Retaining learning and applying it

Both Monkey Boy and Jealous Dog struggle with the above. They both have dyslexia and really significant self esteem problems. MB has ADHD but he's pretty focussed at school on medication. We are fairly sure they both have foetal alcohol/drug effects but they are both very bright in terms of making an good rational argument and both score highly for comprehension and verbal stuff on all the tests. School are doing interventions but nothing ever seems to stick.

Monkey Boy has an EHCP and his attainment has gone down since they started the various interventions. He's off to secondary school in a year and a bit and we have no idea how he's going to function. He cannot even remember phase 3 phonics or the 2 times table and he cannot write a simple sentence. They both have EP reports - not all the recommendations are in place but lots of the strategies are allegedly being used. At Monkey Boy's EHCP review the EP seemed at a bit of a loss. If the boys did not have good scores for underlying intelligence we would be saying ah well there's clearly significant delay and damage and barriers to learning so perhaps they will never read or write or type so lets focus on other strengths and accept they will need to be supported into adulthood. But the EP says they should be able to learn - just no idea why it's not happening. It really feels as though they are not fulfilling their potential.

This is what we have done so far

Jealous Dog - BBC dancemat in order to learn to touch type - he completed the course but found practising tedious and refused to do it. School have now given him a laptop for lessons but he does not have a TA so he will probably just try to cope typing with 1 finger and end up writing because it's quicker. I have tried doing Toe by Toe with him in the evenings but he totally hated it and would not focus so we gave up. He has a maths tutor for an hour at home every Monday doing times tables and number bonds over and over and an English tutor on Thursday doing phonics, vocabulary and reading. He is in year 7 and still cannot do number bonds to 10.

Monkey Boy has 12 hours/week TA support and does Toe by Toe most days with the TA who has been trained - he has been doing it for 10 months and his reading age has gone down. He is just about to start touch typing. He is doing a high frequency words programme and a reading recovery programme - he does not retain the HFWs past the week when he is working on them. He cannot have tuition after school/weekend because he needs loads of sensory games etc in the evening and weekends are full of sports which he is good at - so we don't want to stop that

The EP says you need HFWs and phonics but I thought with dyslexia you should never ever allow the child to guess. Of course though some words cannot be de-coded so not sure how that works.

Any insights would be most welcome. I am now wondering if the self esteem difficulties are really getting in the way - as soon as you ask them to have a go at something independently it's almost as if their brains go into meltdown and under those conditions it's not surprising they cannot learn/demonstrate learning. Does anyone have any stories of successful strategies to support retention and working memory - other than simple over-learning which is obviously fine until you need to move on to the next thing.