My child was fine all the way through primary school. Her teachers always said she was doing well and they had no concerns, she was just a bit quiet and didn’t put her hand up very often. Now she’s in Year 8 and can’t keep up. She’s in the bottom sets and doesn’t understand her homework. Her form tutor thinks she has learning difficulties. Why has this suddenly changed?

Sometimes children do have underlying learning needs that are missed in school. This tends to happen more often with quiet children who don’t draw attention to themselves, or with children who ‘act out’ and are noticed for their behaviour choices rather than their learning. However, there are other things that could be happening as well.

Secondary school has a lot more demands than primary school. In primary school, children tend to stay in one room with one or two teachers and the same classmates for every lesson. A child who felt settled and safe in primary school may have been able to learn in that environment but may now be struggling in the secondary school environment and not able to focus or concentrate. The transition from primary school to secondary school is also a massive change in a child’s life. Secondary school life involves:

• More independence, e.g. remembering the right books and equipment, reading a timetable to work out where you should be and when, and navigating around the school
• Lots of sensory input, e.g. busy, noisy corridors, bells to signal the start and end of lessons, usually far more children making it noisier and busier in general, smells of different deodorants and perfumes, stricter uniform often with a tie and blazer
• Greater social expectations, e.g. being expected to make new friends and to manage difficult social situations such as fall-outs and the need for negotiation and compromise, as well as changing friendship styles and expectations in teenage years (e.g. friends wanting to just sit and chat rather than play games)
• A more abstract curriculum, e.g. being expected to recognise and understand people’s emotions and intentions in English, and to see things from different points of view in history
• Far more change than primary school, e.g. having different teachers for each lesson who have different approaches and expectations, moving between different classrooms, sitting in different places around the room, and lessons being covered by unknown cover or supply teachers

Many neurodivergent children (and adults) have an uneven (or ‘spiky’) learning profile. This means some skills are stronger than other skills. They may be working at the same level as their classmates in one or two areas, really skilled in another area, and find other areas of learning much harder. If their areas of strength fit with the things valued by the school curriculum, teachers can expect them to perform at this level in all areas, leading to frustration for everybody. Skill levels can also vary from day to day depending on other factors such as sensory overwhelm.

Once a child feels that they’re doing badly or can’t keep up, it is easy for this to become a self-fulfilling prophecy as they become less motivated, more anxious, and less able to focus and concentrate.

Neurodivergence often goes alongside differences in executive skills development. These are things like planning, organising, processing information, and holding information in your memory while you do something with it (e.g. remembering a phone number long enough to dial it, or remembering a spelling long enough to write it down). The executive skill demand of the school curriculum increases rapidly in secondary school. Children with difficulties in these skills may fall behind quickly, not because of underlying difficulties with learning, but because they don’t have the same level of executive skills as their classmates and so can’t work successfully in the same way – they need a different approach and the right support.

My teenager has just had a cognitive assessment and the test says that they have a ‘spiky profile’. What does this mean for them?

A cognitive assessment will usually tell you several different things about your child’s learning and cognitive development. The usual assessments  – the Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children – Fifth Edition and the British Ability Scales- Third Edition, provide results which usually look at your young person’s general overall cognitive ability or ‘intellectual functioning’. The test works by comparing your child’s performance with the performance of a large group of children or young people of their same age.

These tests use an overall ability number to summarise a child or young person’s performance. This number can be used to compare the child’s performance with other young people of their age and to see where they fall in comparison to the ‘general population’. It’s very important however to remember that each test of a snapshot in time of the child’s performance and this can be affected by many of the factors we described above.

Also… there are lots of different components of a child’s cognitive abilities which make up their overall ability. Many children and young people, especially those with Neurodivergent needs, perform at different levels on different kinds of learning tasks. The picture below is used to look at how a child performs on different tasks. As you can see the picture shows different levels. The different scores make up what is called a ‘profile’ of cognitive or learning tasks.

(Wechsler Intelligence Test for Children – Fifth Edition)

When a young person has different levels of performance in some areas-high in some and lower in others- this shows as a ‘spiky profile’ in pictures like the one above.

For children and young people with very varied or different profiles, it can mean that their learning progresses and develops in different areas at different rates. For example, some young people may find visual tasks much easier than those involving words and verbal reasoning, and other young people may find the opposite. There are also variations in how individual young people might be able to hold information on mind (working memory) and the speed with which children and young people process information. Some young people may find the understanding of words easy but find it really hard to process them quickly in order to solve a problem for instance.

