My Child's Teacher is Talking About Retention. What Do We Do Now?

It's the time of the year when schools look at student progress and identify children who might need to repeat a grade.  Often they let parents know on the most recent report card or via a form letter.   If you are caught by surprise, it can throw you for a loop.  Here are some things that you can do to make sure you have a complete picture of your child's status, and also make sure that you know how to help.  It is incredibly important in this circumstance that you act positively and proactively.  Discussion about retention at this point in the year doesn't mean it's going to happen for sure, but it does mean there is a situation to be addressed and simultaneously monitored.  For the purposes of this article, I am mostly going to be talking to parents of children in grades K through 3.

1.  If you are caught by surprise, take some time to look at your child's report cards and test data from this year and last year.  Did the school indicate that there were concerns in the past?  Has your child missed many days of school, or often been late?  Has retention been discussed in prior years?  If so, what has the school done to improve your child's rate of success?  What have you done at home?  Gather everything together along with any relative emails or work examples from school, and go over it.  See if you can spot any trends or sudden changes in your child's performance.
2.  Schedule a conference with your child's teacher ASAP.  This is a conference for you to listen to what the teacher has to say, not to be defensive or to make demands.  You will want the answers to the following questions:

• "Why do you think retention is going to be in the best interest of my child?  How do you think it will benefit them?"  You are listening for answers that talk about extra time to mature, extra time to build skills, create better relationships with peers, etc.  You do not want to hear that the decision is being made based on something vague like "school policy."
• "What data is the school using to evaluate whether this is appropriate for my child?"  Make sure that the teacher has multiple data points.  Grades, work product, school screenings and test scores all fit together to paint a complete picture of your child.  One data point alone should never be used as a reason to retain a child.
• "What programs or services will the school be offering my child to help them for the rest of the year?"  Whatever the school is offering, it should fit with the problem that the child is having.  For example, is reading a concern?  The school should be talking about strategies and interventions that specifically address reading. 
• "Does my child need any evaluations from my pediatrician or the school psychologist?"  If the school suspects ADHD, Autism Spectrum Disorder, a learning disability, or any other diagnosable issue, they should be willing to tell you now.  If you hear that they may suspect an issue, but they are vague about what it is or want to wait for an evaluation,  move onto step #3. 

3.  Make an appointment with your pediatrician.  Your pediatrician can look at the possibility of retention and help you rule out (or in) the following things that may be an issue in school:  hearing problems, vision problems, ADHD/ADD, developmental delays, and several other issues.  Bring the data that you have gathered as well as any other data that school has given you.  Request that your pediatrician make copies of all of their findings so that you can add them to your documents.  If your pediatrician feels that further evaluation needs to be done by a psychologist or psychiatrist to rule out specific issues, please follow their advice.  If the pediatrician feels that the school psychologist should do a psychoeducational evaluation, ask them to draft a letter to bring to school.
4.   Once you have gathered all of your data, go back to the school and ask for a specific, written plan covering what the school will do and what you will do between now and the end of the year.  Make sure that it's clear how often the plan will be monitored, and how that monitoring will occur.  Will you meet regularly?  Will you email?  Some schools have something called a Student Support Team (or something similar) that develops interventions based on solid research.  Those interventions are tried for a period of time and then the team meets to determine if they are effective or not.  Some schools write something called a Personal Education Plan (or PEP) for struggling students if they don't suspect they have a disability, but rather just need some intensive effort.  If the school suspects a disability, they will convene a team (which parents are a part of) to determine whether testing is necessary, and then to develop a plan based on the results.  Some schools refer to this as the "EC Process" some call it "Special Education", but both mean the same thing.
5.  Keep up your end of the bargain.  Make sure that your child is completing homework consistently.  Work on improving behavior if that is part of the equation.  Get help from additional providers if you need to.  School Counselors often have resources for extra help that they can give you.  Make sure your child is in school and on time every day.  School cannot be expected to improve your child to their potential if you don't help or ignore advice.
6.  Stay positive.  This is not about you.  It's not.  It's about your child.  For whatever reason, most of which is probably not the result of bad parenting, a poor school, (or any other excuse) your child is struggling right now.  And guess what else? They know it.  Even in Kindergarten.  They can see what other children in the class can do, and how much extra help they need.  More than anything, they need to know that the adults around them can give them the help they need to succeed.  You need to constantly communicate the idea that you are always proud of them for trying and that even though it's hard, you believe that their effort is going to be good enough.  Regardless of what happens.  And PLEASE......  Don't refer to retention as "failing the grade".  It's not failing.  Sometimes it's giving the gift of some extra time.  Something we all need every now and again.

