School pressure to diagnose ADHD | ADHD Information
I was also told by my ped that teachers see some inattention and start going "balisitic" about ADHD. He says that it is perfectly normal for a child, especially a boy, to be unfocused, hyper, and so forth, and that a child should not be evaluated for ADHD until age 6.
I would give the teacher the letter from your ped and then ignore her and discontinue any conversations she starts about ADHD. I also would not meet with the school psychologist.
I was given a Connor's form a couple of weeks ago. I am not going to fill it out. I see it like this. It appears to be a diagnostic tool targeted at ADHD. The problem is that other conditions mimic ADHD and often other conditions are co-morbid with ADHD. So using this type of tool to diagnose would increase the chance of a mis-diagnosis or incomplete diagnosis. I am having neuro-psyche testing done, so I really don't need the school psychologist to tell me if he may have ADHD--I'll find out soon enough.
There is alot of pressure on the teachers and schools to excell on the state testing. The level of school work required these days is 3-4 grade levels higher than when I was in school. To teach this stuff at such young ages requires a class room of robots. This is where alot of this is coming from. I would also watch out in signing anything because in alot of states once you sign your kid over to the state LD program its takes a commitee decision to make changes of get them out of the program. I think they want to get kids labeled as something because they can get more money in the school by the number of kids in the programs. This is actually true, I read, maybe somewhere on these boards but also from people I deal with on a daily basis that, hypothetically if your child was gifted and their inattentiveness was being mis-diagnosed as ADHD, the schools typically will not do the gifted testing (they dont get money for gifted kids the way they do the ADHD/ADD kids) and if they do then they're going to give you the runaround about it. BUT when it comes to diagnosing kids ADHD they are pretty quick to hit that button. I swear out of 5 people I talked to at work 4 of the 5 have had the school do to them what they are doing to me, its like an epidemic, and that's scary because how many kids out there are being medicated that don't have to be?I have been reading your posts with interest as I am an elementary educator. (I am actually doing some research for a couple of students in my classroom. While doing so, I ran across this site and decided to look into your posts.) From an educator's perspective or at least mine, I am not looking to have children diagnosed with ADD or ADHD. When a child is struggling in my classroom in academic areas, behavior areas, and social or emotional areas, I am concerned. One thing that I want to rule out is ADD/ADHD. I am not able to diagnose this disorder at all. It is a medical diagnosis and I am an educator. I can however suggest that there are some attributes that a child displays. We are told never to mention ADD/ADHD to a parent because of repercussions from families that might be offended by having had a suggestion made along that track. Having a child diagnosed with ADD/ADHD in my classroom is not my intention. It is simply to find out what I can do to better help him/her. If a child is diagnosed, I can look toward interventions to aid that child for success in my classroom. If a child is not diagnosed with ADD/ADHD, then there is an entirely different way of dealing with some of the issues.
So, on behalf of my fellow educators, I hope that you see a different perspective. Most of us are trying to find the right path to walk down to be able to educate your child in the best possible way. Please do not think that we are trying to push that diagnosis (or lack of it) for any other reason than that.
