homeschool resources for middle schooler with dyslexia & memory problems

[rvm]

Hi All,

Last time I asked a question about homeschooling, you all came to my rescue with a plethora of information and suggestions. Thank you!

I have child who is almost 14. She repeated K (yes, K - I know it sounds ridiculous because it was ridiculous - and not my idea). She's now in the 7th grade. She has severe dyslexia and mild working memory problems. She also has anxiety and depression. That anxiety has manifested in to extreme test anxiety. On days when she has tests, in the morning before school begins, her mind shut downs and she becomes physically ill. She's seeing a mental health therapist and is on meds so we're working on that part.

She has never liked school but has tolerated it because she loves learning and loves people. Last year, she won the award for most improved student in 6th-grade. This year, everything has gone to hell in a hand-basket.

I recently met with the IEP team and learned, according to them, she on almost on grade level in language arts but is way behind in math - 4th grade level. The charter school she attends has limited resources so she has been working with the same math teacher for 3 years. Personally, the teacher is a lovely lady. Professionally, this is not working out. I asked my child why she doesn't like math with this teacher. She said they have been doing the same math for 3 years. I asked the teacher about this and she said they're on this level because my child does not know all of multiplication tables, which are now called math facts. Well of course she doesn't. DUH!!! She has working memory issues. To make matters worse, she's depressed and has test anxiety which is off the charts. So because she cannot remember all her math facts, she's not allowed to progress. Pardon me for being a rude jerk but who the heck wants to do the same math problems for 3 consecutive years? This is a top-rated, out-the-box charter school. They have my depressed kid in highly depressing situation and I'm furious and exhausted from trying remedy this. She's lost an entire school year and they want to keep her with the same math teacher???

During the recent IEP meeting, they suggested she be a part-time student receiving LA, math and one other course from the IEP team. Wait a minute? The same math teacher she's had for 3 years who is doing nothing to help her?? Ahh... no!

So what do I do? I'm thinking home school.

My kid thinks in pictures (as all dyslexics do) so visual learning is a top priority - aka videos. I checked out Khan Academy and it seems they've made huge changes in the last several years. They used have k-12 in almost all subjects. Now they have k-12 math, a few high school and college subects. Yikes!

I'm interviewing math tutors who can think out-of-the-box and teach visual students. I hope I've found one but we're still in preliminary stages.

What do I do for LA, science, social studies, art & music?

I'm located in North Carolina so it seems we have lots of options for homeeschooling. But... I am concerned because she simply cannot take standarized tests. So the annual tests NC requires will be extremely challenging, if not impossible.

I know this kid is intelligent because we have 2 neuro-pysch evals to prove it and even if there was no science to support this, I've observed her watching science and history documentaries made for adults and ask very intelligent questions and summarize the main points and some details as if she was late teens or older.

How do I pull this off without causing her extreme duress once a year during required annual tests?

Which online venues have easy to understand, but thorough, educational videos? I realize we may need multiple venues.

Anyone have kids with severe dyslexia and / or working memory problems and are homescholling successfully?

Thank you
Robin

[dfrecore]

I would definitely say to get your daughter out of the situation she's in ASAP. There's no point in that at all.

I have no idea about the test-anxiety thing, so I can't help with that. But I would ask what kind of accommodations can be made for a student with your daughter's problems. They are supposed to accommodate an IEP when testing. Our charter school said that they would accommodate my daughter, and she doesn't even have an IEP.

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I homeschooled both of my kids until this school year started, so boy, do I know curriculum. I also live in CA, where in spite of the fact that it's the biggest nanny-state ever, they have virtually no rules for homeschooling. So I don't know what you have to do in terms of particular courses you need to teach or whatever. But I can tell you what I did with my kids, to give you an idea on where to start.

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First, I have diagnosed my own daughter with dyslexia and dyscalculia, and they won't test her, because she is excelling in her charter school. Mostly because of the way it's set up (it's Independent Learning, and she is on campus 2x a week and at home 3x a week). Her main teacher knows she has some issues, and has been wonderful about helping her. The main thing I think that helps is she is very diligent about getting her work done, staying on top of things, etc.

She has had "issues" all of her life, but because we homeschooled until this year (9th grade), we were able to work around a lot of the problems. First, we spent a LOT of time doing things orally. Part of the dyslexia is that she can't really write as she goes along. She has to think about something, then say it out loud to me, then write it. It slows down the process a lot, but she's able to do it because there isn't some time-limit on getting things from her brain onto paper.