Msg. me on FB at "Pamela Mecca Seymour, LPC" or on twitter @pam327.

My Child Just Started Kindergarten and It's NOT Going Well!

You guys were all ready.  New clothes, supplies, snacks, were all set.  He knew all his numbers and letters, and was even starting to read a few words.  This was gonna be awesome.  A picture in front of the house on the first day and she got on the bus or your dropped him off in the first carpool.  All smiles and expectations.

Then you got the first email from the teacher.

She's not behaving.  He's not finishing his work.  She can't sit still during circle time.  His Kindergarten screening found some possible learning issues.  You aren't sure whom this teacher is writing about, because it's not YOUR kid!  There were no problems in preschool, you know she's smart, she's never hit another child before!  Why does he cry everyday when I drop him off?

First of all, I'm sorry things are not going well.  Like the bride caught outdoors in a cloudburst during the vows, this is a major event that has not lived up to expectations.  It stinks.  If this is your first child, it stinks even worse because this is probably the first time expectation has not matched reality.  Been there, done that.  So did my parents.  So has just about every parent on the planet.  It's not easy, but you will survive.

The issue at hand is trying to figure out what is going on, and taking steps to improve the situation.  Those steps may need to be taken at home, or at school.  Most likely they will need to be taken both places.  Here are some questions to ask yourself:

1.  "What previous experience has my child had with a large group of children?"  How big were the preschool classes?  Did she even go to preschool?  Classrooms with upwards of 20+ children can be noisy places with a lot of activity that may be confusing.  That might be part of the issue.

2.  "How are the expectations for behavior at school the same or different from those at home?"  Does school expect your child to be more self-controlled without several reminders? Does the school have higher expectations for things like sitting still and being kind to others?  If so, and you want your child to meet those expectations at school, you will need to change them at home to match.  Are the expectations lower?  That can cause confusion.  In that case you may need to explain why standards are higher at home.

3.  "How much emphasis have I placed on my child excelling?"  Be honest with yourself.  Are your expectations for behavior or academic achievement too high for your child right now?  Are they too high for any five-year-old?  No matter what you say to your child, they know what your expectations are.  They also know when they aren't meeting them.  Sadly, it's not unusual for a young child who is struggling to tell me that they aren't "doing good."  They will not be able to tell me what that means, but they know they have a problem.

4.  "Is my child ready for Kindergarten?"  Some five-year-old aren't, either academically or socially.  This link can help answer that question: http://school.familyeducation.com/kindergarten/school-readiness/38491.html.  Like every other aspect of school, Kindergarten has changed dramatically in the last few decades.  Teachers expect children to come in the first day ready to learn.  School can be stressful for a child who is not ready, and their school career begins on a negative note.  It is OK to give them the gift of an extra year.

So now you have answered all of those questions, and there still doesn't seem to be any reason why your child is having difficulty.  Here is what you should now ask of the school:

• If your child is having behavior issues you should request a meeting with the teacher and the principal as soon as possible.  At that meeting you should request an observation, and ask what will happen long term.  You should also request that the school provides some sort of brief daily behavior report via paper, text or email. That way you are hearing about good days and minor issues as well as serious ones.  Your school counselor should meet with your child to see if they can help. The counselor can also see if you need some extra professional help outside of school.
• If your child seems anxious, you should ask to meet with the teacher to see if they have suggestions. They might have observed situations that seem to trigger the anxiety. When separation is an issue, the teacher might have suggestions on how to improve the transition. If the anxiety doesn't not start to ease off after the first few weeks of school, or seems to get worse, you should also consult the school counselor.
• If your child is having trouble managing the academic material, your first step is to request a meeting with the teacher.  Even a child who can write numbers and words at home may still have a learning issue that a parent cannot see.  Most schools do some sort of screening for incoming Kindergarten students.  You should let the teacher know in advance that you would like to review that screening along with seeing examples of you child's work.  If the data provided seems to indicate that your child is having difficulty, you should ask if the school has a student support team or student assistance team.  This process usually provides a child with research-based strategies to improve learning.