OKay this is probably going to be a long post and I apoligize in advance, okay I am beginning to learn that a lot of schools are putting pressure on parents to diagnose ADD or ADHD when it doesn't exist. Thus is my story/question... My son is 4 and is in a pre-school program through our school district. This program is specificall designed for children who would probably not do well in kindergarten. They have a screening process, my son was screened last year and they said he had scored so high that if their program would have been full he would not have been accepted. I only put him in this program because he needed the social stimulation of other children. Since he joined this program his teacher has said to me that he is always making noises and is go go go (I don't know what she thinks 4 year olds do but....) and sometimes she makes contradictory statements about him being on task (I guess whatever answer suits her that day is the one she gives me) I don't really have this problem at home, yes he is busy at home but its not to a concerning effect. I have workbooks that I do with him and as of right now the pre-k and kindergarten ones are too easy for him. I have him in Math books that are on a first grade level, and he can focus just fine on those. Yesterday she gives me the Coners test so I know exactly what road she wants to go down. I filled it out and gave it back to her, now I'm thinking any answer she gives to suit her is going to sway the results of the test in her favor. I asked her today does she think he has ADD/ADHD and she kind of danced around the question and said "Oh he's on task and he's sharp as a tack (there's the contradictory statement again), but the school psychologst will decide if he needs medication or just an intervention" WTF does that mean?? A simple yes or no on her part to answer the question would have done just fine. I am fighting this tooth and nail because I think this is yet another case of the teacher trying to convince medication because she doesn't want to "deal" with it. He is my child so naturally I am going to be protective of him. I wonder if he is just gifted (hence being in first grade work and only being 4) and he is bored in her classroom and thus acts out. Any advice anyone could give me to handle this would be appreciated. I have spoken with his doctor about this already and she adamantly says he does NOT have ADD/ADHD I am getting a note from her for school now too, but the pressure's on now. I am stessing this probably a lot harder than I should be but I need some guidance as to how to handle this properly. Please help!Oh boy! First of all, the school psychologist cannot decide whether or not your son needs medicine so you can relax about that. He cannot even legally tell you that your son needs meds. He also cannot diagnose ADHD. He can do tests as part of an evaluation which will indicate whether or not your son MAY have ADHD and refer you to your dr or a psychiatrist for a diagnosis.He can do an educational evaluation on your son WITH your written consent only. That would actually be good because if your son is gifted, he is acting out in school due to boredom and the psych can recommend interventions that will enable your son to not be held back until the other kids learn things.
If you allow the school to do an evaluation and are very uncomfortable with their findings and really believe that they didn't do a good eval on your son, you can request an independant evaluation be done and that the school district pay for it. That isn't a decision to make unless you are very sure that they are wrong, as the district has the option of filing for due process (taking you to court) if they don't want to do it. You would then have to prove they were not acting in your son's best reasonable interests.
You can have a private evaluation done on him if you want to and either pay for it yourself or see if your insurance will cover it.
Hmmmmm...this sounds 'very' familiar. (my son is 7 almost 8) and is 'all' boy. Now first of all I'm no Dr. and neither is this child's teacher. YOU know your son better than anyone else. Do you (and be honest with yourself) 'feel' that he is a little on the hyper side? I ask this because our son is 'highly' intelligent. Now if you answer "NO" to the hyper issue ... then YOU know he's not add/adhd. A child without meds/alternative approachs and IS add/adhd finds it very hard to focus in GROUPS. However they do quite well one on one. It does sound like he's bored...but...have you been and just sat and watched? There has to be 'some' reason this teacher felt compeled to give you the Conner's papers...I honestly don't think that teachers WANT a child to be dx with this. (I really don't) besides...if he is add/adhd that doesn't mean that you're going to medicate. BIG NOTE HERE: Your Dr. already told you that he wasn't add/adhd...