One thing that also helped over the years, was the Institute for Excellence in Writing program. The entire first year, they don't have to do creative writing. It's all about learning the program, using stuff already written, and editing and changing it a certain way. Both of my kids have been very successful using this program, but my daughter especially because she knows that she can "edit" things after she struggles to write it all out. It's more of a process to her, and it really works. She already started naturally using the tricks that she learned in IEW to do her 9th grade English papers, and her teacher is impressed, especially with her vocabulary.

For Spelling, we used All About Spelling. Manipulative-based, without feeling like it's for babies, which is good when you have a struggling older student. We are going to work through it again this summer.

For math, we used Math-U-See through 6th grade level (Zeta) and then switched to VideoText Algebra. Both video-based programs. My daughter loved using the MUS blocks to do everything, because that was the best way for her to learn and she instinctively knew it. My son hated them, and barely used them at all - he did it all in his head. But, aside from that, both kids liked the program, and it worked well for both. The only issue we had was that my daughter was VERY late to learn her math facts. We worked on them for years. But even though they highly suggest learning them before moving on to the next book, I finally just started moving on when she understood the concepts. Otherwise she would have been in the 1st grade book until 7th grade! She finally has most of her math facts down, and is in 9th grade Algebra 1 and doing fine (I think she has a B). So get a math program with manipulatives. I HIGHLY recommend Math-U-See (some of the others have manipulatives for younger kids but not older ones, so they are a little "babyish" which may annoy your daughter.

For science, there are tons of great hands-on programs. We've used Elemental Science, Noeo, R.E.A.L. Science Odyssey, Exploration Education, and Apologia. All were hands-on, and all were great.

For history, we used The Story of the World series, then The Mystery of History. Both are very story-based, short lessons, and lots of hands-on stuff in the activity books they carry. You can also get them on audiobook, which is fantastic. Listening to someone tell a story is a lot more fun than reading a textbook, let me tell you!

We did not do music. I think piano lessons would count as music? We did art classes here and there for my daughter.

You can learn a ton by going to CathyDuffyReviews.com to look at curriculum. She has a book out as well, but why buy the book when you can use the web?

And of course, there's the "homeschooling bible" The Well-Trained Mind by Susan Wise Bauer. It's an excellent book, with tons of resources, but just take it with a grain of salt. We did not homeschool 6 hours a day, ever. Even my daughter now is taking 2 classes 2x a week for 2 hours each (so 4 hours a day), and then working on stuff at home the other 3 days for maybe 3 hours, and is AHEAD of schedule, and has been told that if she wants to look at graduating early, she can. She won't because she's playing school sports and loves it, so she has actually decided to slow down a bit. We are very happy with this program, and if it did not exist, we would continue homeschooling rather than have her in a traditional school program where she would be completely overwhelmed by the pace and requirements.

Keep asking questions, and most importantly, go to a homeschool convention to get a chance to touch and feel all of these programs. Here's one I found, but I'm sure there are more: Thrive! 2017 | North Carolinians for Home Education. When you get there, ask around and talk to other parents, and go to any of the workshops that are for "parents of struggling learners" (that's category L when you look at all of the workshops listed). You will find TONS of resources and people ready and willing to help you.

Good luck!

[sanantone]

May I ask why your daughter is in a charter school with limited resources? A lot of charter schools are not equipped with decent, special education programs. I don't know what kind of schools are available to you in your area, but in San Antonio, parents often make sure they move to an area covered by a public school with a good, special education program. At the high school I attended, I used to tutor special needs students, and we were pretty good at advancing students at their own pace.

[rvm]

WOW! Thank you, Dfrecore! That's a significant amount of valuable information!

I have no idea about the test-anxiety thing, so I can't help with that. But I would ask what kind of accommodations can be made for a student with your daughter's problems. They are supposed to accommodate an IEP when testing. Our charter school said that they would accommodate my daughter, and she doesn't even have an IEP.

She has an IEP with extended test time and many other accommodations. The problem isn't so much the time allowed. When she sees a test, she just freezes. Actually, she becomes incapacitated just thinking about it. The 1000s of words she has stored in her memory become unavailable as well as any data she may have learned. She has difficulty retaining new information and she cannot decode words. If she does not have the word memorized, it slows her so much, she forgets what she read prior to the words she cannot decode.

[rvm]

May I ask why your daughter is in a charter school with limited resources? A lot of charter schools are not equipped with decent, special education programs. I don't know what kind of schools are available to you in your area, but in San Antonio, parents often make sure they move to an area covered by a public school with a good, special education program. At the high school I attended, I used to tutor special needs students, and we were pretty good at advancing students at their own pace.

