School Conference Red Flags

Cobb County schools host conferences next week, and parents can listen out for red flag phrases from a teacher, that may indicate a cognitive skill weakness with your child, which causes serious learning struggles.

Cognitive skills are the underlying mental tools that make up IQ, including skills like logic and reasoning, attention, memory, processing speed, and auditory and visual processing. If one or more of these skills are weak, reading and learning can be difficult. If a cognitive skill weakness is the underlying cause of problems in school, the struggles will not ease until those weak skills are strengthened.

So, as you head into conferences, or any time you talk to your child’s teacher, listen for these red flag phrases:

1) “I know he’s smart, but…”
His work doesn’t show it.
It’s just not coming out.
He makes sloppy mistakes.

This is one of the most frustrating symptoms of weak cognitive skills for parents and teachers: a smart child locked inside a struggling student. This phrase is a good indicator that several cognitive skills are very strong, while others are deficient and are causing a big bottleneck of information in the brain.

2) “He’s below grade level in reading.”
Most reading struggles can be linked to weak cognitive skills. Studies show 88% of all learning to read problems are caused by weak phonemic awareness skills—the ability to hear, blend, unglue and manipulate the smallest sounds in a word. Reading struggles can also be caused or compounded by deficiencies in visual processing, memory, attention and processing speed. If your child continues to struggle in reading, it will eventually lead to problems in other subjects too.

3) “He takes a long time to…”
Finish schoolwork
Answer questions
Follow directions

Some kids take longer because they’re more of a perfectionist, but weak cognitive skills are generally to blame if a child is always the last student done with an assignment, doesn’t finish it, or takes hours to complete standard homework loads.

4) “He continues to struggle with…”
Math facts
Paying attention
Following directions

Some struggles are normal when learning anything. But if your child takes a longer than average amount of time to master grade-level learning, a cognitive weakness is most likely the root cause.

5) Other Symptoms that may come up in a parent-teacher conference include:
 
The inability to stay on task
Bouncing from idea to idea
Making sloppy mistakes
Turning in incomplete work
Not turning in assignments at all
Impulsiveness
General attention issues
Spelling problems (including forgetting words after mastering them)
Problems with if/then analogies
Struggles following instructions
Difficulty comprehending numbers, directions, answers
Trouble discerning left and right
Poor ability to use maps
Hesitation to read aloud
Poor organization skills
Forgetfulness
Avoiding prolonged mental efforts
Dislike or disinterest in school

If you hear any of the red flag phrases at conference time, or if the teacher says your child has several of the above signs, it may be time to schedule a cognitive skills assessment. After determining which skills are weak, then you can focus on the most effective way to strengthen those skills and ease the problem.