(just like our's did) so please do yourself a favor and do NOT stress about this. You'll drive yourself crazy. Literally. I know others here will say that you need to have a neuropych to actually dx add/adhd but personally I honestly 'feel' that we parental units really KNOW if our child is normal or not. G'luck and you'll be glad you found this board...however if your son is NOT add/adhd I would never come back here....and the 'only' reason I say this is because one day you'll read something and think...oh..that sounds like my son and then your mind will go into overdrive worrying yourself once again that your son is something that he isn't. God bless you and yours...you sound like a wonderful mom. Kids will be kids...plain and simple. Well in group situtaions he does do well. For example, and this may not be a good one but I'll give it a shot, I have him enrolled in gymnastics classes and tumbling classes. There is a period in the beginning where they have to stretch out and follow the teachers there's directions. They also have to wait in line until the teacher calls them to do whatever it is that they are doing. He has no problem listening and being quiet in these classes and he does wait his turn patiently. I think the teacher at school is just concerned about him making noises because she has said "he just can't help it", but it's not like he does this at home either. The behaviors are different between there and here. My younger brother has ADHD and my mom has watched my son since this began and she remembers vivdly what my brother was like as a child, and says my son shows no symptoms even resembling what he had growing up (yes each child is different), not that my mom is a doctor but she is a nurse so she's medically educated (not as intensly as a doctor would be I know that) I don't know, you're right to tell me I will probably drive myself crazy if I don't let this go and let it take it's course. I just can't help it, I guess it's that mom thing ya know? Like I feel like she's singling my kid out and I don't like it (she hasn't tested any other kids in the class that probably should be because they are far worse behavioral cases than my son is) But the only thing she's giving me to go on is the fact that he makes noises in class, that's all she's said to me, she never says anything else, so then she ran and got the Conners paper, so I'm kind of at a loss there for an answer otherwise. I appreciate you guys responding, I've never encountered this any time before now so it's just a confusing period for me in my life with the whole parenting thing.... A few things leap to mind. First of all, she's not legally educated to diagnose childhood disorders and not everything is caused by ADHD. I'd be leery of a psycologist too as they aren't trained in all childhood disorders and imo school psycologists are even worse than regular ones (and we had terrible luck with even private psycologists). I'm wondering if you son interacts with other kids well. If not, I'd have him see a NeuroPsych to rule anything out, from ADHD to beyond. He may have nothing, but it's always a good idea to check. You put him in a high needs pre-school for a reason. Secondly, you don't ever need to medicate your child and nobody can make you. I would tell the teacher you will deal with it within the medical community and let it go at that. This is out of her area of expertise. But I'd see the NeuroPsych, whether or not I let the teacher know about it. I believe in checking things out. OlderMom38799.7982407407OMG Janna this is soooo for real. I called the doc's office today and asked for a letter from her and the girl that answered the phone at her office says she gets calls daily about this from people that are in my exact position, she also said her nephews went through this with thier schools and they didn't have it either, it's just crazy, that's what I meant with saying that a lot of people are experiencing the whole teacher/psychologist trying to "diagnose" the kids with this. I am watching carefully about what they can and cannot do legally and my hub's uncle is a lawyer and they specialze in education law (I guess that's what it's called) and he said they have to word very carfully what they say to me because they can get into legal trouble if they don't, he said to call him if I encounter any problems. God you guys on this board are so understanding and I appreciate that so much!!He does interact well with other children normally, in school he's running into a problem, but in his gymnastics/tumbling he does fine and play groups with other kids outside of school (meaning ones he has known before school) he does fine, I dunno I read that gifted kids can sometimes have a problem socially too, I dunno, I'm really reaching for an answer on my own lol
I live at the base of the mountain in the country. We're on 4.8 acres of land with no neighbors. We moved here in November.
We CAME from the city. From a teeny tiny 2 bedroom apartment right in town, with LOTS of kids, DIFFERENT KIND of kids, to this.
So, when my wild little 7 year old went to school here with these country bumpkins - well, you can imagine.
I'm certainly no doctor, and I don't know a whole lot about anything other than what circles around my kids and what I've learned from my pdoc and a couple of message boards, but my own personal opinion is ADHD gets thrown around too much. We are not living in the Beaver Cleaver days anymore. The kids now are different then when I (I'm 34 years old) was in school. If I didn't stay in class with my hands in my lap I was getting sent to the principals office to see Mr. Board To The Butt.
Can't do that anymore 
I read OlderMom's post after mine, I think her suggestion is a good one, sly - it can't hurt to have your child seen by a psychiatrist or a neuropsychologist, just in case. BUT - I wouldn't get yourself so stressed out sick over this, nor would I allow this teacher to get under your skin. She's in no position to dx your child, and you can let her know that YOU know that.
(((HUGS)))
janna38799.8033101852
This is really interesting to me.
My 7 year old is a good kid - no diagnosis. He's a boy. He's a 7 year old boy. Need I say more?
His teacher seems to think he's "impulsive". She says "impulsivity runs within ADHD". Well, thank you Ms. Teacher.
I was speaking with my 9 year old's pdoc about this last week. He was telling me how all of a sudden all these little kids are coming to see him because the teachers think they're ADHD. The problem is, half of them aren't.
