on our therapist:
1) several people told us not to even consider a tutor, specifically look for an Ed. Therapist. They were (mostly) right. We ended up with one of each. The tutor teaches again what she missed out on in class, in mostly the same ways, and helps with homework; DD is now caught up and we are done with tutoring. The Ed. Therapist gives her new strategies and tools tailored to her particular profile, and gives separate assignments. We will continue with her. Therapy is about twice the price of tutoring.
2) We tried out five different ed. therapists. One worked but had a full schedule, several others didn't have enough time to even try out, one was a complete disaster from the moment we met so we didn't go back. The final choice was recommended by our tester and is located at a large but local tutoring center that ALSO offers ed. therapy.
3) The person that worked for us has a BA in Psychology, MA in mild/moderate special ed, and specific training in Lindamood-Bell, Orton-Gillingham, Reading Apprenticeship, and lots of assistive technology. Note - no degree in teaching, exactly. A lot of her approach has been to break down the shame of what DD does poorly and get her to allow herself to do better, which is much more psych than teaching. We knew she was a win when after seeing our testing results she did her own research online and discovered, then forwarded to us, a link to the 2E section at Davidson's. My sense is that she is herself more than a little gifted.
I hope this helps others. We do feel very lucky - but we also found several people who might also have worked, but whose schedules were just full. Our therapist seems wonderful but not unique. Good luck!
This advice is excellent. Don't go through the chain places. I tried that for my DD first. We had a excellent educational therapist that worked with my daughter for years. She had a PhD in education and worked with kids who had problems with language and reading issues. Well worth all the money we spend on it.
