11 year old with learning disability....?

Question

My step-son has had to have "alternative learning"(special ed) since second grade. He is seriously behind in school. Is there a learning disability that could be coupled with defiance. He CAN do certain homework projects independantly (he's shown us) but he fiddles and doodles and literally refuses to.

He will not work in school which sends it home to us to fight with him over. I am at my whits end, and quite fankly the teachers, his family or his friends can help him if he won't make an effort. His sight is fine and his hearing is fine. He just WON"T put forth the effort. He is in the fifth grade and he hasn't learned money time or multiplication. How can we even catch up?

Answer 1

I too have an 11 year old boy and yours sounds just like mine. I knew We had a problem in pre-k when they couldn't teach him his numbers,colors or abc's. We got alot of the wrong answers until recently.He was finally diagnosed with NVLD and his short term memory is not so good.I would take him to a Neurosphycologist for the proper testing. In the mean time it worked well for us if I have my son work for 30-40 minutes at a time with a 15-20 minute break in between. It can and will get better,just make sure he knows that you do not judge and are there to help him and nothing else.

Best of luck,

Deniese

Answer 2

My daughter did the same thing from first grade and we found out by 7th grade she had adhd. I would suggest having him retested. Use the OPTAX and you have to be very proactive. Special Education should be a last resort!

Answer 3

This may seem odd, but have you thought about him not being challenged enough?  In my experience, 'can but won't' means he is bored and doesn't want to 'prove' that he can do something that he knows how to do.  Also, with the money, time and multiplication, these are basic skills that he doesn't really 'need' yet.  Some children don't like learning things that they view as a waste of time.    I just thought I would put this out there for you to think about.  You are right about not being able to help if he wont make the effort.  That is why No Child Left Behind won't work.

Answer 4

Demand learning disability testing. And IQ testing.  Perhaps he has a specific issue - dyslexia, processing disorder - that makes it really hard for him.  If you don't have anyplace in your hometown, bring him to Dallas to Shelton School for testing.  I jsut cannot believe that your special ed teachers haven't demanded more for him.  

In the mean time figure out how to break down the work into what he CAN do and break it down into very very small bits.  It can be most overwhelming to face an entire page of work.  Read one paragraph at a time, work two problems, and so on.  Then, do something else for 15 minutes that he enjoyes - like coloring or playing quietly (and set the alarm clock) then go back and work for a short while.  

With learning differences often come lack of motivation.  He may have short term memory issues, too. Truly, please get tests for this child.

Answer 5

He needs to get a proper diagnosis so he can get  proper education.  Learning disabilities are frustrating and make people react in different ways.  He is not happily learning for some reason.  Be kind to him, his life is not easy.

Answer 6

Stay positive. My son is in third grade and gets help with reading spelling and math. We struggle with the fiddling and doodling too. We find that he can do the work but he gets distracted really easy and if you push him it starts to frustrate him. Its hard when one minute he can read or spell a word, or know a number added together, then a couple minutes later he gets it wrong. We keep waiting for it to click. We just keep putting in the time with him to try to keep up as much as possible. Hope things work out, I know what your going through.

Answer 7

When kids have struggled for years, their response is to be afraid to try. Imagine if you were trying to push a rock up a hill every day for six hours a day, for three years and it only moved a few inches at a time. How would you feel?

The first thing is that you need to tell the school to STOP sending his schoolwork home for you to fight over. It is their job to deal with this and you should not be required to teach new information because you have not been trained to do that. Also, it is reinforcing his escape related behavior in school. He delays the onset of the task until he gets home from school.

Since you didn't give us much information about his disability, I can only conjecture that his current placement may be too much for him. He may need to have more services. I guess that is why I really object to them blindly continuing to send home work that he cannot do. Evidently no one cares enough to make sure he is getting what he needs. If he was, he wouldn't be having these problems!

You are going to have to advocate on behalf of your son. Call for a new IEP meeting immediately to discuss both his placement and his homework. You also need the school to write a behavior intervention plan to deal with the issue. In addition, insist that the school district perform a functional behavior assessment to find out why he is misbehaving in school. YOU need to do this NOW. The behaviors you are currently seeing will just become more entrenched.

Please go to the Wright's Law website to find out more about your child's rights as a student with special needs.

Finally, don't fight with your child over homework as he may be getting rewarded with your attention. Give him his homework, tell him you will help him after he has finished a few problems on his own, but that you will not do all the work for him. Next, tell him that he will be able to choose a TV program to watch that evening if he completes most of the work. Tell him he will not watch any TV if most of the work is not done.

Now you must walk away! Set a timer for one hour and then come back. If he hasn't done anything, then just take to homework and tell him there will be no TV. Send the homework back to school incomplete. Do this for two weeks. If you see a change, then it is working. You may want to tell your school about the plan.

It is important that he only gets enough homework that he can do in an hour. Any more is too much for him. Make a point of this in the IEP meeting.

Remember, the school is supposed to be educating your son. You need to find out why this isn't happening. This is not all his fault.

Answer 8

I would do as an earlier answerer suggested and ask for a full evaluation and adddress his behavioral issues.  To do this all you have to do is put the request in writing and give it to the child's teacher.  This is a more recent right given to parents in the last version of IDEA.  

If it's possible to change your approach with him to rewards instead of removing his things, it might help. You have to "catch him being good" and tell him/hug him for just being your son.

If your family can handle it, I would homeschool him to the end of the year or later.  Intensive, one-on-one training is what he needs to catch up and that is just not possible within a normal school day.  

Also find good computer games to help with the rote memorization and basic math skills.  Maybe he can even shop for them on-line for you.  Give him a budget up front.  

I'd also try to get him involved with something he likes and would be good at - karate, Boy Scouts, baseball, etc.  He needs to build his self-esteem and self-worth.  Doing this outside of his school district may help, too.  Clean slates.  

DON'T let him hear you talking about him.  Remember learning disabled kids have regular or better intelligence, but for whatever reason information doesn't enter, process or exit the brain in the expected way.  He's frustrated and needs to feel that someone is in his corner.  :)

Answer 9

hi, he is suffering from Attention Deficit problem. so let him do his work independently and tell him. make the study a fun game to him. try to teach him money and multiplication through real life experience..take him to the shop and give him the money to pay to the shop-keeper.don't let him understand that you are trying to teach him.. rather make him feel as he has grown up you are depending upon him. and give him some award if he works properly and with the time gradually you stop that..and don't force him to do anything just try to built up interest.

hope by this way you will be able to overcome the problem.

Answer 10

Do you know what his disabilities are, what subject does he have trouble in ? Maybe if he has a hard time in reading maybe dislexia ?