To me, there is a huge difference between hyperactivity of a normal little kid and the inability to focus, concentrate and show some type of impulse control. My 7 year old is hyper, he likes to run, after 7 hours of school, sitting in a chair, yeah, he's going to be fidgety. What's the big deal? But he can sit and do his homework, play board games, do puzzles, and take turns. He's able to concentrate.
For what it's worth - the school psychologist can't give your child any medication recommendations nor can they give you an accurate dx. They may be able to make a recommendation, but in my opinion, a psychologist's dx is not near as valuable as a psychiatrist. If you get a psychiatrist to say no ADHD, then that's where I'd leave it.
One main reason my Grandsons teacher suggested to my Daughter that she request he be tested was because at the end of second grade he still could not read....plus during class he would get up around his seat and acted like he didn't even realize he was doing it...he also could not focus on his teacher when she was talking to him...even on a one on one....his eyes kept on looking elsewhere even though he was trying to listen(we have seen this ourselves) He would loose his train of thought in mid sentence. So my daughter requested the testing. The state has a series of questions that have to be asked such as delayed talking and other things. Then they had a round table talk with the mother and Spec Ed teachers and school Psychologist...then she tested my Grandson...then all of the paperwork was sent with my Grandson and Daughter to his Dr. I believe he was diagnosed correctly because this year 4 years later he made the honor roll.I can't say like I have had other people say to me that I don't believe ADD/ADHD even exists because my brother is a product of it. He was diagnosed with ADHD at a young age. But I have asked my mom does my son remind her of him at all and she said no. He doesn't have any problem reading at all. He can look at a word and tell you what it is (now I'm not saying he could read like Tolstoy or anything but he can read kid his age books, and not by memorizing them because we rarely read the same book twice.... we own A LOT of books) I dunno I guess I'll probably hear something this week about it, and the sugestion was there that they wanted to possibly medicate him (not verbatim I promise) based on the not so well thought out wording his teacher used by saying "Well this test will give the psychologist an idea if he needs medication or an intervention" Yeah..... I'm starting to calm down about it, but it still pisses me off because I know some kids actually do have this problem but honestly my kid isn't one of them. As a parent and as much involvement I have with him I would know if something wasn't right with him.[QUOTE=slygirrl] I have workbooks that I do with him and as of right now the pre-k and kindergarten ones are too easy for him. I have him in Math books that are on a first grade level, and he can focus just fine on those.[/QUOTE]
Hi Slygirrl. Did someone tell you it was good to do homework with your little guy? He isn't even in school yet.
I think it's a good idea for schools to say, "Something isn't right. I think you should have your child evaluated." I don't think they should diganose and say, "Your child could have ADHD." My daughter was a non-reader in second grade and nobody sees attentional difficulties with her, including us. She is very focused. Her problem is an auditory processing problem. She is now in fourth grade and is in LD half the day. With the extra help, she is now reading at a third grade level, a big leap from when she started. I get upset when schools say "ADHD" and recommend stimulants as too many parents take it seriously. There are a number of reasons children fail in school. It is the school's responsibility (I think) to point out when they notice the child is struggling, but not their place to say why. They just aren't trained for that. If my daughter had been fidgety at all, I'm sure the school would have chalked her reading problem up to ADHD. I'm sure in some cases ADHD is the cause, but not all the time. OlderMom38802.8352430556
[QUOTE=IMac][QUOTE=slygirrl] I have workbooks that I do with him and as of right now the pre-k and kindergarten ones are too easy for him. I have him in Math books that are on a first grade level, and he can focus just fine on those.[/QUOTE]
Hi Slygirrl. Did someone tell you it was good to do homework with your little guy? He isn't even in school yet.
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What is that supposed to mean???
I think your DS may just be bored if he is willing to do higher levels of work and is able to focus.
So my advice is to go with what you personally see, because your agenda is to do the very best for your son. I don't believe the school has the same agenda. I don't think for the most part the schools are bad, but I think their primary agenda is to get funding.
I know in Texas, or at least our school district, they won't even say the letters in a sentence together. I think maybe there was a lawsuit or something at some point. But they are pretty afraid of being perceived as diagnosing a child with ADHD. Your school district is apparently different. However, I don't think any teacher can diagnose him, or a school psychologist either.