    Often children are having difficulty in more than one of these areas.  For example, anxiety can contribute to poor academic performance.  Likewise, a child who feels frustrated with academics can act out.  It's important to make sure that your meetings with school personnel take all issues and factors into account.  School personnel need to collect the correct data in all areas. That data must present the most complete picture of what is happening with the child.

Now that we have spoken about what you should request from the school, here are some things that you need to do:

1. Take a breath.  I will guarantee you that your child is not the only one in a group of 25 that is having difficulty.  This bump in the road, as much as it stinks, does not mean you are a bad parent.  It does mean you have to adjust your expectations for this school year.  With your consistent effort, things will get better.


2.  Do not refer to the child as "bad".  The behavior is inappropriate, not the child.  Children who see themselves as "bad" have a very hard time finding incentive or the possibility to change.  Please do not do this.  Period.

3.  Listen to your child, then check with the teacher or principal.   Five-year-olds love attention.  They figure out pretty quickly how to tell a story that will give them just that - whether it's telling Mom that they are bullied, or telling the teacher that they didn't eat breakfast. (And they tell us all sorts of interesting things........)  Sometimes they are not lying deliberately.  They have a fuzzy idea of the difference between fantasy and reality.  They also have a fuzzy idea of time. They can combine something that happened in the morning with something that happened in the afternoon into one event.  This to say that as a parent you have to trust, but verify.  BTW, even if they have an 8th grade vocabulary, they still have a fuzzy sense of reality and time.  It's kind-of like even though they have an 8th grade vocabulary, they are still only 3 feet tall.  So please do not mistake advanced speech for advanced development.  They are two different things.

4.  Reward positive behavior.  Yep, deliberately kicking a classmate should have a negative consequence at home.  Those of us at school actually count on that.  I don't care whether the child was provoked or not.  On the other hand, disrupting circle time maybe doesn't have a consequence, but sitting still has a reward.  "You did your job well today, so you get to take a walk with Mom or Dad" or extra LEGO time, etc.  Research has demonstrated time and time again that rewarding positive behavior has more of an effect than punishing negative behavior.  This tends to be true when the negative behavior is not too serious.  Behaviors best managed through positive reinforcement include disrupting or distracting others, not obeying certain rules, or not finishing schoolwork.

So Mom and Dad (or Grandma and Grandpa), with your consistent help, things will gradually get better.  Please do not wait for the situation to go away with time.  It might, but an attitude toward school, one that is not positive, may be forged in the meantime.  I have a friend who still remembers being sent home from Kindergarten on the first day because he fell off the jungle gym.  That's probably not exactly what happened, but the memory is "I screwed up on the first day of school and had to come back the next year."  His folks probably felt the same way, which is why they never said anything to him about it.  This memory is now 45 years old.  Partner with your school and make some positive things happen.  Email/msg/tweet me if you need help.  FB - Pamela Mecca Seymour, LPC, Twitter @pam327.

Why getting to school on time is really important.

This morning I spent some time in a classroom while their teacher was finishing a meeting.  The majority of children were there right on time and ready to begin.  The teacher assistant greeted the children at the door and gave them a warm-up work to do until it was time for morning meeting.  It was a 5-10 minute activity.

Three children arrived late and did not have time to start the activity before being called to the rug.  One child was visibly anxious about this and came to me saying, “I haven’t started tracing my numbers yet!”  I assured her that it would be all right and that she would have time to finish the activity later. But as she watched the other children putting their work in the completion basket, the look on her face told me she remained unconvinced.  I wondered how well the child was able to hear what the adult was saying in morning meeting. She did not raise her hand at all.  I wondered if she was still thinking about that worksheet. 

We all know how hard it is to “catchup” during the day when we start behind.  I hope the rest of her day is better.

