having a label for my children was tremendously helpful - both in advocating and in how my children see themselves. No one *wants* to have a "label", but to have the name of a diagnosis that explains why you have a challenge with (whatever your challenge is) helps. Truly. Before they had their diagnoses my children thought they were not as "good" as other kids at the things that are challenges for them. They thought it was just something about them that was "wrong". They had trouble with self-confidence. They still had the same challenges after they received their "label" but they then had something that they could say "I have trouble doing ... because I have ... ". Having a diagnosis also helped me explain to them when they were younger why they were seeing a professional for help with whatever, and now that they are older, it helps them understand how to make plans and deal with challenging situations etc.
One of my thoughts - what do I want from testing? Answer- Someone to tell me what is going on in that child's head. Why is she like that? How can we parent her better?
I don't know that you'll ever get one absolute answer from one episode of testing. But testing can really help understand what is going on in a child's head, why she's like she is, and yes, it can definitely help us understand how to parent our children better. So really, those are all three really good reasons to go forward with it
Best wishes,
polarbear
