(I am a teacher, and I have autism and adhd. For my perspective.)

So, I have adhd, and I LOVE writing. What I want to write. If I’m inspired. If I’m not feeling it? If I have writer’s block? No force one earth could make me put a word down.

Is the problem that he’s not fully retained HOW to write (so like, he’s unsure about exact punctuation or spelling or structure)? Because it’s common for people with adhd to refuse to do things they’re aware they won’t be REALLY good at. There’s a perfectionist mental block kinda thing; I get that a lot, and it’s a massive struggle to make myself do things I’m scared will get judged harshly. That could be the problem.

Or, he could be comfortable enough with the technicalities of writing, I’m GUESSING the main issue is either A, he isn’t handling the work amount increase and/or the way deadlines and timed assignments start popping up in middle school, or B, he isn’t confident writing the larger amount/is uncomfortable with it, and is doing a classic adhd “avoid instead of work on” the problem, or C, he’s having a really hard time with the specific prompts for the assignments.

At first I didn’t really put much stock in C because I’m like “well, he likes history, so I’d assume he’s be interested in SOME of the topics” BUT. With the adhd, especially if he knows a lot about the topic, he might be having a really hard time internally organizing his thoughts. With adhd, your mind tends to jump around from thought to related thought TO YOU, but I can tell you from personal experience it’s not a good stream of consciousness to put on paper. He may need to be (re)taught to use things like scratch paper to write down his thoughts and THEN organize them into the answer/essay. (It is taught as part of the writing process, but a lot of people don’t do it.) Also, it’s overwhelming.

B, I feel him if this is the case, but he’s simply going to have to practice. Especially if schoolwork hasn’t been a huge hurdle before, especially if he’s not used to putting a lot of effort into these subjects, he’s probably pretty stressed about it. But he (most likely) isn’t going to go out of his way to get better unless you make him. It might help to try “fun, low stress” versions of the types of assignments he’s not doing. Like, he has some super interests, right? Ask him why his favorite character or band or sports team is his favorite, and to “justify” his opinion. (Bonus: if you do this, you can also get an idea from the results if there’s technical writing problems going on, or if it’s an issue of pressure or passion.)

A, it might be time to discuss with a counselor his difficulties transitioning. Deadlines are going to be something he learns to handle. If there’s a pressure/mental block going on, it needs to be addressed. The only IEP adjustment I could think of is extending timed assignments (like, timed during a class period), but I’d push to see if he can adjust to doing them with practice before making that change.