Until I spent time in classrooms early in the morning, I did not appreciate how late arrival can mess up a child’s day. It can also mess up the classroom.  This particular morning there were no children that came in and interrupted morning meeting, but I know that often happens in other rooms.  Coming in late puts the “late arrivee” on the spot for anything they might have missed.  Moreover, everyone's attention diverts to the person putting up their water bottle, lunch, etc.  Children are missing what the teacher is saying.  And what she is saying first thing in the morning is pretty important.  If it’s just one child, the teacher can check in with the group and make sure everyone got everything.  But if it happens four times over 10-15 minutes, it becomes difficult to regroup.  Everyone ends up getting pretty frustrated.

I’m not talking to the parent that is late to school once a quarter.  I’m talking to the folks that are late more than once a week.  Now before you get all irritated with me,  I will tell you that I used to be chronically late.  I misjudge the time and try to stuff too much activity into the period right before I have to leave to go places.  The only reason my kids were at school on time was because I worked in the front office and had to be in the building early in the day.  Most important, I didn’t think it was a big deal to be 15-20 minutes late all the time.  Finally, a good friend of mine left me behind one day when I didn't meet her to carpool because I was 15 minutes late yet again.  She was fed-up.  The day after that, another good friend and psychologist told me that chronic lateness is just passive aggressive behavior towards the person you are holding up.  I guess that’s why it feels so rude.

I can’t tell you that I was never late after that, but I decided that being on time was going to be important.  I just realized I wanted to give people more respect, and I wanted to stop arriving at places feeling rushed and scattered. 

Isn’t that something you want to teach your child?

It's Not Just Food and Sleep.

Stressed out kids.  Seems I've been reading a lot about this lately.  (see The Epidemic of Stressed Parents Raising Stressed Kids - Huff Post )  I see it all around me at school and in private practice - anxiety, depression, ADHD, OCD, etc.  According to this Huff Post article, one out of five children suffers from a diagnosable mental health disorder.  That’s five or six children in your child’s classroom. Maybe your child is one of them.  So you might be calling me for help.

If you do call me, you will soon learn that one of my favorite mottos about problems that kids and families face is that everything is overdetermined .  That means that there is more than one factor that causes an outcome.  Conversely, it often takes more than one intervention to change that outcome.  Stress in families is overdetermined. We talk a lot about various things kids should and shouldn’t eat.  We talk about exercise and time outside.  We talk about sleep.  We talk about reduced screen time.  (see TIME - America’s Teens Outscore Adults On Stress ) All of those things are good to consider.  However, there is not one specific thing that is going to be the “silver bullet” for reducing stress, or ADHD, or depression, or anxiety.  That being said; there are some other things I think we ought to think about adding to the mix.

• Technology – The amount of time children and teens spend online is discussed a great deal.  I think there are other aspects to technology that need to be considered, specifically about school.  My children graduated from high school in June 2011.  At that time, a few teachers were asking for assignments to be turned in online, and some were posting assignments on websites.  In three short years, I have watched a revolution take place.  Now assignments are given and turned in online, and grades and countless other activities related to school live on the web also.  There are two stressful aspects to this revolution that I think schools have not fully considered.  One is that there are still families who don’t have the hardware needed to interface with all of these technological activities.  I am working with a young lady whose school does a great deal online.  The sole computer at her house is a 1998 iMac on a cable modem.  Some sites will not even load reliably on her machine.  Her parents have limited resources, and she is embarrassed to say anything to her teachers.  I also wonder what happens to children when the cable is disconnected because the bill hasn’t been paid or because there isn’t service where they live.  I think this may cause stress for more people than we think it does.  Another technological issue occurs for children who do not have technologically savvy parents.   What happens when the network goes down, a post on Edmodo is due, and neither the parent or a child have the technological know-how to fix the problem?  How many times has there been stress in your house because homework is due, and the technology is “down”?  Don’t get me wrong.  I LOVE educational technology.  For many applications, it’s a wonderful thing.  I just think we need to be mindful of the consequences of relying on it, and then penalizing children when problems arise that are out of their control.

