What services to ask for?

>>Is it time to lay off the interventions and just let him get on with his life?<<

I know of what you speak ;-)

Maturity helps a lot.
I’ve seen this with my friend’s aspergers sons.
I see this with my own children. (17, 17, 13).

And listening to your ‘gut’ feelings.
And wanting to just be a ‘mom’ instead
of a drill instructor.

Realizing that one of the many things your
child has to learn are coping strategies because
some stuff can’t be completely remediated.
Letting your child find his way.

These may not be any answers, just random
musings.
good luck :-)

Wow, me at a loss for words. But I see myself and my son in what you describe and I am exhausted too.

I’m thinking the same thing, just giving everything a rest and see what happens, yet I haven’t come as far as you yet. You have been down a long road, haven’t you?

You are between a rock and a hard place though. Being in a private school, I imagine you are at the bottom of the totem pole and basically at their mercy; therefore, the lawyer.

My son has very little endurance or willingness to accept help. Everything is an intrusion to him, so we work that double edged sword. He needs it, yet he doesn’t want it. So, I’ve thought, what if I just let it all go and let him come to the realization that the assistance he did have (though far from being appropriate) is necessary to succeed in school. He is only 10 though, with some processing and perceptual problems so I wonder if this approach borders on cruelty.

I JUST DON’T KNOW. Do you ever wonder if it just you trying to do too much? I struggle with this all of the time. But I could not rest not giving it my all! I guess I always look for someone to tell me that I am doing the right thing by being persistent, which I know is the right answer. But this micro-managing just wears one down.

I’ve probably been no help since I have no clue what kind of services are appropriate. I’m still working on that one myself. But certainly empathize with you and wish you luck.

What does your gut tell you? I would take a cue from that. Mine hasn’t let me down yet.

What I would do if I was you would be to get the Test of Problem Solving Game from Lingui Systems and play that with your son and back off the therapy since he is SICK of it… It sounds like he has problems with logic and reasoning. My daughter has made tremendous gains over the years but again her lowest scores are in the logic and reasoning areas and things that the test of problem solving asks for. These type of skills are higher level skills congintively. Good luck…

Pattim’s the professional and I’m just another Mum but I was going to suggest the same sort of thing. We have tapes on teaching Logic from the rainbow resource room( a homeschoolers resource shop just add .com and you should find it- Introductory Logic from Logos School materials) and we have a CD from amazon.com called Zoombinis amazing logical journey which is addictive for kids and adults. I know it’s embarrassing to say , “Well, nevermind “to everybody-but seems they’d respect it more than just fishing. Good luck. TS Eliot at his age…. Sounds like my fantasy for my 6 yr old….

It honestly sounds like he is doing pretty good considering all the areas of deficit. You said he is fed up with the tutoring? Is he satisfied with his performance and/or frustrated at school? Those are the things I would factor in to make my decision.

Honestly, that quote through me - I had to re-read it several times. Perhaps he is a bit of a perfectionist. If you son is making solid B’s, likes school, not working too hard, I think I would call it off - unless I see something that made me concerned. JMHO.

BTW, my daughter is also making great grades; however, she still struggles with decoding (comprehension is way up) and now has presented with “mom, the word is stuck in my file (pointing at her head) and won’t come out.” We will probably now go to a SLP, but only b/c she mentioned it. Otherwise, hopefully, we are pretty much done with therapy except for finishing the LMB program and an occasional tutor in math when she gets in higher grades.

I would give him one more, Phono-Graphix. IQ has been proven that it is not fixed but fluid, too much good research to think otherwise. PG has helped kids where Wilsons and LMB hasn’t due to how it treats the advanced code. Main cause of low comprehension is the slowness of decoding those words with advanced code and MS words. After PG, give it a rest and let him practice what he has learned with your support. Use a lot of graphic organizers to help comprehension and do a lot of visualizing vocabulary. When he has a vocabulary word in whatever subject, have him draw the definition using colored pensils and crazy drawings. For example, when I was teaching US History, the word was boycott, I drew a wierd looking shopping cart, with a circle around it and a slash through it, ‘don’t shop there’. Ask if he can tape lectures although, private schools don’t have to adhere to an IEP but most do uphold a 504. Give him accommodations and let him practice the different strategies with support from you. I think that this is all you can do now. He has had so many programs that he may be on overload and he sure knows that he is different. His self-esteem is probably very low. As one psychologist told me when I had Jackie diagnosed, let her do something after school that she likes and does well. She danced, was in beauty pageants and modeled clothes. She had a great childhood even though she had a rotten experience in school and I credit what the psyc told me for that. There comes a time that you have to step back and do the best for your kid in school but remember, he will never have another time to have a childhood. Once it is gone, it is gone, don’t let him regret him not having one.

