Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Twice Exceptional Advice on trying to get IEP for dysgraphia?

Hi Jen,

If you've been reading the forums for quite awhile, you've probably read that I had a ds who's now in high school who has dysgraphia. He also has developmental coordination disorder (dyspraxia) and an expressive language disorder (difficulty getting his thoughts out of his head - both on paper and verbally).

You've already received a lot of great advice (and very thorough advice). I have just a bit to add based on our experience - we did get an IEP for my ds in elementary school, but it took quite a bit of work, we didn't have a school where staff was eager to help. DS *did* have two teachers who saw that he was struggling and who wanted to help (in their own way), but in one case the teacher only saw the disability and not the ability, in the other case, the teacher wanted terribly to get ds help but once he was "in the process" for IEP eligibility determination it became clear she was given programmed messages from the school administration that she had to deliver, aimed at convincing us there was not a problem and ds didn't/wouldn't/shouldn't qualify for services.


Our ds also had a great deal of anxiety and depression in early elementary school, which was due to living with his disabilities and being in a classroom daily seeing what all the other students were able to do so much easier than it was for him. We (parents) didn't see this at all - the way we found out he had dysgraphia was through a neuropsych exam to which we were referred by his ped when we took ds in to see the ped because he was so anxious he started having panic attack. Finding out ds couldn't *write* surprised the heck out of me, even though once we knew it was an issue, it was clear as all get-out that the signs had been their forever.


I think (and it's jmo), that the most important thing to do is to first frame your efforts around what is and what you want to accomplish. If you have a dysgraphia diagnosis for your ds (which I *think* you do), from a professional, did they give you an outline of therapies/accommodations/etc to follow? I'm guessing they did, and that OT was a part of it. Why did they suggest OT, and do you feel your ds has accomplished those goals at this point in time? Or not? And if not, do you feel it's worth pursuing until he does?

For instance, when my ds was first diagnosed, our neuropsych recommended three things as first steps (she also recommended other things farther down the road, this is just the starting place). 1) Remediate using HWOT at home over summer break to teach ds how to form letters correctly. 2) Handwriting OT to help him develop a correct pencil grip and posture and develop functional handwriting (functional did *not* mean handwriting he could rely on to do any kind of extended writing) and 3) start teaching him how to type right away. Our neuropsych was very clear - ds would never have the automaticity required to be able to rely on handwriting.

We tried the HWOT - it was hopeless, ds was a mess when we tried and it was completely ruining his day. I decided after just a few sessions to give up on it. I wasn't giving up on remediation or helping ds, just saw that this one particular path wasn't going to get ds anywhere other than more depressed than he already was. He started private OT a few months later (nothing moves quickly in our town re OT) and continued for about 9 months (he was released by the OT then, having accomplished her goals for him). OT was very useful for our ds - it didn't remediate his dysgraphia, but he did learn the correct pencil grip and good posture while writing, which helped eliminate pain which he'd had in his hand from his unusual pencil grip. It also helped him with spacing letters appropriately, with maintaining steady pencil pressure (so his papers didn't end up wadded and torn) and gave him *legible* handwriting. It didn't increase his very slow handwriting speed or help him gain any automaticity of handwriting, but what he did gain from OT has been very very helpful throughout the years.

We also started him typing write away - we had him learn touch typing using BBCMat followed by another software pkg (I can't remember the name now). We had a lot of people advising us "just let him type" "have him send emails etc" "he'll gain speed as he writes".. but that didn't work well for ds because his written output was extremely limited. I also have heard that letting children hunt-and-peck and find their own method is very effective, but we found that our ds was able to learn touch-typing at 8 (and our other younger non-dysgraphic kids later did too). DS wasn't *fast* (and still isn't) - his fine motor issues aren't going to let him every become fast at typing - but it's still much faster, more legible than handwriting for him, and it opens up access to a wide variety of technology that is very useful for dysgraphics (word prediction, spell check, etc).


