Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Parenting and Advocacy GT school not enough for DS - what now?

bronalex, it sounds like the school is proactively working to provide differentiation - and that's huge!

I don't have time to think about what I'd ask re the gifted side of things at the moment, but wanted to address the question about an IEP for sensory challenges. I am guessing that in your ds' case what you need is a 504 plan, not an IEP. A 504 plan outlines accommodations that make school accessible for students with disabilities; an IEP is put in place for students who need individualized instruction. In our ds' case - if your school district offers them - a *gifted* IEP would be appropriate, but if you wanted an IEP for sensory issues you'd have to be able to show that he needed some type of remediation for those issues to be successful in the classroom. Most likely what he needs are accommodations - things like sitting on a bouncy ball or bumpy cushion, wearing ear plugs to drown out background noise, sensory "breaks" where he is able to go to a quiet room for a while during class, etc - those are all examples of typical sensory-related accommodations. The one reason he might qualify for an IEP for sensory issues is if he qualified for sensory OT - and if he did, and if you don't mind him missing class for a pull-out, I'd give it a try. Our dd had private sensory OT and it was *wonderful* for her.

Hope that helps a bit -

polarbear

ps - your ds has had VT hasn't he? Has that helped at all? I'm wondering how much of what looks like sensory is actually vision related? That's another thing you'll need to think about (probably) - vision. Does your dd need accommodations allowing him to sit close to the board etc.