2e issues really muddy the waters with school. Most schools in this country are ill equipped or totally unable to deal with them. The problem is that you often need the services and oftentimes you simply cannot get the services unless your child is enrolled in a public school or you go through them at the very least.
I had this happen to ds when he was 3.5/4 years old and in pre-kindergarten. I couldn't get the ot/pt/speech without enrolling him in a special needs pre-k program, period, authorized by the NYC Board of Ed. I had to obtain a lawyer and go through the ordeal of threatening to go to mediation. Talk about a major headache. There's nothing like the NYC Board of Ed and its bureaucracy anywhere on the planet. NYC has some of the best and worst schools in America.
We now live in MA and I'm still wrestling with the public schools over getting ds7 re-tested for DYS. If we could afford to get him re-tested privately, we would. We can't, but part of me also believes that my ds7 should get some educational 'services' from public schools even if it's a darn test or textbook. I don't feel like this is asking for blood. Oy. Will this ever end?
Yes CAMom, that's one reason why I decided to homeschool in the end. It's much easier than fighting, advocating, arguing, etc. the system. I'm a former public school teacher/college instructor myself. So I've had the eye balls and looks too - like how dare you ditch the public schools to homeschool! It's venomous at times.
Mk13 - with an spectrum diagnosis, try to get hold of Kristine Barnett's book, The Spark. She pulled her autistic son, Jake, from the public schools and used his interests to work on the behaviors. He's a math/science prodigy who's now 14/15 years old, working on his master's, and an original theory to Einstein. He was featured on 60 Minutes.
Many gifted kids hate repetition and rote learning, especially eg/pg ones. Another reason to homeschool!
