Reviewed my oldest sons IEP he has met all the goals set forth for him in April. The problems is although they solved the pressing problem at the time I don’t believe they addressed the underlining issues. His goals were: Will make up all work when absent, will turn in daily assignments on due date, will review for tests by reviewing notes and memorizing important information, will seek assistance from teacher when needed, will take needed materials to class each day, and will keep notebook and will write down assignments with due dates. As you can see the school felt his difficulties with reading and writing was due to the fact he had so many missing assignments—if you are not doing the work how can you learn anything. Now he is doing all the work and on time. He is listening and taking notes best he can in all classes. He is studying for tests and has sought the teachers help. Observing him though I notice that although he is now more persistant and follows things through his areas of weakness still significantly impact him. Here is what I mean. On the ISAT and the MAT7 he scored below grade level for reading, he is given a reading assignment in Lit of reading a short story from the text. They have 55 minutes to read the 10 pages, should be plenty of time for 10 pages, he gets half way through. Last night when writing his labortory report for science it takes him a good 3 hours although he already had all the information and just had to intergrate it into a short paper. His IEP contained no reading goals, if a child tests below standards on the state mandated test don’t you think there should be reading goals? He was not even close to meeting standards. Should it take more then 55 minutes to read 10 pages? He read only 5 in this time. Yes we have worked on reading with him at home. When he reads out load to us it is very halting, very monotone, very labored. What should I ask the school to do? Just provide books on tape?, should I ask for direct reading instruction. His reading level although behind did not qualify him for title 1 services. He is in 9th grade with about a 7th grade reading level. Just kind of at a loss to help him progress further. He has made many nice gains and not sure if I am just expecting too much.
Re: IEP goals met--but.......
Laboured and excessively slow reading would worry me a lot. You say his reading level is 7, but that obviously must be untimed. I don’t remember – what have you done for reading? How is his decoding?
By the way, in my experience the very worst thing you can do is to pressure him for speed at this point; he’s already near exhaustion and that would be the last straw. But better decoding skills, not just knowing, but overlearning and making them automatic, can take away a lot of the excess effort and lead to better speed.
Re: IEP goals met--but.......
Victoria, Yes if given time he can read and comphrend at this level. When he was reading his 9th grade text the 5 pages he read in 55 minutes he was able to comphrend it all but 55 minutes for 5 pages is a long time. He had 1 to 1 reading instruction at the beging of last year when he went from a 3rd grade level to where he is presently at which depending on test given is between 6th and 7th. His tutor felt he had a lot of backround knowledge which he uses as a coping skill. Unfortunately due to scheduling conflicts she was only able to work with him the 1st 4 months of school. I have been looking for a good tutor but they are very hard to come by in this area. They do have a Sylvan learning center but I can not afford their asking price. I have purchased Great Leaps to work with him at home but school and homework have him so wiped I almost hate to ask him to give more. Last night he worked on homework for 4 1/2 hours straight, yes solid work without being distracted or inattentive. He gets home from school at 1515 and takes a break from that time until 1800 because he needs to recharge his batteries. He is totally drained when he gets home from school and again after putting so much effort in doing his homework. The good news is he wants to do it. He does not want his work cut back he wants to do what the other kids are doing. He is doing very well in all his classes with the exception of Lit. In his social issues class the type of classroom instruction is group discussion and debate, it is a very interactive class and much up his learning alley. In science it is again group work but it is hands on with lots of visualization, again up his learning alley. In his math class they also do group work, group discussion, use dry earase boards at their desk, and use lots of repetition again right up his alley. I have noticed a significant increase in his vocabulary, ability to see things through, attention to detail ect. This is why I believe his reading deficit can be improved and I think the school should help us to get there. We as parents do what we can by partner reading ect with him but there is only so many hours in the day.
Re: IEP goals met--but.......
4 to 5 hours a day of homework is excessive. Please work to find him a life besides school. This was depressing just to imagine. Suppose God had placed him here to be a great artist, musician, baseball pitcher…?? Please continue searching for help.
Lisa,
I would agree with you that he should have remediation in reading but as an accommodation in the meantime consider joining Recording for the Blind and Dyslexic and get his textbooks on tape of CD.
http://www.rfbd.org/
Helen