I have a 10-year-old son who is at least borderline gifted and has just been diagnosed with ADHD-inattentive type. Among his problems are disorganization and being off task in class; he especially has difficulty with transitions. Third and fourth grade have been very difficult.
We just received his proposed IEP, which would take effect as he enters the middle school for fifth grade. One of the proposals is to have a “collaborative teacher” with him in a couple of his classes. We are promised that this will be so low key, no one (including him) will know this person is there for him. But we are concerned about the stigma among his peers if the cat gets out of the bag—and quite certain he would reject this arrangement if he knew.
Also, we have thought about pulling him out and placing him in a Montessori school—and his fourth grade teacher has encouraged us to look into it.
Our questions:
1. Thoughts on the aide—er—collaborative teacher? Is this anything more than a crutch with a nasty potential downside? Can this move him toward self sufficiency?
2. After five years of public school, would he be able to adjust to a Montessori environment? If we moved him, there’s a school locally that goes through eighth grade.
If anyone else has been down the ADHD/gifted road, we’d like to hear your experiences.
Re: IEP for a gifted/ADHD fifth grader
I should clarify that the collaborative teacher’s role would be largely helping him to stay organized and on task—a prompt here, a signal there to keep him focused, cue him through transitions, keep extraneous papers off his desk, etc. But will he be learning to do these things for himself?
He is quite aware that he is underachieving, but he is highly sensitive to anything that would draw attention to his problems. Whether it actually exposes him to ridicule hardly matters; he will perceive it as such, hence the likely resistance.
Re: IEP for a gifted/ADHD fifth grader
Brendan,
I have two inattentive ADHD/gifted children and so have some insight into your situation. One of my children also has LD. I suspect that Montessori might not provide enough structure for a dreamy ADHD kid, even though it is a great program for gifted kids, so you would really need to spend some time observing how the classes function with an eye toward discerning how “child-led” the classroom really is.
You didn’t ask for advice on this second point, but I’m wondering if you have talked to your child about his diagnosis and what it means. I have found it to be extremely important (and protective of my children’s self-esteem and belief in their competence) to let them know that there is a reason for their difficulties and that there are things we can do about the problems they are experiencing. Kids often are quite relieved to find out that they aren’t “stupid,” which is frequently what they are thinking to themselves. You can’t control how other people think about ADHD, but you can control how you and your son think about it. If you teach him that it is a problem to be hidden from the world, he may end up feeling defective. If you teach him that it is a hurdle he can overcome, he will be proud when he does so. If you are interested, Mel Levine has written a great book for children dealing with ADHD and LD. It is called “All Kinds of Minds.” It really helped my children and it may help your child as well.
Doreen
Re: IEP for a gifted/ADHD fifth grader
We just wonder if we’re being offered a non-solution with the collaborative teacher. On the one hand, the low-key approach that’s been described is appealing because it would lessen the potential social stigma and avoid the likely resistance from him. But would something that unobtrusive really help him in the long run?
As for what we’ve shared with him, we’ve told him that all the tests he’s going through are part of our search for ways to help him do better. We’ve haven’t broached ADHD specifically—perhaps in part because we see it as a partial answer at best to what’s going on with him. The diagnosis got him in the door for special services, but among all the professionals who’ve evaluated him, the one thing they agree on is that he’s a fiendishly complex case. Or as I’ve told, him, God gave him a brain like no other. A good brain, but we haven’t figured out how it works yet.
Re: IEP for a gifted/ADHD fifth grader
Dear Brendan,
Although you have not described your son’s specific school difficulties, much of what you have written sounds very like the emotional profile of a gifted child with a learning disability. In fact, LD can look very like ADHD in a gifted child, or it can go along with ADHD. Obviously you are on the right track here because you are working to find out just what is going on with your son. One thing I can tell you is that when a gt/ld or gt/ADHD child receives help for his weaknesses while simultaneously being offered intellectual challenges consistent with his intelligence, he will thrive. Your boy is probably angry and frustrated right now because he cannot produce work consistent with what he actually knows. We found counselling was very helpful when our children were feeling this way. What helped most, however, was making sure that they weren’t stuck in dumbed-down classes simply because they couldn’t produce at the rate of other gifted children. In time, they learned strategies to increase their output and are now doing very well in gifted classes. It is hard to have a “complex” child, but hang in there.
Doreen
I have seen collaborative teaching work well— but it depends on both teachers’ wanting to make it work. I do think a skilled collaborative teacher can help a student work towards self-sufficiency. But… I don’t think it would be a good idea to keep it a “secret” from your child. If you do decide to try it, he needs to be a part of the team as much as his 2 teachers. He needs to know why she is there and how she can help him. My child hated having another teacher work with her because she couldn’t pay attention to what the regular teacher was saying when the other teacher was talking to her. She also hated having someone lean over her and watch her work. That teacher was there for her, but also helped anyone in the class that needed it.