Oh boy! Here we go...

So, April 20th I sounded so full of excitement and hope and promise for figuring all this stuff out with Will. It was not to be.

He was given the CELF-4 (can't recall at the moment what that stands for!). He scored a 22 on it and the criterion for a child his age is 18. Great. He did great. Well, to be truthful, he did not do great, but he beat the criterion and therefore did not qualify for anything else from the Speech and Language department at his school.

BACK TO SQUARE ONE, AGAIN!

What makes matters worse is Mrs. C, his teacher, never even followed up with us about it. Nope. And she had ample opportunity to. The last day of school she gave me a hug and told me that if I wanted her to speak to his teachers in 5th grade she would be more than happy to. Great.

So, school ended. Will received a Personal Achievement Award for getting all A's and B's all school year. Great.

I was thrilled and proud of him for receiving that award. But, it just covers up all of his struggles. Once again I feel that he is just falling through the cracks.

So, summer came and now summer is soon going. It is August. I finally, FINALLY, contacted The Affinity Center, which does psychoeducational testing and therapy and treatment. We meet with a psychologist on Monday. Chris, Will and I. I spoke to her on the phone for almost an hour last week and I am excited to meet her and have her meet Will and get this ball rolling.

However, I think our first obstacle to deal with is going to be his anxiety. He is very worried about going to 5th grade. A new school. New teachers, new schedule. New everything. His mantra lately is that he hates school and is very stressed about it. His words. Great.

So, it may be that Will goes in for a session or two with Chris (Dr. Mayhall) before school starts and before we do any testing. We need some strategies to help him deal with the anxiety of the new school.

Then, we will hopefully move into testing. I have been doing lots of reading this summer. Some great books, that I will reference a little bit later. I have also just in the last couple of days been research Executive Function Deficits and believe I have hit the jackpot. Much of what I read describes Will and his issues.

So, I hope to bring that up at our meeting on Monday. I want her to look into that as a possiblity.

Any hoo. Just wanted to update and I plan to do a lot more updating as we get into the nitty gritty of figuring all of this out, once and for all!

FINALLY!!!!!

Wow, finally, we are getting somewhere.

I have not posted in months. Not sure why. I guess Will was kind of getting by. Still very inconsistent, though. I've had talks with his teachers and whatnot, but he was getting by. Sort of the story of his last two years of school, really.

Well, this week is changing everything and I couldn't be more excited! Will had a science test last week, on weather. We studied and studied for it. He knew his information. He enjoyed learning this stuff. Cumulus clouds. Cumulonimbus clouds. Barometers. Cold fronts. He took the test on Wednesday and brought it home on Friday.

He got an F.

Not possible I said. I looked through the questions he missed. No way should he have missed them. NO WAY!!!!! He knew all those answers. I made him go over it with me, completely against his will. He did not want to look at it, he didn't care that he got an F, he told me grades don't matter anyway, etc... But, I made him. He knew the right answers. He knew them. We read the questions together. In almost every single case he missed a part of the question and therefore gave the wrong answer. I was sooooo frustrated!

So, I sent an email to Mrs. C, his teacher. I expressed my frustration with this test and his test taking in general. It always seems that he can do the assignments and homework and projects just fine, but when it comes to be tested, on any subject, he fails miserably. Whether it is math, science, reading, social studies. He has trouble taking the tests.

Mrs. C emailed me back and I just wasn't satisfied with it. So I responded to her email and she ended up calling me. We had a great conversation about Will and all of this. We have actually had two phone conversations now and FINALLY... they are going to do some testing. I at last feel a little validated. Momma's instinct! Now, the testing could still show nothing is going on, but I just have a feeling it will.

No more falling through the cracks for Will. No more just getting by. Maybe we will get some answers. Even if the answers are that there is not a problem and he just needs some good study skills developed or whatever. At least we will have ruled some things out!

Hallelujah!!! I am so, so happy!