A few thoughts here - first, it's helpful to know what the guidelines your school district has for qualifying for IEP eligibility and for services such as OT once a child has an IEP. Chances are good there is a very specific set of guidelines. Per the law, IEP eligibility should be a team decision which you (parent) are a part of, but you may be in a situation where the school is sticking hard-and-fast to the specific district guidelines and will try to convince you that they have to follow them (this happened to us). As severely dysgraphic as my ds is, he did not technically qualify under the guidelines in our school district. What helped us get around that was to be first, familiar with the test scores/etc that determined those guidelines and cut-offs, and then to also be very familiar with what specific evidence we had of our ds' dysgraphia in test scores. For instance, on his school district WJ-III Cognitive test he scored very very high - but he had one specific subtest which was extremely low due to his dysgraphia. When the school staff would argue that everything was "ok" such as grades, achievement test scores (which were usually averaged together) etc, we pointed out that one subtest and the huge discrepancy and explained how that was evidence of the severity of his dysgraphia. We also brought examples of his writing to team meetings. We would hear from teachers that his writing was "not the best, but also not the worse" in the classroom (this was a common theme for at least 3 years) - we countered with "we aren't here to talk about the other students, we're here to make a plan for our ds." We also asked for proof of claims like this - for instance, the school tried to tell us ds' handwriting speed wasn't an issue during one meeting - they pulled out a timed write paragraph ds had written, told us how many words he'd written in x number of minutes, and told us that was "about in the middle" of his class. So we asked how that compared to grade-level norms on national or wider scale measures. The school staff tried to tell us that those numbers didn't exist because there were so many different studies no one could know for sure what was correct. We politely asked for just an average example anyway. We weren't going to give up seeking that piece of data (and to be honest, I already had a really good idea where our ds would land because it was easy to google and get this info online and do a simple test at home) - so the OT finally took my ds' paper, counted up words per minute, left the room long enough to look it up online herself, and returned to let us know he was, in fact, working at a grade three levels below the grade he was in on this specific type of timed task.


As you move forward, try to do two things. First, you can document everything that happens by sending an email after-the-fact stating what happened or what the conversation was etc, send it to the school staff that was involved, cc anyone from your ds' school team that might need to be in the loop, and let the person you're sending the summary to know that this is your understanding of what happened or what was said, and is there anything you are misunderstanding or anything extra to add.

Second, make written requests for everything (email works a-ok for this).


Get him keyboarding right away. Remember - this is about his *life*, not just about school. You may be successful in advocating at school or you might not, but you will *always* need to be supporting your ds in learning how to live with his challenges. Keep the big picture in mind - he needs to become an independently functioning individual (and he will!). For most dysgraphic people, becoming independent means relying on AT for writing. And that's *A-OK* - if you look around you you'll most likely notice that a ton of what you'll be advocating for in terms of accommodations are things that most neurotypical high school kids and adults use *ALL THE TIME* One of my not-so-fondest memories of my ds' elementary school was the irony of me spending so much time arguing, um, I mean politely advocating, with a school staff who insisted my ds could not use voice-to-text technology and that they'd never ever heard of it... and then going into the school office where all of the admin staff had their headphones on using voice-to-text on their computers.


He needs accommodations. Not just for middle school, but for standardized testing and for his SATs/ACTs/ etc when it's time for them. Remember - he needs the accommodations so that he's able to show his knowledge. Be very brief in what you write when you make a request to the school, but be sure to include the reason - he needs to be able to communicate what he knows.

Also, if it helps, be sure to remember that what you're requesting is entirely reasonable (unless you're requesting something that is way out of the ballpark not related to the needs he has). Follow the advice of the professionals who've evaluated him, research everything you can so you can be familiar with his challenges, pay close attention to his schoolwork and *save* examples, do some simple "testing" at home to develop examples if you need to (things to show the difference in speed/quantity of written vs keyboard vs verbal output when writing etc). Stay calm and polite at meetings but also stay firm - have a script in your own head re what you want to achieve, what you need to say to make your point, and don't deviate even if the school tries to move the meeting in a different direction or tries to dissuade you.


It's a very frustrating time - I found elementary school to be *the* very toughest time for my 2 2e kids, especially for my dysgraphic ds. Remember that your ds has one *very* positive thing going for him right now - YOU. You're advocating and sticking with it, thinking through it, doing your best to get him what he needs. Once he has accommodations in place, things will improve. Chances are once he gets to middle school and on into high school, things will continue to improve because more and more classes will (most likely) utilize technology.

There's also one last thing I meant to mention way back at the top - it's helpful to think through - do you want an IEP or a 504 plan for your ds? IEPs are meant to be individualized education plans, and if all you think your ds is dealing with is dysgraphia, he might not need and IEP. OTOH, if you think he needs OT, you might need to get an IEP for him in order to get OT services through the school. If you have a local parent advocates group it would be worth a call to talk through your ds' situation relative to what typically happens in your local schools because things work differently in different districts. Advocates can also help give you the language that will be most effective when you are talking to, writing to, or making a request of your school staff.

And one other note - sometimes you can expend an enormous amount of effort on fighting the system just to get that something such as an IEP or a 504 - I mentioned we had to fight for our ds' IEP - it took almost 3 years to get it, and once we had it, the school staff still had the same mindset that ds didn't really need help, so they didn't follow through with much of what was outlined in the IEP. We ultimately had to use private therapists for the things that we felt our ds needed in order to move forward and be successful in school, and even though it was not easy financially, it was worth it to have access to people who were motivated and able to actually help him, and it made a HUGE difference in his life.

Sorry I rambled for so long! I hope some of it is helpful

Best wishes,

polarbear