Support for learning when a child or young person has big differences in their ‘profile’ of learning will need to reflect how we can build on their strengths to help them manage their difficulties or needs. For example, using visual strategies to present information if this is a strength area for a young person, to support their learning of words if this is more difficult for them.

It is also really important than people who support a young person are aware of these differences because sometimes being really good in one area of learning can make others think that you can manage that level of performance in all areas. If this is not the case for a young person, it can lead to over- or under-estimations of their abilities in different areas. The young person needs all around them supporting them in their learning and cognitive development to know about how they perform and how they would best be supported.

I have been told my child has a Learning Disability – what does this mean?

Learning Disability or Intellectual Disability: Learning disability is a term used in the UK which is internationally now recognised as ‘Intellectual Disability’. These terms mean the same thing and refer to children and young people (or adults) who have significant difficulties in two main areas of their learning;

1.their intellectual or cognitive ability and functioning (‘learning needs’) and

2. their learning and their use of everyday adaptive living skills – this includes self-care, dressing, toileting, being able to access school or activities, social skills and using transport amongst many other everyday skills.

A child or young person would be given a diagnosis of Learning Disability if they have difficulties of  significant level of severity in the areas above before they are aged 18 years. This is likely to mean that they will need support to assist their learning of both new educational learning as well as their learning of every day living skills. They may need adaptations to the ways in which they are taught, supported and guided through childhood and into their adult life. The extent to which a child requires support will be very individual to each child or young person.

My child scored low on a cognitive assessment, does this mean they have to go to a special school?

Most children have their needs met in their local mainstream schools. Teachers are skilled at teaching and supporting children with a wide range of needs and abilities. Most children’s needs can be met within the school’s resources – this is known as the Graduated Response at SEN Support level. If the school has noticed that your child needs some extra help, they may have put things in place like an IEP (individual education plan) or APDR (assess, plan, do, review) cycles. You should be invited to talk about these plans and what’s in them, and to be part of the review process. If you feel your child has needs that the school hasn’t noticed, or if you’re not happy about or not sure about the support your child is receiving in school, ask to talk to your child’s class teacher / form tutor and/or the school’s SENCO (Special Educational Needs Coordinator).

If your child’s school feels your child needs extra help or support and they can’t provide all of this help through their school resources within SEN Support, they might suggest applying for an EHC (Education, Health and Care) needs assessment. This is a detailed assessment to find out what a child or young person’s special educational needs are. It will explain the support they may need to learn, progress and achieve. This assessment might lead to an EHC (Education, Health and Care) Plan being put in place. This is a legal document that tells schools what they need to do to support your child, and it often brings the school some extra funding so they can provide that support.

The majority of children with an EHC plan are taught in mainstream schools. Some children with an EHC Plan go to a special school. This is usually children with the most complex needs. However, even if your child has very complex needs, you can still ask for them to attend a mainstream school instead if this is what you would prefer.

I have been told I am having a cognitive assessment. What will it feel like, do I have to do it, how will it help me, do I have to revise? Can I have someone there with me? Can I ask questions during the assessment? Will my usual supports and reasonable adjustments will be available throughout e.g. enlarged text? How long does the assessment take? How long before I hear about the assessment outcome? Will I know what the tasks are in advance? Where will the assessment take place?

Being asked to do an assessment can make you feel anxious. This is normal and other children feel this way too. You might think it will be like an exam or other type of test at school but it’s not really like that. Some children enjoy the assessment as it can be quite fun, especially if you like puzzles and word and number games. You can do the assessment somewhere you feel most comfortable, even at home. You do not need to revise for the assessment. If you’re asked to do a cognitive assessment and don’t want to you can say no. If you would like someone to sit in with you like your parent or carer that is fine. They may be asked not to answer for you though.

The assessment can help the adults supporting you to understand more about the way you think and learn. From the assessment the Psychologist will know how best to help you learn and will write this in a report. Your parents, carers and teachers will then know how to help you achieve your goals whether this is at school, in hobbies or socialising with friends. When you go to the assessment the Psychologist will help you feel relaxed before you start. They will explain clearly what you must do and can sometimes repeat questions if you don’t understand them. The assessment usually lasts about an hour or maybe less, because it’s hard for children to concentrate for too long. The Psychologist will let you know that you can stop the assessment at any point if you don’t want to continue or are feeling too tired.  If the assessment isn’t finished in one session, you will be asked to come back to finish it at another time.  Reasonable adjustments can be made to help you with the process of doing the assessment. The tasks won’t usually be talked about before you do the test as this is part of what is being looked at to understand how you think and learn – how you find it doing different tasks without a lot of preparation.