I would not medicate a kid who gets a high A minus due to attention issues. There are short and long term risks that come with all the meds, where for many kids it is worth the risks due to the massive benefits. In your case it's not worth any risks IMO.

Your kid's AP teacher will have a good idea of how she will do on the AP exam within the next few months. The threshold is low for a 4 and even for a 5. Our DD's AP teacher was tough, but caring and I was shocked she thought our daughter had a good shot at a 5 and at worst would get a 4. I thought based on how harshly she was grading it would be lower. She was on the mark and our daughter has some attention issues, but not at the level we were willing to do a trial of meds.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I dont really understand your premise. If you suspect your daughter has adhd, yes she should be treated. That may or may not involve medication. It doesn't have anything to do with getting 5s on an ap test. It has to do with equipping her body and brain for best outcome. Across all of life. If you don't treat this, she will be the person in the office who forgets to send the calendar appointment, or sends it with the wrong link, or wrong attachment, or something else that drives her boss crazy, and she wont have the tools to help herself do better.

Knowledge and awareness are power. Let her talk to a doctor, but don't do it to make 5s on a test.

Unless you plan to medicate, there is no special “treatment” other than figuring out how best to stay organized, a system that works to keep track of tasks to accomplish, etc. Which is what you would do either way.

Knowing how your brain works is key to finding a system. There isnt one system that works for everyone. There also may be times when medication is needed (if she becomes a parent for example) and having the history of her medical background will be useful. It just seems so odd to look at this through a lens of trying to score a 5 rather than long term success.

Anonymous wrote:I dont really understand your premise. If you suspect your daughter has adhd, yes she should be treated. That may or may not involve medication. It doesn't have anything to do with getting 5s on an ap test. It has to do with equipping her body and brain for best outcome. Across all of life. If you don't treat this, she will be the person in the office who forgets to send the calendar appointment, or sends it with the wrong link, or wrong attachment, or something else that drives her boss crazy, and she wont have the tools to help herself do better.

Knowledge and awareness are power. Let her talk to a doctor, but don't do it to make 5s on a test.

Unless you plan to medicate, there is no special “treatment” other than figuring out how best to stay organized, a system that works to keep track of tasks to accomplish, etc. Which is what you would do either way.

I dont really understand your premise. If you suspect your daughter has adhd, yes she should be treated. That may or may not involve medication. It doesn't have anything to do with getting 5s on an ap test. It has to do with equipping her body and brain for best outcome. Across all of life. If you don't treat this, she will be the person in the office who forgets to send the calendar appointment, or sends it with the wrong link, or wrong attachment, or something else that drives her boss crazy, and she wont have the tools to help herself do better.

Knowledge and awareness are power. Let her talk to a doctor, but don't do it to make 5s on a test.

This is my child too, OP. Maybe has adhd. He manages to get As, but just barley (93), and every semester there are a few A minuses until the last minute when he squeezes in a few high point assignments and gets the A. But almost all the points lost are due to small mistakes and/or not reading directions carefully. Slow processing speed isn’t an issue, if anything he processes too fast. Always first done. For us, I just don’t think doing a neuropsych evaluation to get a diagnosis and medication is worth it. I do check in with him a couple times each semester and ask how his focus is in class, if he is having a hard time getting things done, and if he feels he needs extra help.

What is “this kind of ADHD”? As a PP has pointed out lots of kids make mistakes like this, I don’t have ADHD but I would sometimes make careless mistakes. I still do on occasion on my job (working with numbers).

Medicating your kid solely to get 5s on AP tests doesn’t seem like a good idea. What are you going to do, give her some of your other kid’s Adderall on test day?

If she “really” wants to get 5s (and who doesn’t?) she needs to just do her work more carefully. And doublecheck it. 4s usually get AP credit too at colleges.

A lot of markdowns on math tests are inattentive mistakes. Even the normal
non-adhd kids make dumb mistakes! If she can take she class with a regular speed to,e she’ll have plenty of time to review carefully.

My ADHD daughter got Bs in Calculus class, and 4s on the exams. Inattentive mistakes were part of the problem, and slow processing speed especially when identifying how to set up a problem (which approach to integration for example) was another piece.

All's well that ends well. She's a great kid and attending a great University.

As far as AP Calc exam, the threshold for accuracy is not that high. 70% gets one a score of 5. I have one unmedicated child with severe ADHD who makes careless mistakes whose grade was in the high 80’s and low 90% in Calc BC the entire year. He does genuinely enjoy math and does well in it with minimum effort. His school (and consequently, the College Board) would not even allow him any extended time. Calc exam was the least of his problems. Timed writing is where it all falls apart. If you suspect ADHD get it diagnosed and ask her school for accommodations.The sooner the better.

Anonymous wrote:I’m no ADHD expert and have no way of knowing whether or not medication would be appropriate/helpful in her particular case.

In regards to minimizing careless mistakes, does she check her work? After she’s completed the exam, she should use the remaining time to take a fresh look at the questions. Where applicable, it tends to work best to start at the answer, apply the inverse operations, and see if she arrived at the beginning.

Yes, she tells me she does check her work, and she catches some mistakes every time. The 92% comes from the mistakes she still misses after re-checking.

I’m no ADHD expert and have no way of knowing whether or not medication would be appropriate/helpful in her particular case.

In regards to minimizing careless mistakes, does she check her work? After she’s completed the exam, she should use the remaining time to take a fresh look at the questions. Where applicable, it tends to work best to start at the answer, apply the inverse operations, and see if she arrived at the beginning.

Both my kids have ADHD, but my second has never been formally diagnosed or medicated, because she's also a good student and has so far done well in school. However, she is now going to take AP exams, and wants 5s. Her grade in math every year has always hovered at 92%, entirely due to inattentive mistakes, like confusing the x axis with the y axis, or writing a minus when she meant to write a plus sign. She has no trouble with understanding the concepts or any of the steps to show her work. Sometimes her answer is correct, but the teacher points out that it's only because she made TWO inattention mistakes that cancelled each other out!

Do you think she could get a 5 on her AP Calc exam in these circumstances?
Would you medicate this type of ADHD?

Thank you for your perspective. I know it seems minor, but my kid really wants to do well in school.