Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums General Discussion Just plain confused and mad vent

Hi Belle,
The issue is that Speech and Language is classified as a disability and Occupational Therapy is classified as a related service. Only students with disabilities are entitled to IEPs (excepting states that have Gifted IEPs), and the only way to recieve a related service is to have an IEP. A related service is essentially defined as a service needed by a child with a disability in order to benefit from their special education.

There will be a limit as to how long the S/L services can be continued if your child no longer meets eligibility (mandatory 3 year review to evaluate continued eligibility--can only be waived if IEP team asserts that there is adequate data to support continued eligibility). Do you ever observe the sessions with the O.T.? Perhaps this would be a good time to find out whether some activities could transitioned to the classroom or to home (while there is still O.T. support for training/writing up routines and activities). However, I would also point out that Dyspraxia is a type of learning disability. Have you considered asking for a re-evaluation in that area? In general, it would need to be determined that the dyspraxia is preventing your child from benefitting from instruction. However, SLD criteria are not consistent from state to state, so you would want to carefully read eligibility rules for your state (probably available on the web site for your state's department of public instruction).

I believe disabled students can also receive related services under Section 504. That can include services for medical issues even if the student is in a regular education program.

Thanks Taminy for explaining it SO much more clearly for me- the Speech teacher tried, I just didn't get what she was saying - your explanation is more understandable..so thanks! He has had an IEP since he was 3 and this year was his 3 year review - they did numerous assessments and it was determined by the Speech and OT to continue his IEP in both areas due to the outcome of the assessments- so that is a good thing that they have assessments backing them up - with Speech it showed that he had mastered all most all of the areas but also clearly showed his inconsistencies. The only thing about his IEP is that this past year's goals were written more based on the fact that he was being homeschooled so it didn't have any of the traditional accomodations you would see in a regular school based IEP since I was pretty much helping him by meeting his Sensory and OT needs with methods at home...so they both stated that if we put him in public school next year, we would all sit down with a big IEP pow wow and totally revamp his IEP to fit the needs in a classroom. This is where his speech teacher stated she did not want to drop his Speech off - when he is 1 on 1 and has all of his sensory needs met and he is focused, his speech is SO much better from where he was a year ago and almost all of his issues left are developmental but, when she observed him in a group atmosphere she saw a huge decline in his speech patterns because his system was so focused on all the other things around him that he lost the focus on forming his sounds correctly and many times you could not understand what he was saying because he would drop sounds. So she knew we were considering public school this coming school year and said that she was very leery about dropping speech since she knew once he was in a classroom then all bets were off with some of his speech patterns and she didn't want the IEP dropped since we would have to start from scratch all over again....she was SO happy when she completed the assessments and they showed that there was still cause for him to be staffed for speech. The OT assessments showed he very much needs to continue OT and if we do public school next year she said he would need quite a list of accomodations so that he could be successful due to his Dyspraxia....thanks so much for helping me understand the terminology better!

Students who qualify for 504 can receive related medical services such as injected medication at school (e.g. for seizures, diabetes, anaphylaxis.) I even know of a couple of people whose kids have one-on-one aides. These kids are disabled, but not necessarily in a way that substantially limits their ability to learn. It's more an issue of their ability to have safe access to school.

Schools don't like to provide more than "freebies" for 504 students because Section 504 is unfunded. But under the law, there is no restriction on the cost of accommodations. Legally, the school must provide FAPE (Free Appropriate Public Education) in the Least Restrictive Environment (LRE) to students, regardless of cost. Schools do get some government funding to pay for services for students with IEPs.

<sigh> Why can't they do this for gifted students?

Val

It really should apply to gifted students. The premise with FAPE is that ALL students are entitled to a free appropriate public education and that some students need special education services in order to HAVE a free appropriate public education. The rub is that no one is entitled to an optimal education, and there is still so much mythology about what advocates for the gifted are requesting, that it is too often interpreted as push for optimal rather than appropriate (a.k.a. adequate ). Sometimes I remind myself that special education has only existed as a public school service for 30-40 years--and it has been a bumpy road in terms of compliance. Perhaps one of these days the laws that led to special education will be used (successfully?) to make the case for gifted education. Sigh...A gal can dream....

Hi Belle,
I wanted to pass along some resources that were sent to me.

http://www.montgomeryschoolsmd.org/curriculum/enriched/gtld/docs/Twice%20Exceptional.pdf


http://www.cde.state.co.us/gt/download/pdf/TwiceExceptionalResourceHandbook.pdf




Happy Monday!
Taminy