DownSyn Forum

kittycat3376 · Posted: September 24 2007, 11:53 PM Post subject: Cassie's IEP meeting

Cassie is going to a new school this year for 4th grade, her old school is now only K-3rd. For now she is still only going to get speech therapy, but we have started the ball rolling on the documentation to get her IEP extended to math later if necessary.

I really like Cassie's new teacher. She was a special ed. teacher for nearly 30 years, and I am confident that if Cassie starts to fall behind in any areas she will notice and notify me immediately. She has agreed to gather the results from Cassie's WASL (Washington Assessment of Student learning) and another placement test and put them in Cassie's file, so they will already be prepared if I have to request an IEP evaluation. She has even offered to tutor Cassie one-on-one before or after school a couple days a week if she does start to struggle so that we can get her IEP eval. done without her falling back even farther.

So far this year the class has been reviewing, when they start on the new curriculum if she starts needing an extraordinary amount of time to finish her math homework the school has already agreed that, as soon as I call them and report this, they will start the IEP process. Last year, I kept telling her teacher that she needed two to three hours to do a single sheet of math homework. The teacher and the school just kept telling me that she wasn't falling behind in class. That's because I was spending two to three hours a night helping her to understand the work at home! It's as if they wanted me to stop helping her and just let her fall behind before they would do anything about it!

I feel sooooo much better about Cassie's new school and new teacher. I am so relieved to feel like they are actually listening to me.

_________________
Christina Wade
mom to Keith; 8-4-94 (ADHD), Cassie; 4-24-98 (DS-mosaic), and David; 5-5-06 (DS-trisomy 21)

http://3specialkids.blogspot.com/

pookeymom · Posted: September 25 2007, 6:31 AM Post subject:

What a relief for you I'm sure. I hope this school year is a great one for Cassie.

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Mom to Tristin 10, Camille 6, Elijah 4, Caleb and Isaac 2

www.firstgiving.com/HanzelyTwins07

momofrussell · Posted: September 25 2007, 7:01 AM Post subject:

Glad they are listening to you too! It's kinda hard to have team meetings and do what's in the interest of your daughter if they aren't listening to you!

A.

_________________
2007 St. Louis Buddy Walk Regan 14 (and a half), Russell 9 (and a half) DS, Autism, Visually Impaired, Reece 7.

ecki · Posted: September 26 2007, 10:26 PM Post subject:

Sounds like she's going to have a good year!

It's nuts that your kid should have to fail at something to get more help. It was a big debate in one of those parent training groups I attended. Do you let your kid fail so the school will do something or do you spend the whole bunch of extra time (or money for tutoring) so they can keep up but the school takes the credit for "educating" your kid??

_________________
Ecki

MomMom of Kayla (Ds/Autism 4/5/04) and Laurie (PDD-NOS 7/12/01)

Our Blog - Opposite Kids
Kayla's Story http://www.ecki.com/kayla/

kittycat3376 · Posted: September 26 2007, 11:14 PM Post subject:

ecki wrote:

It's nuts that your kid should have to fail at something to get more help. It was a big debate in one of those parent training groups I attended. Do you let your kid fail so the school will do something or do you spend the whole bunch of extra time (or money for tutoring) so they can keep up but the school takes the credit for "educating" your kid??

EXACTLY!!!

It is so much harder for a child to catch up than it is to stay on track once they are caught up. It took 5 years of very hard work for my sweet little girl to get up to grade level. I WILL NOT sit back and let the schools sabotage that and ruin my daughter's will to learn.

It's also more expensive for the school to provide 5 times as many services once they are failing than it would be for them to provide the services needed to keep them from failing. You would think somebody in the damned district would have a better eye for long term cost efficiency.

_________________
Christina Wade
mom to Keith; 8-4-94 (ADHD), Cassie; 4-24-98 (DS-mosaic), and David; 5-5-06 (DS-trisomy 21)

http://3specialkids.blogspot.com/