Welcome WinonaTac, I think you'll find quite a few of us here who have children with similar challenges. There are several different forms of dysgraphia, but fwiw graphomotor impairment is essentially dysgraphia - but schools don't usually use the term dysgraphia. My ds12 has fine motor dysgraphia, as well as dyspraxia and an expressive language disorder. We successfully advocated for an IEP for him, but it took a *ton* of research and advocacy as well as a bit of karma. It also took a few years, so in the meantime we tried our best to do what we could outside of school as well as advocating for accommodations at school.

Here's my list of random thoughts and questions for you:

1) Do you think your ds really needs an IEP or will accommodations accomplish what he needs for school? An IEP is used when a student needs individualized instruction; a section 504 plan is used when a student needs accommodations to participate fully in school but don't need additional instruction above and beyond what is offered in the regular classroom.

2) There are quite a few things (AT) that your ds can be using to help work around handwriting difficulties. My ds uses a laptop for all of his schoolwork and homework, and uses specialized software. One of the types of software that helps ds the most is word prediction, which displays a list of words to choose from based on typing the first 2-3 letters of a word - this really increases the speed of his typing as well as freeing up his working memory which leads to better punctuation/grammar/etc. He has math software that allows him to graph, write equations, etc on his laptop. He has a LiveScribe pen for taking notes, but is transitioning to similar tools on the iPad next year. He likes voice-to-text software (he speaks to the computer, it writes out what he's said). He also uses text-to-speech software when editing (the computer reads back what he's written).

3) I am not sure if visual or auditory processing challenges are indicated in your ds' testing, but one thing you can do is to compile a list of all the questions you have and ask for a follow-up session with the psych who did the testing - either on the phone, via email, or an appointment in person. We've done this every single time we've had an evaluation for ds (and our dds) simply because I usually have more questions after I've had time to read the reports over and think things through.

4) My ds' dysgraphia is rooted in fine motor challenges (as opposed to visual), and is specifically referred to as graphomotor - so I'm guessing fine motor is the cause of your ds' too. If you google types of dysgraphia you should be able to find a description of the various types and compare it to your ds' testing results.

5) Do you have subtest scores for the VIQ and PRI parts of the WISC? Is there a lot of scatter in them? Trends there might point to visual/auditory challenges.

6) I am not sure what the comment "Disparity stress and anxiety" means in your report, but fwiw our ds developed severe anxiety during the time his disability went undiagnosed and he was struggling in school. His anxiety lessened *SO* much once we (and he) knew what was going on, why he was struggling, and as we began to make changes such as accommodations etc. It seemed like it took much longer to get his accommodations etc in place than I would have liked, but just knowing what was up and moving in a direction eliminated most of his anxiety - which was probably more important than anything else we could do at the time.

7) Did the psych who did the testing put any specific diagnoses in the report (things like "Disorder of Written Expression" "Anxiety Disorder" etc)? It's helpful when advocating to have actual diagnoses.

8) What specific reasons did the school say were the reasons your ds doesn't qualify for an IEP? Has he been through an official IEP eligibility process? Have you requested an eligibility review in writing? If you haven't, I'd start with this report plus a list of your concerns and turn in a written request.

That's all I can think of at the moment - best wishes as you advocate for your ds!

polarbear