DeeDee - both are lacking this year; I think that is why it has been so much worse than last year. Somehow 8th grade teachers as a whole have difficulty separating out accommodating for learning disabilities and toughening up kids for high school. Quantum - this is what we'd done in the past with some success, but the teachers have been quite uncooperative this year about fitting into "our" system and, instead, demanding that my son figure out how to deal with their myriad systems of organization.
My son's gifted teacher who has been the worst to deal with by far told him last week that he really needed to work on this memory thing and "get over it, because it's going to be a disadvantage when you're an adult."
My son, without missing a beat, asked him if he gave the same advice to kids in a wheelchair about not being able to walk as adult so they should start working on it now. The teacher said it wasn't anywhere near the same. My son said it was exactly the same and that just because a disability was in the brain and not visible didn't mean it wasn't a disability.
We worked with the Special Ed chair and decided to remove my son from his elective and put him in a special ed classroom the last period of the day. He is in the class as an aide to help with the 3 D-Level students, but he spends most of the period doing his homework. The aide in the classroom then walks with him to the teacher's lounge so my son can deliver all of the homework to their mailboxes.
His stress level is down, the constant yelling from the teachers has somewhat abated, so it is a fix for this year. But, oh, am I dreading next year.
