teachers and school records

You would think so, but in my experience (merely a mom) most of them do not read the child’s record. I got so I would go out of my way every year to write a letter to each teacher describing our son’s LDs in the hopes of avoiding some of the insensitive things teachers have done to our child because they had not read his records.

I don’t know if there is no process at the beginning of the year to tell the teacher’s which kids have LDs or whether some teachers are told and aren’t interested enough to follow through by reading their records.

Whatever the case, it sure is disappointing and frustrating.

We set up a special before school meeting with our
son’s SE teacher and, nope, she didn’t even glance
at his file before we got there.
In fact, she had to get up, dig through a filing
cabinet and find the record.

I also contact each teacher before school.
I either meet with them (most important
in language and social studies).
Other teachers I contact by email or send
a letter, then make it a point to talk to
them at back-to-school night.

Anne

I have done the same as Anne and set up a meeting before the school year started or during the first week just to let them know my daughter had an IEP which gave her extended test time (among other things) and to share a few strengths and weaknesses. These are always brief because the teachers don’t know her yet but I find it opens up communication for the rest of the schoolyear. I am a speech-language therapist and have worked in public schools for years so I know things can fall through the cracks.

I agree with you but few of my colleagues do. In fairness to them, some of the files are very thick with almost hundreds of papers in them. They become very hard to read.

Teaching has a different outlook that medical care. Doctors would never dream of not looking in a patient’s chart but that’s not the way of teaching. Medicare care looks to heal a person and teaching looks to get the person to be compliant to the needs of a group. Often schools don’t encourage teachers to read the files.

So sadly I’d tell you it’s common in my school for teachers not to read files. Even when they do, little comes of it. Teachers can rarely adopt dramatic changes in their teaching style or their classroom practices.

If though your child has IEP, teachers are supposed to follow that IEP by law. You could make some noise around that. If he does not have an IEP, there’s sadly not much if anything they have to do even though they should.

You are so right! Great analogy. I’m just so sad that it has to be this way when all of the info is right at their fingertips. It would make things easier and more productive if everyone where on the same page for these kids. Thanks for your input.

I wonder if some don’t read them because they don’t want to judge the child right away. Last year when we moved to our current district the teacher read my sons file before classes began. She said it painted a certian picture in her head of what to expect. She later told me she wish she hadnt read it because it painted the wrong picture of him. After he was in her class for half the year she decided to ask for a new eval because what she saw did not match my sons records. He was re-evaluated and found not to be retarded like the 1st district had thought. In defense of the 1st district though my son is on the autism spectrum and was very hard to test when he was 1st evaluated. Just a guess as to why maybe some teachers dont read the files. You would expect them to though after having the kid in class a while.

Most of my colleagues give that as their reason but…. I don’t quite buy it. The reality is - it’s a lot of work for me every year at the busy beginning of the year to read all those files and I’m a pretty fast reader. Unless you’re a really strong and fast reader and have a good memory of what you read, the files just aren’t helpful. There’s too much stuff in them. I like to read them to get a sense but, as you say, I go into the files whenever I have a question about a student.

Files in schools are really kept to protect the school, not the child. I think it comes down to that.

Teachers are very overwheled at the begining of school. Alot of times the students change classrooms at the last minute and the teacher does not have the time to get and read the file.
As a teacher I would hope the parents of the child would let me know from the very begining what is going on with the child. Sometimes the files contain information that is outdated and not relevant to today. This can be very confusing for a teacher who has to look at at least 20-30 files.
I do go to the files when there is a question or concern. But to try to read them all at one time is very overwhelming.
Teachers are trying thier best to help each child. As I stated earlier, if you would let the teacher know at the begining it would save a lot of trouble for the teacher and the child.

Please tell me that I misunderstand what you said. “Files in schools are really kept to protect the school, not the child. I think it comes down to that.” I can’t believe this is true! I cannot believe that a teacher would say this. I’ve always tried to make the effort to refrain from the US vs. THEM mentality when it comes to dealing with the school even though my gut tells me that this is how it is. But if this is true it does change my perspective. WOW!!!!!

They have to document everything they have done with a child to cover their tails.