Best of luck to you, and don't let the schools push you around. They can't even give kids a tylenol without your permission, so they can't give prescription meds either.
They get homework occasionally in his pre-k class but its silly stuff, he likes learning so I just keep him going by getting these books, I don't just force the stuff down his throat, I have him in athletics too, I just want him to be well-rounded that's why I have him doing them, and really we just work on them when he decides he wants to so it's kind of up to him when he wants to do the work outside of school anyways. He's always been ahead of his age group I kind of want to keep him that way.It's good to hear you aren't having any problems. Take care. [QUOTE=jacquie] I believe he was diagnosed correctly because this year 4 years later he made the honor roll.[/QUOTE]
Jacquie, it's so nice to hear a success story.
[QUOTE=IMac] [QUOTE=jacquie] I believe he was diagnosed correctly because this year 4 years later he made the honor roll.[/QUOTE]
Jacquie, it's so nice to hear a success story.
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YES IT IS!!!!!!! MY DS IS ON THE HONOR ROLL TOO. BUT HIS MENTAL MATURITY IS A BIT BEHIND. HE IS NOT READY FOR ALL THE HOME WORK AND EXTRA RESPONSIBILITY. WE ARE KEEPING HIM IN THE 2ND GRADE NEXT YEAR. HE HAS A SLIGHTLY MODIFIED WORK LOAD, BUT STAYING IN THE 2ND GRADE, HE WILL BE DOING THE SAME WORK AS THE REST OF THE KIDS IN THE 2ND. HE WILL BE OUT OF THE IEP BY THE 6TH OR 7TH GRADE. WHICH IS THE MAIN GOAL. AND TO TOP IT OFF, HE WANTS TO DO THE 2ND GRADE AGAIN, SO HE CAN LEARN HOW TO READ BETTER. HE LOVES HIS TEACHERS. LOL I'LL PROBABLY NEVER HEAR THAT AFTER THE 3RD GRADE. LOL
Loving his current teachers is a big plus. I feel so badly when kids cry because they have to leave a beloved teacher. i do worry about that. he will have the same teacher for two years. and he just loves her. lolHi - my sons have had homework since Kindergarten as well. This way, they slowly increase the amount of homework each year, so that when they hit Middle School they don't go into shock over the amount of homework.
First grade homework usually includes a variety of different things -- a math page or two (which might be measuring, telling time, finding shapes, etc. in addition to adding and subtracting), a fill-in-the-blank story that they have to illustrate / color, spelling homework - writing out the words and making some short sentences using the words, some "buddy" homework where an adult and the child work on a homework paper together, and reading for 15 minutes each night.
My fourth grader (mild ADHD combined types) has had two huge "at home" projects already this year (in addition to regular homework); and spent close to 20 hours work on each project. They were wonderful and earned A +'s so the effort was well worth it -- but if he didn't start with homework in kindergarten, he'd be miserable in fourth grade. Our Fourth graders get about 15 minutes of homework + 20 minutes of reading assigned each night.
cosake
[QUOTE=jacquie]Imac,So far it is a success story.. but we are headed into adolesence...who knows what lies ahead
From the sounds of it, you will have no worries.
Ogram,
My Grandson still take a couple of classes in special ed. He will probably have his IEP all through schools. He is able to do school work because of his meds and the help of the wonderful teachers and a school who believes and takes care to learn about and understand the ADHD child...as well they do with all LD children. My daughter was so lucky to have a school like that so near to them. My Grandson is also behind in his maturity but I think we see that in allot of ADHD children.
We would never keep my Grandson back in school as his self esteem was low enough and to be kept back would have been the worse thing to happen to him. Your son sounds like he did well and I would say you probably made the right decision. The Special Ed Class helped him catch up . He will probably always have to take special ed reading classes or at least tutoring. His IEP states that he can use a spell check for his school work, and a typewriter or computer for his homework...and be given verbal tests if warranted. When he was diagnosed the school told my daughter it would take him 4 to five years to catch up to his class but would probably need the help of special ed for a long time.
Imac,
So far it is a success story.. but we are headed into adolesence...who knows what lies ahead
