The report comes in a week after the private APD Assessment. I know Angel has APD without a shadow of doubt and I know, from my research, that APD hardly ever exists in isolation. But still, it’s a blow.
You can be diagnosed with five different difficulties with ADP. Angel has two:
Auditory Temporal Processing Skills - which means she finds it hard to differentiate between sounds and in her case in particular to hear the gaps between words.
Binaural Integration - which means it’s hard to hear things coming in different ears, effectively meaning it's very hard to follow a conversation with more than one person.
Background noise also plays a factor with all APD difficulties. The report also said she almost definitely has working memory and other cognitive difficulties that need to be assessed via an Educational Psychologist and Speech and Language Assessment.
Somehow knowing it and seeing it in black and white are different things and there is a grieving process of sorts and I feel overwhelmed and worried. Worried for her future, for how she will cope in the world as an adult if it's so hard to understand and access information.
I email the school. Finally I have irrefutable proof and the Senco who said, ‘Well of course it's an adjustment coming from a Steiner School of 20 to a state secondary of 2000’ (like that explains all Angles difficulties), will be silenced.
I write a dossier of what has occurred over the course of the school year:
Where we are currently:
1. Angel is accessing little to no education in school due to her learning difficulties and stress levels.
2. The strategies that have been put in place to date are either not being implemented, being implemented poorly or not enough for her needs.
3. We are doing everything we can to support Angel outside of school with a cognitive and literacy programme (Fast Forword) and private maths tutoring.
4. It is very hard for her to do these on top of being in school full time and it seems counterproductive to send her to school to not access education, have panic attacks, come home stressed and thus be unable to do the things at home that could help her progress.
The things that are working at school:
1. Some amazing and supportive teachers that Angel has formed close bonds with
2. Good friendships
3. The one-on-one music lesson
4. PE
5. Literacy support on Tuesday and Thursday mornings for 20 minutes
6. Mentor – Angel met with the person who allocates Mentors following a 6 month wait since our mentor request. She loved it and we think made a big difference in her ability to face school the following day.
The strategies put in place to date and their effectiveness:
1. Homework adjustments / break
a. 18 October 2023 – Simpler homework agreed with as it was apparent that the level was way beyond Angel’s capabilities.
b. 8 Jan 2024 meeting – Explained homework was still impossible and agreed on a homework break, bar maths, so we can do Fast Forword programme.
2. Class Pass - Implemented April 24. Working but if Angel is in a full scale panic she is unable to use it.
3. May 24 - Pass to go to the Learning Support Centre for Science and Geography implemented.
6. Exam pass for most of the year 7 Exams – March 24. This was successful and Angel managed to do four exams in total in the small room with a teacher who sat with her when she had a panic attack. The rest of the time she went to her normal lessons and she was ecstatic to be able to hear and actually learn something, one on one.
7. Test Pass – this has been asked for but not agreed officially but many teachers have noted and adapted their approach to tests with Angel as they give her acute panic attacks.
8. Lesson slides in printed form wherever possible - Agreed initially in May 22nd meeting and again in June 7th meeting. Angel has never been given anything in printed form.
9. Can not be asked direct questions in front of the class - agreed on two occasions May 22 and June 7 meetings. Angel is still, on occasion, asked direct questions.
10. Teaching Assistant - June 7th agreed Angel would be added to the TA timetable and receive support in three lessons a week and it was confirmed on 13 June again by email. This has not yet been implemented.
11. One on one music lessons implemented May 22024 - helping enormously.
What we need:
1. Speech and Language Therapy / Assessment
3. An Educational Psychologist Assessment
4. Be added to the TA timetable and told in advance when the TA will be present as we will ensure Angel is in for these classes.
5. Create an adapted timetable so Angel is not going to classes that she cannot access and is not in school full time which will allow us to work more effectively on the help she needs at home. Unfortunately, the list of classes she can’t understand has grown over the course of the year as class disruption has increased and even the less academic classes she used to enjoy (art, drama, music) she now finds stressful.
6. Be given a laptop and internet access when she is in LSC so she can access Fast Forword. This will mean she can rest her brain when she comes home rather than be stressed doing nothing in school and come home to more brain overload. Or at the very least, be given English or maths worksheets that she can access on her own or be assigned a TA for these lessons that can assist her with the lesson worksheet.
8. Be given a test pass until such time as she is able to access the curriculum. It is unfair to test a vulnerable and already anxious child on subjects that she, in effect, has not been taught. Her test and exam anxiety has increased exponentially over the year so the idea that it will decrease if she is exposed to tests is not working. When and if she does return to tests, the APD report suggests they should be in a quiet room, not in a class setting.
9. Some additional one on one or small class teaching either in the form of a teaching assistant in a quiet class or a private tutor either at home or in school time. She needs help with her core literacy skills and does not have a hope of catching up without additional help in this area. Currently the only actual additional academic help she is getting is the literacy support for 20 mins on Tues and Thurs.
10. A strategy to ensure she is not asked direct questions in class.
11. A strategy around getting lesson slides or information about the forthcoming lesson in advance.
Then I speak to the virtual head in our London borough (in England all local authorities have a virtual head teacher you can speak to if you have an adopted or fostered child) and he says, don't send a long email, just request an urgent in person meeting. I scrape the dossier and request a meeting. It takes 3 weeks in which time I feel I am slightly losing my mind.
When we first suspected APD, I had a meeting with the ‘Head Of Learning’ and had already requested:
a test pass
an adapted timetable
that teachers do not to ask Angel direct questions in class
that she is given printed lesson slides
Yet still Angel comes home every other day having had a panic attack because she has been asked a question in class, once in response to a video they were showing in science. I feel like going down to the school and saying to the teacher, she can’t even follow dialogue in a kids movie, let alone a science video! I know the head of learning has sent the email to her teachers but clearly not all of them have read it or they forget. And still tests are being set and there is no answer on the test pass. I set about emailing each teacher directly that has a test pending and email all those who continue to ask her questions but still no word on a meeting date or an adapted timetable.
We decide to adapt the timetable ourselves and agree with Angel that she will go in three days a week until we can get her more support. We move her maths tutoring to Monday lunchtime and she does the ‘Fast Forword’ programme in the mornings on the days she is not in school. She is not allowed her phone or any screen time during school hours. She is a changed child. She starts making videos of stories she creates with her horse farm and wild animals (we let her use the phone for this task). She does better in ‘Fast Forword’, better with her maths homework, better in maths tutoring. If she has a panic attack in school, she still bursts into tears at pick up but she recovers quickly. She even tells me she feels she is following a little more in class. It’s so clear her brain needs downtime. After one particularly stressful day, I say ‘you don't have to go tomorrow if you don’t want to’ and she says, ‘You know what mum, we said I would go in three days a week and I’m going to try and stick to that.’
I am awestruck. I think, she is bloody amazing to stick at it with so many broken promises. She is learning resilience if nothing else!
Written - June 2024
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