Sanantone, my apologies. I should have been more specific. When I said limited resources, I actually meant, they only have one math teacher in the Exceptional Children's division in middle school. They've actually allowed 2 other teachers to tutor my child along with a few high school students. The problems are she is so severely dyslexic, cannot retain short term information (once it's committed to long term memory, she's good) and she has severe school anxiety as well as test anxiety, few people in her lifetime have been successful at teaching her.

The school itself is one of the best-known charter schools in NC for kids with IEPs. Approximately 20-25% of the student body has an IEP. Unfortunately, they've only had one other child with dyslexia & memory problems as severe as my child's situation.

We've tried several schools for kids with LDs, public schools and probably a dozen tutors. Only 2 tutors have made significant progress. She's been through the Lindamood-Bell, Orton-Gillingham & Wilson programs. Wilson was successful as was a very out-of-the-box visual therapist who had constructed her own techniques to help her brother who suffered with severe dyslexia. We stopped going to her after 2 years because she was getting huffy with my daughter because my kiddo could not remember what they worked on 3 or 4 days prior. I explained about the memory problems many times but that didn't seem to change things. My child got to point where she refused to go there and cried when I made her go.

I've got a smart kid - in her own way - who is so underserved by the American Educational system and common core junk that if I don't find a solution soon, when she turns 16 in 2 years, it's probably not going to be a pretty picture as I fear she will drop out of school completely.

[dfrecore]

I've got a smart kid - in her own way - who is so underserved by the American Educational system and common core junk that if I don't find a solution soon, when she turns 16 in 2 years, it's probably not going to be a pretty picture as I fear she will drop out of school completely.

I am guessing that there probably isn't a country in the world where the public school system could help you very much. As much as we say that Sweden or Denmark or South Korea have better school systems than ours, they never talk about dealing with kids who have issues - only how much better they are via testing.

Not saying your system is good per se, just that I'm not sure anywhere is better at this point. Except probably homeschooling.

[dfrecore]

My advice to look at the homeschool convention and start reaching out to people - someone in your state, experiencing similar things to you, will have much better advice than I do for the testing. You need to start going crazy on research, because you WILL find people who can help you.

[sanantone]

I am guessing that there probably isn't a country in the world where the public school system could help you very much. As much as we say that Sweden or Denmark or South Korea have better school systems than ours, they never talk about dealing with kids who have issues - only how much better they are via testing.

Not saying your system is good per se, just that I'm not sure anywhere is better at this point. Except probably homeschooling.

There are numerous differences between what the U.S. has to deal with in its school systems vs. most other developed nations. The U.S. is a lot more ethnically diverse, some European countries put lower performing students on a vocational tracks, and the U.S. has a relatively high child poverty rate for a developed nation. A lot of European countries are a lot smaller, have high taxes, and are much more socialist almost completely eradicating child poverty. The way they train, hire, and pay teachers would be opposed by most of our politicians. They're highly selective and pay very high salaries whereas the U.S. pays modest salaries and will accept almost anyone who can pass a set of tests out of desperation.

I'm not an education expert, but I believe the OP's daughter's problems may be beyond the help of an educator. There are possibly neurological problems that only medical professionals can gain insight into.

[cookderosa]

I'll write more later- but testing in NC is not what you think. I'm in NC, I'm even a standardized testing proctor- you don't need to worry about this at all, in fact, on this one issue alone I would say you can save her mental health by stopping the testing. What the hell is a test for?? Seriously, what does a test show? You can do a standardized test with her at home online for about $25 or you can go through the steps of having one administered- but HERE IS WHERE IT DIFFERS. The results don't matter! NC doesn't require results, just that you test. So, if you really want to do something phenomenal for her, pull her out of school, administer her exam, and when the results come- let her put them through the paper shredder. Don't even open them. Don't peek. Just shred. Give her this power and you'll see a changed child.

EDIT to add- I can send you names of tests you can do at home or set you up with someone in your area to administer a test. I'm not sure where you are, but if you're anywhere near Charlotte, we can meet for coffee.

[JamesIE]

Also, depending on the nature of the testing anxiety there may be a pharmacological option. I've taken and known friends who have taken beta blockers before an exam, recital, etc. It can help with some of the physiological elements of the anxiety, rapid heart beat and the associated feelings this induces.

A sympathetic GP can be a real asset.