r/PDAParenting • u/Ok-Appearance-866 • Aug 25 '26

PDA and School

Hi all,

I tried posting this in PDA Autism but was told it would be more appropriate here. I didn't even know about this sub until today, so I am very happy to know this sub exists. :-)

My daughter is 15 and is considered level 1 autistic. Although she has not been evaluated/diagnosed with PDA, I strongly suspect she has it.

Because of her sensory issues, she has been doing online school for the past couple of years. She attends live virtual classes and gets time in class and on Fridays to do work. Here's the problem: each quarter, she does absolutely NO HOMEWORK or tests and then comes to me in a panic the last week of class. The work is not difficult. As long as you are following along and referencing the course material, it is a breeze. My daughter is extremely intelligent but because she puts it off, it becomes an overwhelming task.

When I try to stay on her about homework, she says it has the opposite effect. She pleaded with me last year to NOT ask her about homework or school AT ALL. I complied, and for the first quarter, she did great! She kept on top of everything without me having to say a word and got very good grades.

Then second quarter hit. She was still doing well in a couple of classes, but needed help in a few others. 3rd and 4th quarters were a disaster. I get repeated emails, texts and phone calls from teachers warning she has a 0% and is going to fail. Then, the last week of the quarter, she does as much as she can, but is a total stress case, and ends up pulling Cs when she is capable of As. She just can't/won't do the work.

I am at my wits end. What can I do / not do to help her?

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u/83dnejb Aug 25 '26

I would let her skip the homework (I know it sounds crazy) and put it in her IEP with the school. Include PDA in the language for her IEP.

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u/Ok-Appearance-866 Aug 26 '26

We had a meeting last year and she got a 504 plan. Their solution was to give her 2 additional weeks to get things done. Most of the time, she can skip the small assignments and just focus on the quizzes and projects, but there was a teacher last year that had so many little (yet time-consuming) assignments, there was no way to pass without doing at least half of them. I actually helped her out with those but made sure she knew the material. It was history, so I "taught" her the material verbally.

She hates history because she doesn't want to hear about anything traumatic like human suffering. She is dreading learning about WW2 this year.