It seems you may have two challenges before you:
1)
Helping the teachers through a learning curve on gifted issues.
For this you may wish to bring a written list of resources to direct them to, such as:
- Davidson
Educator's Guild -
A Nation Deceived - Iowa Acceleration Scale (
IAS)
- Institute for Research and Policy on Acceleration (
IRPA)
- Davidson Database,
Resources - Hoagies' Gifted Education Page,
educator's tab If you follow up your meeting with a
summary e-mail, you could include the clickable links for their convenience.
2)
Helping your daughter learn with appropriate curriculum, pacing, and peers in school. Why an IEP? What needs have been identified? What achievement level has been agreed upon... for example is her math achievement at the middle of the school's 3rd grade curriculum? Prior to brainstorming on
options, it may be wise to agree what the specific current
needs are.
ETA: Tips for meeting prep have been posted on other threads but in case it is helpful, here is a brief summary:
- Research state laws and the school or district policies and practices. This information is often found online. You may wish to print and put this in an advocacy ring binder to refer to over the years as the laws and policies/practices may change over time.
- Have any test results and other pertinent facts available to share (milestones, reading lists, other accomplishments/achievements)
- It is good to have them speak first. If asked to speak first, you may simply wish to thank everyone for attending and summarize that you are all here to share information and ideas about how to best meet your child's educational needs... and that you would like to hear from them.
- Agenda
- Know who is in the meeting, and their role(s)
- Stay calm
- Know what you are asking for
- TAKE NOTES including Who-What-Where-When-Why-How of services, so you can summarize in an e-mail afterward [Some families announce they plan to record the meeting and then do so, rather than taking notes.]
- Use active listening (rephrase what has been said, and put it in a question form) to clarify understanding
- Be open to receiving the school's data/observations.
- Listen to any proposals they may make, ask appropriate probing questions, such as how a proposal may work, how the proposal may help your child, the schedule/frequency of service delivery, etc
- Do not be forced to make a decision if you need time
- Summarize next steps & time frames, and/or need for a follow-up meeting
- Thank everyone for their time & interest
- After the meeting, write a summary (points of agreement, etc) and share it, possibly by e-mail