This kiddo’s at an age where your respect for him is important — so telling him that you really are proud of the incredible progress and effort he’sbeen making and if he would like to take a year and see what he can do without the extra stuff, you’d like to go for it— and use that energy and time to consciously look at strategies to improve his learning and comprehension. Good grief, he’s probably an expert on it by now :-) — and this “transfer” is by far *more* important than further incremental gains in skills.

Don’t set him up so that he feels like he has to get straight a’s — remind him every day if you have to ,that people learn the *most* when they are willing to make mistakes and instead of taking mistakes as judgments (that you shouldn’t have even been trying such a thing), to take ‘em as learning opportunities to grow from.

So during “tutoring time” those first weeks of school, figure out a long-term “study plan.” And do that cool stuff patti & UK mum said ;)

Is there any way that the homework can be modified or lessened or eliminated all together? I took away homework from my 12 yr old and it has made life better. most of the homework didn’t teach her anything and was a waste of time to her—I couldn’t live with the stress of trying to make her do it. She needed to concentrate on the tutoring I was getting for her—because it helped her make progress and homework did not.

My son, because of a mess to long to go into,
entered middle school in regular ed - not even
inclusion - the first thing I asked for was to excempt
him from spelling.

The teacher, who used to have a real inclusion class
until all her aides were whisked away, understood
and had no problem with that or any other modification
I asked for.

Anne :-)

Just a mom here…but I SO agree with Sue! Better to have a C in Eng. Lit and a good relationship with parents, especially at his age!

IMO, if he is doing reasonably at school (and that sounds reasonable to me!) at his age it is time to start spending time on his STRENGTHS, not his weaknesses…what are his talents? Go with Sue’s plan and give him free reign during the former tutoring time…but encourage him to use his time productively to feed his interests and talents…

best wishes,
Elizabeth

I would love to eliminate hoework but it really depends on the class curiculum.
In 4th grade,we were able to forgo most homework and concentrate on tutoring. In 5th grade ALL the homework assigments were integral to the teaching the next day. If the homwork wasn’t done, then he be lost/zone out during the school day. This was a huge burden on us because we were still doing tutoring also. It was the worst year of my life with my kids. Next year he will go to a private LD school where he is expected to do his homework on his own. It will be such a huge releif to the rest of us!

Thank you for all the encouraging comments. For Little Lulu and others—I was certainly not in this place two years ago or even one year ago. I, like Xena, was always ready to battle on. But at the beginning of this summer I started thinking that maybe what we have now is good enough. Even though he could clearly benefit from more remediation the ratio of cost to benefit now seems too high.

Patti M.—About Linguisystems Test of Problem Solving game—I looked at the website and assume the one you think is suitable is the one for ages 6-12—it looks like a game, while the one for older kids does not (uses newspaper stories, looked a bit daunting for my son).

U.K. mum—I’m impressed you use Introductory Logic—I actually have the book, but had put it away for the time being because it’s billed as targeted more for 8th grade. Have you actually used this at a younger age? I didn’t know about the videos—I would definitely use these if we went this route later on—thanks. I’ve heard a bit about the Zombinis—I’ve always wondered if it’s effective—is this your experience and is there a particular one you would recommend? BTW—the TS Eliot quote was not actually in a book Eliot wrote. It was in a DK Eyewitness book on the Future. He totally loves the Eyewitness books—I buy them as bribes. I scan the cover, cut it into puzzle pieces and give him a piece for each homework assignment finished before 7:00. When the puzzle is complete he gets the book. The puzzle making is a bit of a bother, but this is the only incentive plan I’ve used that’s been at least a bit effective.

Shay—son actually did phonographix for a couple of weeks. The language therapy place we went to was very big on it and suggested we try it. For various reasons it did not seem to be worthwhile in his case—he has always had high word attack skills, the teacher was not a great fit, and at the time some of the sounds that had to be practiced exacerbated his neurological disorder. After trying it a while, the head therapist decided it was addressing skills he already had and we went back to more language therapy.

I talked to the school principal today—it seems the school has acquired a special ed teacher for the first time so we now have the new possibility of having him get some help on reading/listening comprehension during the school day. If that could work out—it would be great. No more making arrangements every week and driving to appointments. I think I’m beginning to see light at the end of the tunnel.

