Let me start by saying I am married 2 yrs now, I have a 7 yr old boy from a previous relationship. My son had been living with my mother(his grandmother) in a township before, so I decided to take him to come and live with me . I then registered him in a nice private preschool in a white suburb near by where we live, and he was accepted .I also must mention that my son could not speak a word of English before this but I had hoped that he would learn at the school.

Problems started within the first parent meeting, when teacher complained that he speaks "funny" , he does not want to participate in any class activities including music class, he has a short concentration span, and he does not talk or play with other children during playtime. I said to the teacher that maybe he needs time to adjust and that he is new at the school so he might be shy at first.
Within about 3 months at the school, teacher and principal called a meeting saying that he has not improved and he definetely has learning problems and more and that he needs to see a local Educational psychologist immediately. We could not afford this but we sacrificed and took him to this Psychologist. She assesed him and made a report that he has Autistic tendencies and he shuts down and goes into his own world . and his world must be "confusing "for him as his mother is in a mixed race marriage.

The psychologist then recommended that we take him to a neurologist to check him properly. I was horrified and depressed, from knowing that you have a perfectly normal , healthy boy to being told that he might not be normal after all is quite scary for a mother. Neurologist checked Simphiwe and said that she could not tell of any problem, she suggested that he goes for an MRI and EEG to rule out any Autism or Epilepsy and other mental disabilities.
Neurologist informed us that results came out saying everything is normal and there is NO mental disabilities. The neurologist suggested we go to see the Child psychiatry and Therapeutic learning centre.

Meanwhile at school we were going to countless meetings, with the principal and the teacher complaining and putting us under pressure , that we take a facilitator who must sit with him in class daily for up to 4 hrs . We told the school that we cannot afford this as the facilitator charges R40 for each hour she sits with him. We told the school that we would like to wait for the outcome of the Child Psychiatry centre, before we make any decision.
The principal then pushed on saying that he is already lagging behind other children and that he also needs other therapies as well. The neurologist had made a recommendation that Simphiwe is not ready for grade 1 and that it would be best for him if he stay another year in grade R.
We were not sure about this cause at home we had a perfectly normal and curious boy , who likes his bedtime stories. We thought it over and over and made a hard decision to let him repeat grade R again just to give him more time to adjust. It was the hardest decision of my life.

The Psychiatrist suggested they do another Psychometric test on Simphiwe as the first one was unfair on him as he was new at the school and could not really speak English. So Simphiwe was assesed twice by two doctors , in English and in Xhosa and they made a conclusion that there was no major concerns, they mentioned that he was a bit slow because of Language and that he needed time to adjust, stability, routine and language consistency. The doctors said that Simphiwe does not need any therapy and there is no evidence to suggest that he needs to go to special needs school.

I must say that prior to getting this feedback from Red Cross Hospital we had already decided to work with the school and take their facilitator and attend each meetings, the facilitator had told us that he is making a remarkable improvement and he is playing and interacting well with other children. When we took the latest information to the school principal that there was really nothing to worry about, that the problem really is Language.
The principal was furious saying that these doctors do not know what they are talking about, that he has not made any progress at all and that he might need Ritalin and he always play alone.

Now please note that I am getting conflicting reports :
1. Facilitator who spends about 3 hours in class with him daily say he is doing very well and concentrating more in class activities, that he is making friends and interacting well with other children.

BUT
2. Principal says there is no improvement at all, he needs Occupational therapy maybe even Ritalin, he always plays alone ?????

I am very confused here, all the tests and assesment we did , all say there is nothing wrong with my child that he needs more time to adjust. But school say there is something wrong with and the more thearpy he get the better ??
For me its starting to look more like ther school has a problem with my child or there is other motives here.
I have gone to the Social workers to get advice and they promised to investigate the matter.
In the meantime, I would appreciate any Input or advice offered on here . Has any parent ever experience this??? Please help, I am a wreck

THERE is your answer. Teachers used to be able to teach, and they used to actually be able to educate. Nowadays, it appears that they are unable and/or unwilling to do so - and actually rely on the O.B.E. system to move children through the system, rather than for the children, through the acquisition of knowledge, to advance naturally to ever-increasing levels of awareness and knowledge and thereby to progress through the system.
Let's face it.
O.B.E. is an unmitigated failure.
I work for a large financial corporation - and the youngsters applying here for a job after spending their entire school-lives in the O.B.E. excuse for an educational system that is still being used here, despite well-publicised and documented failures of O.B.E. both here and abroad, are almost every single one functionally illiterate. The only ones who are able to read and write and spell properly, are those who come from homes where the parents were very involved in their education, and who either went to specialised and highly-sought-after private schools, or who were home-schooled.
We have recent graduates here (I kid you not!) who are unable to appreciate that writing a memo to the CEO is something that should not be accomplished using "SMS-speak". That to address the CFO as "u" is not appropriate. And that to "LOL" your boss when he returns a document and instructs you to rewrite same because it is completely unintelligible is just not on.

