Struggling hard...little experiment time
Where do you turn when your child is struggling so hard in school that when you ask them to try as hard as they can...they begin to tear up and say "I am trying my best". What can be done when the child expresses that the teacher is going too fast for them to understand because instead of trying to help them understand more new stuff is thrown at them when they have yet to get the first thing being taught? Kindergarten...I will say that I was greatful that the school took the initiative to help...but this year forgotten left to fail. This year not one good grade has come home yet. Even trying to contact the teacher to see where she was struggling the most did not help any because instead of considering what I had to say.....the message I got back made it sound like I don't do anything with her at home and just send her to school with a "Good luck!".
When she brought home four failing grades in a row and acted confused every time, we do homework...that led to me wondering if she just wasn't understanding or if she simply isn't paying attention. Last year, I know that she had a very hard time, but it was also her first time in school, so she did summer school in order to try to help a bit. Now, this year it seems to be the same all over again. I know that only the first report card has come, but I am worried that she is going to fail again. It could be different in the school that she is in, but I am desperate to keep her out of ESE (special needs classes). I moved down here High School year and my brother was in those classes. At the beginning of the year he had believed that he could be anything and would name off a million things he wanted to be when he grew up...by the end of that school year things changed. He went from believing that he can do everything just like everyone else...to saying "I don't know, what can I be...I'm retarded" (medically diagnosed slight mental retardation). I don't want that for my bright little girl, to have her spirits crushed would be horrible.
There is several possibilities as to why she is having such a hard time and one of those is brain damage. I don't even want to think of that being the case but with her history it is possible. See, when she was only two, she was in daycare and kept getting double ear infections. That led to her being put on amoxicillin multiple times in order to try to get rid of it but it made her sick. Each time that I brought up to the doctors that I believed it was hurting her, they acted as if I was stupid because I am not a doctor. Telling me that "an antibiotic doesn't do that, she has to take it". It would give her extreme diarrhea, nausea, vomiting and fever...eventually it led to a grand mal seizure. Since a fever was present they chalked it off as a febrile seizure and having never heard of it I accepted that answer. Then another one hit when she was having breakfast with her grandma and I didn't find out until after I got off work...took her to the hospital and they said it again.
It wasn't until the night that our friends were moving away that it happened again. My husband and our friends had gone to go get drinks and some snacks for the kids and that left me sitting on the couch watching a movie with my little people. Everything was fine, my oldest was sprawled across the couch and my daughter was happily sitting beside me enjoying our movie time. When they got back, just as our friend opened the door...she suddenly fell backwards her arms and hands becoming T-rex arms, fingers locked bent, her little brown eyes rolled into the back of her head, gasping for air as if she couldn't breathe as her entire tiny body convulsed. Our friend loudly exclaimed "OH MY GOD GET IN HERE NOW IT'S ALI!" Never having seen a seizure, her father wanted to pick her up and as I cried counting, I informed him the worst thing that we could do for her in that moment was move her...we needed to wait. When she came to, she instantly clung to me crying as I rubbed her back and got dressed while holding her. Our friend rushed her and I to the hospital. When I explained to the doctor that it was now the third possibly fourth time that we had been to the hospital he immediately said that he was transferring us after making sure that she was okay to go.
They sent us to the children's hospital and took us straight to a room hooking her to machines. Nothing else could be done until later because it was almost two in the morning when we arrived. I also happened to be pregnant with my youngest at the time with barely two months left before my due date. When they ran an extended EEG test on her...it resulted in ten grand mal seizures in under twenty-four hours. The next day when she tried to eat, she couldn't even feed herself which made her sad...she began to cry harder when I began feeding her and it would just drool out of her mouth. She couldn't hold eye contact, barely able to hold her head up. My usually bright, happy little girl...became a zombie before my eyes. Her usual huge smile that could light up a room was gone and all she wanted to do was be held and sleep on me. It was days before she began to come back but then she had a new battle...adjusting to a medication given at the highest dose possible for her age and size. The medicine gave her mood swings and stole her appetite away to where I was begging and pleading for her to eat even her most favorite foods...but it stopped the seizures in their tracks and I was afraid to try anything different because it worked.
She was on that medication for three years and was just coming off it when she began kindergarten. I didn't expect straight A's or anything like that...but I didn't expect for her to fail either with how smart she is. In kindergarten though, they realized that she was struggling and without having to do anything they provided the little extra help that she needed. Before the end of the year, they even scheduled a meeting with me (very much appreciated) and when I spoke to the teacher, she actually listened to what I was saying. I mentioned what she went through and told them that she is actually stupid smart if given the chance to show it. She has issues with being still for long periods and in a classroom, you can't really get up to move around or be fidgeting with things. That is when the teacher excitedly told me that she had decided to try testing her a little differently, it being the last test of the year and having had several conversations with me she took my advice...instead of trying to make her sit there and just answer her questions, the teacher decided to have her answer a handful of questions and then do something involving moving. The teacher even got teary eyed as she told me that when she graded her test she had started crying...she passed with a 98%, resulting in the only test that she scored above a 50%.
With doing some research I discovered that there is a possibility that the seizures had an effect on the learning center of her brain. On the other end of that she could simply have ADHD, which is hard to get an accurate diagnosis for a female because a lot of times it is simply chalked up to being a girl. Of course, my first course of action was to do even further research. This led to me spending endless hours researching different things that can impact learning and different ways to teach people with various issues. I took quite a few notes in doing my search and so far most of the options don't seem to be helping much. Keeping in mind that this could just be an age thing as well, I came across an interesting concept that I spent some time looking into. The brain is something that we will probably never fully understand but I read that within a certain amount of time (I'm a tad tired but I think it was two hours) of falling asleep.....your brain can actually learn. From my understanding, it becomes a subconscious memory.
If we truly can learn in our sleep...could that help someone that is having problems in learning? It didn't really say much to that matter, but it did not say it wasn't a possibility either. Now for the experiment part that I mentioned...if every night a person (child) listens to something that they are really struggling with, will that person actually learn the information? Flash cards, having her repeat like a parrot, tracing, coloring page and sibling assistance isn't really getting us anywhere. Tomorrow, she has a BIG TEST on all of her sight words! For someone that doesn't even have the first group of words down...having to do all of them at once is almost impossible. Since we are just starting this, I am not expecting a major success right away. I know that she will likely not pass her test tomorrow, but I am hoping that she will at least get some of them correct. Since her dad works at night, a relative is in her room and I have insomnia anyways I had her come out and sleep with me. Since 11:30 pm I have been playing Learn to Read/Sight Word by Mister B...so going on four hours...I have been cycling his sight words videos on YouTube with a Bluetooth speaker near her (volume down of course because not trying to wake her, trying to help her).
We still have been doing her flash cards I made, through the school week with the weekends being relax days. Of course, I am changing that as well to 7 days a week of learning (just haven't figured out exactly how I am going to do that with me working from home, taking care of the house and of course the distractions of being home with siblings to play with). Once I'm able I even have found little workbook type things where the letters/number are indented into the page to help with handwriting. I've got to find my other papers again (they are in one place or the other lol so they are not lost) but I got a purple binder that I am going to be using for her. In the binder I am putting her medical papers from when she was diagnosed with epilepsy (thankfully now seizure free!), progress testing scores (they do a test to see if kids are at grade level in the beginning of the year and the end I think), some of her classwork & tests and since I am doing this experiment plus everything else I plan to fully track this. I am going to write down dates, length of time and specific videos played each night...I also intend to create little "tests" for her to take with me. I am also thinking that a somewhat secluded study area might be necessary but of course I'll have to make it her so that she doesn't think of this as a punishment.
