Anonymous wrote:Ask the teacher about work completion, work initiation and whether your daughter can stay on task. How much support does she required as compared to her peers? Is she easily distracted? Impulsive?

But if it's inattentive type ADHD without problem behaviors don't be surprised if the teacher has no clue. My kid's teacher did not. But I went in one day and watched my kid space out by looking out the window. I could tell when he came back he had no idea what was going on. He had missed a few things and was behind. I saw him look at his neighbor's paper and copy the answers that he was zoned out for and missed. Then I looked at the teacher to see if she noticed. She had not.

Why wouldn't you want a 504 or an IEP?

It's not that we wouldn't want a 504/IEP, but 1) I'm not positive my kid actually has ADHD, 2) even if she has it I'm not sure she'd get a formal diagnosis (eyeballing the diagnostic criteria, she seems to be a couple short, which I personally don't consider to be definitive re: whether she has it or not but nevertheless may mean she'll never get formally diagnosed); and 3) even if she does eventually get a a diagnosis, she doesn't have one now and it would presumably take months or more to get one and then translate that into a 504 or IEP. Hence the question of what kinds of "accomodations"/requests one could reasonably discuss with a teacher to help a kid without one.

Ask the teacher about work completion, work initiation and whether your daughter can stay on task. How much support does she required as compared to her peers? Is she easily distracted? Impulsive?

But if it's inattentive type ADHD without problem behaviors don't be surprised if the teacher has no clue. My kid's teacher did not. But I went in one day and watched my kid space out by looking out the window. I could tell when he came back he had no idea what was going on. He had missed a few things and was behind. I saw him look at his neighbor's paper and copy the answers that he was zoned out for and missed. Then I looked at the teacher to see if she noticed. She had not.

Why wouldn't you want a 504 or an IEP?

PP here. I meant to add that you can flag for the teacher that you’re noticing this and ask the teacher what they usually do to help with this. She won’t be the only one with this issue and that way you aren’t burdening the teacher with just your idea of what to do. Though this only really works if the teacher seems game to help.

With our daughter we always just reinforce that reading the question closely and checking it again after she finishes it is part of doing the assignment and is particularly important for her. We emphasize that she understands how to do the work but her brain needs help slowing down and being careful. We have also started discussing pacing oneself on tests to make sure you get to every question and are able to put down an answer. Our DD’s problem is controlling her speed in both directions — sometimes going too slow, sometimes rushing. But I have found that emphasizing when she understands the concept is helpful in not making her shut down and get defensive.

It’s fine to ask the teacher for her point of view, and to say that you notice careless errors and ask for advice about to help with that. Teachers want to help and want kids to do well.

When the assignment comes home, go over the mistakes gently with your daughter. Have her use a highlighter to mark the addition or subtraction signs, or whatever part of the problem you think she disregarded, and solve correctly, so that she starts to stop herself when taking tests to check herself. It will take a while for this to work. Just focus on being careful, not if she added incorrectly or just didn’t know the answer. Don’t emphasize the grade, just the being careful part. If she gets stressed over this, stop after just one wrong question, and praise her for the ones she got right.

I have wondered for awhile whether our daughter has ADHD (runs in the family, and some signs point to it but not clear-cut), and this year in 4th grade she is making a lot of "careless"/sloppy errors on tests and quizzes that lower her grades, especially things like copying numbers wrong or doing the wrong operation by mistake in math (she's done this in the past too but her grades were still fine, and this year's teacher sends home the actual assignments so we can see exactly what mistakes she makes whereas last year's didn't.)

Are there any questions you would suggest asking her teacher at parent-teacher conference to try to tease out whether she sees any signs that could point to ADHD (besides "does the number of mistakes she makes seem outside the norm for 4th graders to you"?) I am not sure how exactly it would show up at school... she doesn't seem too inattentive/spacy at home, more the hyperactive/impulsive side of things (especially impulsive), but she's also a big rule-follower so she's unlikely to be blurting things out or getting out of her chair or the other kinds of rule-breaking ADHD things that might be more typical (and that she does at home where she feels less inhibited.)

Also, is there anything we could reasonably ask her teacher to do to help her if she's open to it that aren't a big burden (and that she might be willing to do without a diagnosis/504)? Like, is it okay to ask if she might remind our daughter to check her work on quizzes and tests before she turns it in, or is that too big of an ask? She has a big class and we don't want to be the annoying parents and it's not the end of the world if our daughter gets Bs instead of As, but if there are helpful things in your experience that teachers have been willing to do (either with or without a 504/IEP) that aren't a big lift, it would be useful to hear...