• Common Core and Standardization – With the technological revolution we also have a curricular and pedagogical revolution happening.  Last week I met with a young man in 7th grade.  In one week in his social studies class they had covered the end of WWI and the Great Depression.  Monday and Tuesday on the first topic, and Wednesday and Thursday on the second.  This young man is pretty bright, so we always start with what he remembers and we build from there.  When I asked him what he knew about those topics, the answer I got was, “The Treaty of Versailles caused the Great Depression, so Franklin Roosevelt had to fight Hitler even though he didn’t want to.  Oh, and the stock market crashed right after the war.”  Granted he’s got ADHD and tends to miss things, but let me be clear.  The material covered 1918 and 1919, skipped to 1929 and ended at 1939.  In four days.  He had no context.  You should have seen the look on his face when he realized he was missing an entire decade in the timeline.  Like I said, he’s pretty bright, but this is not the first time he’s mixed two completely different concepts together that had been introduced in a short span of time.  I am not laying this at the feet of his teachers.  They are expected to cover certain pieces of material (standards, goals?) on a certain schedule.  As we work harder and harder in schools to cover more and more material in ever-shorter periods of time, we are confusing children.  This is not rigor.  I was a fan of Common Core when it was first introduced, but if this is going to be the result, no way.  Even more, for children that have organizational difficulties, the pace and demands of keeping up with all of this can be a hurdle too big to overcome.  Talk about stress! If your child brings home math homework in the 2nd grade and the question is - “Look at the following numbers and circle the one that is the median. 208, 246, 273, 264, 223, and 210” — could you help them?  Do you know what the median is?  (I learned when I took statistics in graduate school.  Not everyone has taken statistics.) Does the school expect you to?  If the answer to the first question is no, and the second is yes, you need to let someone know.  Parents need to be engaged in this and let the school and district know when their children have had enough.  Parents also need to start asking schools to teach specific strategies for different ways of planning work and learning material.  Finding the ways that work best for your child to study, finish homework and plan and complete projects are life skills that everyone needs to learn to keep stress under control. 

• Stuff – This is not just materialism.  It’s about the complications that stuff adds to our lives.  I do a lot of home visits.  I see bedrooms filled with stuff.  Not just toys, but clothes, shoes, cosmetics, stuffed animals, books and all kinds of ephemera.  Stuff makes life complicated for kids.  It’s complicated to figure out what to do first.  It’s complicated to figure out what to wear.  It’s complicated to figure out where to find anything.  It’s certainly complicated to figure out how to keep it organized and neat.  It’s plain old complicated just to look at everything!  All of that causes stress.  If your child doesn’t want to part with things, why not just put the majority of it away?  It can be cycled and re-cycled back into the room.  Take the clothing pile down to what they need to wear in a week.  If something rips, gets stained, or just looks worn, replace it with something from the stash.  In my mind, a stress-free room looks, well, empty.

• Loneliness – Think back to your childhood and your best friendships.  How did they start?  Many times they started at school, other times in the neighborhood.  Think about your earliest memories with those friends.  Did your parents always like those children? What do you remember doing with them that brought you close and can still make you smile? Chances are it was on the playground at school, or in someone’s yard, or even in someone’s house.  Most likely it was an unstructured activity without a hovering adult or maybe without an adult at all.  Maybe it was just sitting around doing nothing at all.  Now think about your own children.  Do they have the same types of activities with other children?  They probably don’t have them at school for more than 30 minutes, so don’t count on that.  Do they have them in the neighborhood?  Why not? Close relationships, the kind that grow closeness and trust, the kind where you can share secrets, the kind that build lasting bonds, do not develop at karate and ballet class.  They also don’t develop during play dates when Mom picks (or influences the choice of) the guest.  They develop through spontaneous, unstructured activities when kids can do what they want – with whom they want.  (Within reason, of course)  I talk to many children who do not have those opportunities.  They are lonely.  A child does not have to spend lots of time alone to be lonely.  A child who does spend time alone may not necessarily be lonely.  It’s not the quantity of the relationships; it’s the quality of the relationships. 

What do you see here that might be affecting your child?  How do you think you might be able to change?  I would be interested in hearing your perspective.  Leave a comment here, on my FB page at Pamela Mecca Seymour, LPC or tweet @pam327.
Thanks!

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