Teachers (as a rule) nowadays are apparently unable to deal with children who are NOT drugged and semi-comatose. It has become the exception to find a child who is NOT on Ritalin/Strattera/whatever other drug is the flavour of the moment, rather than to find a child who actually needs (but isn't getting) drug-'therapy'.

What are the statistical odds (as I have first-hand experience regarding) of 23 out of 25 children in ONE class, in a particular school, all 'needing' Ritalin/Strattera/whatever?

http://www.ehow.com/how-...velopment-children.html has an interesting point: It says that about 8% of all American children today are being given Ritalin, but that less than 5% of these children actually NEED it. In plain English, less than 5% of the 8% getting Ritalin actually need it. Mathematically speaking, in a group of 1000 children, you would find 80 children on Ritalin, and of those 80 children only 4 (four) children should actually be using Ritalin. Does that figure not scare you? Do the warning lights not start to flash when you hear that more than half your child's school class is on Ritalin? Do you not get a trifle concerned when the FIRST resort of a professional educator (or somebody who says they are a professional educator) is a drug that affects the same area of the brain as Cocaine? And doesn't it worry you at all when you hear that scientists and neurologists call Ritalin "Kiddy-Cocaine", and admit that it is chronically and wildly over-prescribed, often on the say-so of an incompetent teacher/principal who has absolutely NO training in neurology whatsoever?

http://www.huffingtonpos...ildren-re_b_708093.html contains this little gem: "ADHD is often grossly and carelessly misdiagnosed and overdiagnosed. All too often a teacher complaint and a 10-minute talk with a pediatrician results in an ill-considered diagnosis and an indefinite prescription for psychostimulant medication. This hurried process can miss both simple explanations (a gifted child who is bored, a poor fit between student and teacher, parents without adequate time and resources to motivate an intense and difficult child), or more serious problems like anxiety, depression, dyslexia and other learning disabilities."

Statistically, and according to experts in the field, perhaps 1 child in 1000 REALLY needs drugging with Ritalin/Strattera/whatever. The rest need exercise and decent teachers. Mathematically, the chances of more than one (1) child in any class/group of less than 250 children actually NEEDING psychostimulant medication (Ritalin et al) are so small as to be effectively nil.

Perhaps it's time, Neliswa, that you had a very good look at the school and realised that the problem isn't in your child, but in the school and in the system that allows them to drug intelligent, questioning, and challenging children with tremendous potential into submissiveness and mediocrity.

Good luck!

1. Report the "local Educational psychologist" you went to first to the HPCSA (Health Professionals Council of South Africa). It is completely unacceptable professionally to administer a psychometric test that hasn't been validated for the type of person who's being tested. It is in fact illegal. This "local Educational psychologist" is a disgrace to the profession and should be dealt with as soon as possible. At the very least ignore everything they said.

2. The psychiatrist you visted was correct in their method and a correctly conducted test is right 95% of the time, so if the psychiatrist said there's nothing wrong then I am inclined to agree.

3. Go in and meet with the principal, and tell him the following:

You have complied with his requests and been very reasonable so far, however you have been assured by a psychiatrist (who conducted a proper assessment) and the facilitator (who spends 3 hours a day with him) that there is no problem. By contrast, and with all due respect, the Principal is busy most of the day and perhaps if he has a special interest in the student might find the time to walk past the class a couple of times, so he is hardly in a position to make a judgement. If the Principal is operating exclusively off the evidence offered by the teacher, and placing this above the opinions of the psychiatrist (a trained professional) and the facilitator (someone who spends 3 hours a day working directly with your child) then the Principal and teacher must revise their positions. This is NOT a request, this is an instruction. If the school continues to treat your child in a discriminatory fashion because English was not his native language and it took some time for his English to come up to the level of the other students then you WILL pursue legal action, because continued discrimination will damage your child's self-esteem in the long term. Unless the teacher can produce a license from the HPCSA showing that they're a qualified and licensed psychologist (educational, clinical, child, etc) then the teacher will IMMEDIATELY stop attempting to make an uneducated and unlicensed diagnosis of your child.


Speaking as a qualified and licensed psychologist your child's behavior doesn't seem at all unusual to me, and everything you have reported is perfectly logically in terms of the initial language barrier he had to overcome. It is difficult to concentrate when someone is speaking a foreign language, and it's also difficult to make friends. Give him time and it'll sort itself out. My only real advice is that I would advise continuing the facilitator and slowly phasing the facilitator out as you don't want your child to feel abandoned.