Taking the IEP in a different direction

hopanka · April 2014

We have our meeting this Fri coming up and I feel we have to change the course. DS, in third grade, has always been heavily supported in the social aspect at school and majority of his goals have been written around appropriate play during non-structured time (joining kids to play a game at recess, being able to alert an adult or resolve a conflict with a peer independently at the playground, cooperating with kids during a group activity with active input....etc). The Social aspect has always been his deficit, academics were easy. So, that's why we have focused on social. While I cannot say the social aspect has been mastered, academic issues have recently emerged, and so I am foreseeing that we will have to focus on those now a lot more than before. He's gotten worse in math and reading comprehension (being able to extract info from the text for clues in order to answer an inferential question). Also, homework has turned from a fun activity that he enjoyed to a dreadful experience. He is also beginning to feel a bit bad about himself because he sees school is hard for him now. I don't want him hating it completely. So, I am looking for solutions/accommodations that would help him going forward into 4th grade. His issue is that instruction has gotten longer, he loses interest, gets lost or shuts down and then cannot follow along, if he had missed a couple crucial steps. He complains instruction of a new topic is too long for him now in comparison with 2nd grade. Also, word problems where you have to be able to extract important info from the text and correctly solve multiple steps in the right order is beyond him now. What can I ask for? Individual, more condensed instruction? Maybe in a resource room? Shorter homework? Not being responsible for showing 50 different ways of solving the same problem, instead just one he knows well? Sorry about the wall of text, laptop is broken, so I'm on the phone.

lite-bright · April 2014

Ugh. I want to read this in more detail later, because I have a feeling this is our future.

I'm already struggling so much to help DD1 with reading comprehension. I ended up in tears over her last assignment because she can read at the first grade level and that's where the work is coming from, but her comprehension is just SO not there. She gives me answers that don't even make sense (like "If you talk about something and you're wrong, it's gone.") and I have no idea where to even start with her to help, because what I'm doing now sure as heck isn't working.

I'm going to be meeting with her teachers next week to get strategies.

hopanka · April 2014

Thank you, Auntie, as always. I think revisiting the IQ test is a good idea to see which road we should attempt. I think he is at least in the average range because things that are of interest to him - he is great at. Such as figuring out computer glitches or following directions and applying them at a tennis practice. Of course, I would like to envision college for him, but is it realistic? I am questioning my judgement, plus I just don't know what other curve balls will come our way in the future.

Can I ask the district to pay for an IQ test?

What do you think of the Intensive Instructional Program (IIP service)? Do you think it may be feasible to ask for that as a new service, since OT and ST is being dropped from his IEP?

Thank you!

hopanka · April 2014

hopanka said:
Thank you, Auntie, as always. I think revisiting the IQ test is a good idea to see which road we should attempt. I think he is at least in the average range because things that are of interest to him - he is great at. Such as figuring out computer glitches or following directions and applying them at a tennis practice. Of course, I would like to envision college for him, but is it realistic? I am questioning my judgement, plus I just don't know what other curve balls will come our way in the future.

Can I ask the district to pay for an IQ test?

What do you think of the Intensive Instructional Program (IIP service)? Do you think it may be feasible to ask for that as a new service, since OT and ST is being dropped from his IEP?

Thank you!

Also, forgot to mention that DS's is sort of motivated by shame. Sounds harsh, but after we had our parent teacher conference and it had been mentioned by his teacher that he's gotten worse because he is not paying attention, he has improved slightly over the following week. He has tried to be more focused since. I may or may not have exploited this as the last resort when he didn't want to do hw the other day, and told him that I was immediately emailing his teacher about it. He got scared and got right to it.

lite-bright · April 2014

Thanks, @-auntie-.

I talked to DD1's teacher this morning and I do feel better, but I'm still going to ask for a meeting. She's in the first grade group because of her strong decoding skills, but her teacher said her comprehension is in-line with her kindergarten peers; when we originally set this up, we decided to make sure she was still getting comprehension work in her kindergarten class.

At the K-level, her teacher said they're mostly still focused on the sequential stuff/being able to re-tell, which is the area where I do see some improvement; and make a personal connection, which she definitely can do. She's getting the standard first-grade homework sent home from her reading group, though, and that's where we're struggling. Her K teacher doesn't expect her to actually DO that homework, I guess, and suggested that I go over it and model the thought processes but that we shouldn't be spending a lot of time wading through it.

I haven't met the first-grade teacher yet so this is probably overdue. I don't know what her expectations on the homework are, so I've just been making DD1 do it -- I'm not the type to let homework go unfinished!

hopanka · April 2014

Thanks, Auntie. I will take notes on the various tests you recommended, however is is not his triennial this year. It was last year, unfortunately. Hopefully, we will be able to get them done at some point.

It's interesting that your DS has gotten better at school the older he has become. You would think the harder curriculum in higher grades would suggest otherwise, but I suppose it's the investment into the various support and interventions that started paying off over time? I will try to remember that when I'm ripping my hair out.

The IIP is an intensive tutoring program that takes place after school. It is apparently a service offered by LAUSD. I emailed my lawyer for suggestions on services in our situation and that is what he said. I am sure it wouldn't be handed to us on a silver platter, seems like an expensive service, so I would probably have to fight for it.

I think your suggestion of in class instruction and then individual review sounds really good, but you are right that DS might push back. We won't find out if we don't try, though.

I also agree that positive discipline is best, when I threatened him with ratting him out to his teacher that was pure despair after an hour of noncompliance. We normally have a much more peaceful household when using positive reinforcements and praise.

Funny thing is that lately I have been speaking with a few parents of kids in DS's grade and they ALL said they are starting to struggle, namely in math. A couple of them are already looking into getting a tutor. These are NT kids. I also talked to our OT whose son is in DS's classroom and she admitted that she lets him cheat on how much homework he gets done. "They need to be kids, too": she goes. And this person works for the school, lol! Her DS apparently admitted to her that he gets really bored in math because it's too long, so he stops listening.....that's what DS said!! I thought it was interesting to hear that someone else has the same experience/struggle and he is as NT as they come. Made me feel a little better, I have to admit.

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