ADHD was the trendy diagnosis when my son was in grade school (early nineties). He had several friends on Ritalin through high school. Now the trendy diagnosis is autism, in all it's different forms. Maybe parents need to look at their child and resist trendy diagnoses. Maybe with some boys it's just a bunch of testosterone. And, yes, the kids who were on Ritalin had to take their dosage at least once during the school day.
When we adopted our son at age 7 four years ago, he was taking Ritalin. Ritalin is a stimulant, and Son would have nasty effects when the med wore off.
We decided to take him off of it, and he was pleasant and even more attentive and definitely more sweet. Two months later, we decided that since the adoption wasn't final, we should have the doctor write a letter to the school so that we wouldn't get in any trouble for neglect! Hadn't had a note home in months, but when the doctor's note went to school, a note came home that said, "Son was very distracted today."
We homeschool now. If he has a fidgety spell, we give him a basketball and send him outside for a half hour.
Autism is not a trendy diagnosis. There's a real problem with it, and it is getting worse. The real question is why??????
My experience has been that many parents can't see the problems of their children. When teachers try to tell them, they blame everything except their parenting and their child. Meanwhile, the kids have to try to learn in an environment with a hyper, out of control kid.
My son is diagnosed ADHD. For us, it means the teachers, by state law, have to make accomodations for him. Sitting still for several hours is out of the question. Luckily, the school moves the kids around quite a bit. They also have to tell US (not just him) when he has projects due. They cannot let him just squeek by. They have to make him do the work. When they don't make him do the work, his grades suffer. When you ignore an ADHD or ADD kid, they fall apart. We get to pick his teachers for the most part. Luckily, he is also in the gifted program so we get a bit more leeway. We chose not to medicate because it changes their personality.