The Zoombinis game is excellent. Have used it with almost 7 yr old but just 4 yr old can also do siimplest level and starting games. Both LOVE it and I’m always amazed when we find something like this on the computer that LD son will work nd work on it until he’s reached levels and learned things I didn’tthink he could do. Sometimes applying it outside is more of a leap but I think that comes in time and the skills have been learned, the connections made. What I gave you is it’s titleand available from Amazon for about $12 , I think.
I took symnbolic logic in college to get out of the higher math requirement and have always thought it should be taught in schools. The videos I reccommended are better than a book for my son because he learns well from videos. They say they are geared for kids starting at 8 according to the literature, but always depending on your 8 yr old…..They were about $50 from rainbow resource room, a website for homeschoolers which I got off this board, but amnot sure of the address at moment. The Phone no. on videos is (208) 883-3199 if you want to call and talk to those who made the video. It’s in Moscow, Idaho.????
The other CD I’d reccommend is Where in the World is Carmen San Diego. Son is history buff and so he loved this and the detective format. He even figured out how to get around the clues that have to be read. This should also be about only $10. Got ours at Woolworths. Just thought if he loves eyewitness stuff he’ll love this.
Good luck.
I found a quote that I sent out in return cards to all the high school graduation announcements I got this year. “Too much scholarly study is sloth”, Sir Francis Bacon. Maybe it applies to remediation too.

I think that you may try Visualizing and Verbalizing by Lindamood-Bell. It is a good program for comprehension/visualization and it is fun too. Go to their website to find out more about it or search this site.

I rented Where in the World is Carmen San Diego from the library. It was great but a little over my 8 year old’s head. Something similar for the younger crowd and very fun is Pajama Sam. It is so funny and cute, I even had fun with it. I will have to look for Zoombinis.
The library is a great source to get some of these computer games as a trial and then you can buy them if your kids really like them.

Uk mum—great quote—I am definitely looking into the videos. Linda—good tip on the library. We have the Carmen San Diego game—hasn’t piqued his interest much—possibly because it’s more geography than history. He has enjoyed the DK Castle Explorer game.

Shay, We did five weeks of LMB V/V intensive last summer. The center recommended six more intensive weeks (largely I think because of the TOPS-R score), which I was willing to do but he was in utter revolt—said I had ruined all his summers with therapy, which sadly is somewhat true, and in any case, according to him, he already knew how to think in pictures so he doesn’t need it. (I don’t agree with latter argument but it is too hard to press the V/V when he has this view.)

I’ve too often seen just stopping the structure being a bad thing. Really, use that same time that would be spent with the tutoring, figuring out study strategies (just go to “LD InDepth” and look in the “for teachers” section and you’ll find a menu to choose from).
Get out a calendar and start writing in assignments and when there’s a long term one, break it into pieces and plot out how it’s going to get done and done well. Think about the incredibly GOOD habits that can be formed — starting to study at the beginning of the year, not the night before the test.

The Visualizning and Verbalizing book is something most teachers should be able to pick up and follow, and it sounds like it would address his kinds of gaps — it’s for the parts that *aren’t* decoding, but more the making connections between the words and the ideas they stand for. (Now, it ain’t going to make a true *visualizer* out of folks like me… but it will make connections to the visual ideas.)

Daughter, almost12—CAPD, ADD, expressive language disorder, visual processing disorder; speech therapy for 4 years, FFWD 1 and 2, LMB V/V 5 weeks intensive, Writing Road to Reading, 6 weeks intensive, vision therapy, IM, PACE. (Last one did not seem helpful for her.) Much remediated, but school still not easy. All therapy done privately, goes to preparatory school, no accomodations, no IEP, A’s and B’s with massive parental imput.

I have dropped formal therapy with the exception of working on vocabulary development which is the only area where she scored below the 50th percentile on ERB testing this past spring (1st percentile.) Her test of problem solving in PACE (cribbed by PACE, I believe from the LB test) was low last summer, but I decided to simply work on that with math logic problems last year, and math was an area of strength this year. I don’t think more V&V would be useful at this point because like your son, she can think in pictures, and there is more to verbal dexterity than pictures. Pictures do not help you with analogies or similies (which is what a vocabulary test involves on the ERB, or for that matter the SSAT). I am sort of toying with Instrumental Enrichment, “http://www.zipcon.net/~highroad/ie.htm”, and I’m not sure I could do a good job working on it with her given my short fuse and both of us being burned out with therapy. If I hired a therapist to do it, instead of taking the training myself, it would cost $70 bucks AN HOUR three hours a week. It is, however what I would ask for if I had a lawyer saying, OKAY, money is no object and the time will come out of somebody else’s hide.

Right now my approach is three fold. First, Wordly Wise 3000. We are doing books 1&2 this summer (designed for 4th, and 5th grades), and expect to do books 3 & 4 next year (weekends only because of the homework load, and books 5 & 6 next summer.) I am also working on grammar and syntax using the book on diagramming sold by the Riggs Institute www.riggsinst.org, and am working on greek and latin roots with her. I also like some of the lessons in Language Wise (available from the Reading Reflex people at www.readamerica.net) although most of them are too simplistic.

–At one time I would try anything no matter the time or money expense—now I really want to do….nothing.

I can relate. I am thinking of sending her to a boarding preparatory school for high school partly to help her learn to organize without me, partly because my four year old would like to see a little something of me, and partly because I am so burned out…