How much progress is realistic to expect?

What excellent questions!!! I have the same concerns myself. My son has extreme difficulty with decoding. We have had this goal on the IEP for three years now and he still cannot read unassisted. He is now in 4th grade and the reading assignments have been such a burden because he can’t help himself. I questioned this and they told me that they continue to put it on the IEP because the reading selections are getting harder each year that he moves up. Well, aren’t the basic skills the same? If he knows the basic skills he should be able to read unassisted, not just pretend to read then not be able to answer questions about the selection. Obviously what they are doing with my son (for decoding) is not working. I requested an objective evaluation of his present grade equivalency in reading and am waiting for the results. Their method of reviewing progress is observation (80% accuracy in each skill stated on the IEP and teacher observation) but to me that shows nothing concrete of his progress. They disagree of course, but I think this is their way of not actually being accountable for progress. I too would like to know how much I should expect. We are a reading world. One cannot get by without being able to read. I’m not saying he needs to be a scholar but he should be able to decipher directions on a medication bottle or be able to communicate by reading and writing. His disabilites are not such that he is unable to do this, but rather I believe that it is the methods being used to teach him decoding that are not working. I really do not think that I should have to tell an LD teacher this.

Have you all asked these questions on the teaching reading
board?
I was able to get some pretty specific help when asking
a quesiton regarding my DS and our then current problem.

My own thoughts are never stop trying to get up to grade
level and keep trying different things. Along with instruction I’m also
looking at maturity and a finer tuning of coping skills that
will come with time.

Anne

I would keep working at it. I am an OG tutor and while she has made some excellent progress there is still clearly some more work to do with regard to being automatic. When you say she is almost done- do you mean with all the scope and sequence or just the straight phonological stuff? There is an entire sequence for decoding according to morphological conventions like word parts- roots suffixes and prefixes also. Typically elementary students don’t spend a lot of time with this but it would be appropriate for her now if she hasn;t already sone it. There is no reason why- based on what you have indicated anyway-that she could not decode at grade level. It really depends on her profile as a learner along with the instruction she is getting.
Robin

I was at a meeting this morning for rewriting an IEP with measurable goals. This seems to be a really confusing issue.

The lawyer is going to have the school use the percentile ranks from the Woodcock Johnson. However, this works because the student was given the same eval last year and then this year. It showed little to no progress and in some areas the percentile rank went down. He said using these tests and goals measurable in percentile ranks were the best way to go. That way if you say Susie Student will increase her Basic Reading Skills from 10% to 20% and next year you retest her and she is at 18% you know that she has made progress. He said using teacher observation, quizzing, test scores. Is a highly inaccurate way of measuring progress.

Also, he talked about having the program during the summer. He said children may have to relearn in the fall because they regress every summer. He recommended summer tutoring every week.

Maybe you should have your child retested and see where she stands. You may find that even though she has completed the program she has not made significant progress.

Just a thought, I spent two hours in the meeting listening to the attorney!! I have more info about IEP, law, and measurable goals than I knew existed.

Wow, good for you!!!!!! Your lawyer is exactly right. I’ve been fighting for this for many months now without the school giving an inch. But it is true, you need objective measures (actual testing scores) to help determine progress vs. regression. Teacher observation just does not cut it. What teacher is not going to say that the child is progressing especially if they do not have to use numbers to prove their opinion; and that’s exactly what teacher observation is, opinion. To parents or those who are not there to observe, we need numbers that are consistent with their observations. If they are not consistent (such as in progress) then something (or someone) is wrong. Basically it makes them not accountable for progress or regression. I hope they do not give you a hard time about this. Do you think the compliance was due to the fact that the lawyer was the one who insisted on this? What state are you in? Good luck and don’t let them convince you that the test scores mean nothing.

You’re asking excellent question and the answers to them aren’t written in stone.Your daughter is in the position of needing to catch up while keeping up and that can be a elusive goal.

I would say if you’ve given OG five years of time and possibly money, it might be time to call it a day - at least for a while. Her time might be better invested by reading on her own for 20-30 minutes a day in books she enjoys. She will not lose ground in her reading and likely she will gain more ground if she reads regularly.

It’s unlikely that while she’s in school that her homework will be done at the same rate as the naturally rapid reader. If she’s spending 2 -3 hours a night on homework, she needs it to take less time yesterday and continued tutoring couldn’t make that possible even by tomorrow.She could be offered modifications to her homework so that it does not take that much time.

It was definately because the atty was there. They tried to give him the run around but in the end it didn’t work. We are in Massachusetts and we are in the one of the top three largest districts in Massachusetts.

The school system gets a ton of money for special ed children. Unfortunately, they don’t always spend it on special ed. For example, if your child is going to be referred for special ed testing they ask you for you insurance info. Then they bill your insurance and when they get the money it goes into the general town fund. So your childs reading money could be filling a pothole!

This district is terrible, that is why we have the atty. It was expensive but worth every penny!!

K.

We have been using O-G tutor for almost one year now. She started her at level 3 and is a good way through level 5 now. Prior to that she worked with a tutor who used a combination of different programs but was not certifed in any one. She was also in our school district and we felt we wanted someone more objective from outside the school system. We called an O-G clinic asked for names of tutors that could provide advanced decoding skills. That was how we found our present tutor. We have always done the tutoring year round and as often as 3 times a week when we first started. Now she gets it once a week during the school year and twice a week during the summer.

This a little of this topic, but you mentioned in your post about calling and OG clinic. I am trying to locate a Wilson tutor. My school district supposedly only has two. One of them is absolutely fantastic but can’t do all the tutoring. I went to their website but it didn’t help!!

Any suggestions!

Thanks
K.

I had also looked into Wilson at one time. I emailed them at [email protected] and asked them for a list of certified tutors in my area and they mailed it to me.