Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Twice Exceptional What to expect from the IEP and suggestions please

Thanks so much for the reply- but want to clarify--- we have just asked for the IEP meeting (he is on an IEP for speech only right now)

The testing done was through private testing (like your story above- the school kept dragging there feet--- he will get it,, look he already improved a little.......).

Those suggestion are what the private reports suggest- not what the school has agreed to. I do not even know yet if our school has an orton-gillingham_based program.

Glad to hear the good news about the outcome- gives me something to look forward to. My DS actually enjoys reading a little bit (if it is comic books or the like) so there is hope.

Thanks again

Oh, I didn't realize that (obviously)!

In that case, if your school offers any remediation (you don't say whether or how far behind your son is?), make sure the remediation is a research-based program taught by a trained professional. That is a requirement of IDEA, but I think schools need to be reminded of that fact. My son's school wouldn't provide remediation (he wasn't far enough behind), which is why we went with a private tutor who used Wilson. Our school actually laughed at the suggestion of 5x week, which is what our tester recommended as well. The best we could do was a 504, which is supposedly excellent (not that its followed).

I suggest going to Wrightslaw.com and read as much as you can about what the school is required to do for your son. Dyslexia is mentioned under IDEA as a "specific learning disability," so it should be covered, but it must significantly impair your son in order for the school to give him an IEP to cover it. Our school district seems to want to fight a dyslexia diagnosis, and I wasn't willing to wait for evaluations, so we went ahead and got a tutor within 6 weeks of diagnosis. They would have never fully given him what he needed in terms of private instruction anyway, so that was the right choice for him, even though it was extremely expensive.

Our meetings were never negative-- and I was able to site the law (thanks to Wrightlaw) to keep things progressing. Still, we didn't get what I thought my son needed in the meetings. It's much easier for the school to say yes to accommodations (which are free) than remediation (which actually costs the school something).

Great that your son likes reading! My son still says he doesn't. Do you know about "high interest" books? They're written for your son's age group, but at a slightly lower reading level. Also, we had great success getting my son to read after we bought him a kindle. It's much easier for him to read when he can increase the font size-- and the kindle allowed him to access books (at a larger font size) that he hadn't been interested in reading before. Plus, many books are text-to-speech enabled, so if he's tired, he just turns on the kindle speech option and listens to the book.

One final note-- my son has dyslexia without ADD. I know the two are often co-morbid, but it's not always the case. If you feel your son doesn't have it, know that it's possible he doesn't.

I think it might be helpful to you to try to find out if there is a local parents' advocacy group - even if you don't feel you need their help going into your IEP meeting, they may be able to let you know quickly (over the phone) where the resources are and what resources are available in your district. In our district, the reading programs aren't found in every school, and sometimes even the school staff present at team meetings either aren't aware of what's available or won't suggest it for whatever reason, so unless you know it exists you might get a non-answer when you ask it even though the program is there and your child would qualify - does that make sense?

polarbear

Did your child have an audiology exam as part of the workup for dyslexia? The big gap between the two subtests that rely heavily on listening and the one that does not is kind of a red flag for me.

My DS has had hearing test (many- full booth test) due to his speech delay but nothing else. The results are always fine.
It was recommended at one time that he be tested for audio processing issues- but the insurance would not cover it and we let it fall through the cracks. This was one thing we had ask the school about 2 years ago and they did the- 'lets wait and see' approach. We are in a better financial situation now (so can afford out of pocket if need be) and will look into this a bit more and bring it up to the school again.

We have a meeting set with the 'Team' on Tuesday. Do not have much info- except the said the local screening team will look over the testing he had done and determine if more needs to take place. I am trying to get together all the things I can. Any suggestions on what to expect or ideas of things I should bring in would be appreciated. I am really not sure what this meeting is about (Husband took the call)- I assume it is just -are we accepting of the test they want to run/not run kind of thing.

Thanks Again

I've had two of three of my kids on IEP - the older son as gifted, the younger originally for speech and has mushroomed from there.

The younger (12 now) started with speech delay that led to the discovery of dyslexia and then testing by a neuropsych where he was diagnosed as dysgraphic and screened and excluded for ADHD. Do know that while some kids (my oldest being one of them) are gifted with ADHD, gifted kids with an exceptionality can appear as if they have ADHD when, in fact, they do not. Having the documentation to prove my son didn't have ADHD has been used more than once with a teacher who wanted a easy pill-popping fix to deal with my son's dreamy inattentiveness, disorganization, or quirks.

Our IEPs have been for the most part very successful. I've found that through the years most of the teachers were my son's biggest advocates, asking for accommodations they thought would make a difference in their ability to really pull out of him what they could see inside and would give him successes they knew he needed. If you have even one teacher who sees the gift despite the disability, recruit them to help you advocate for the best possible conditions for your child. They "inside" the system and, as such, often have sway that we as parents do not.

It hasn't been all rosy, and I have had teachers, especially this year, openly defy and passive-aggressively ignore parts of my son's IEP. But for the most part, the teachers have had the same goal that I have to help my son be as successful as possible.

Good luck with this part of the journey!