auditory processing questions

It sounds like your child has some real laterality issues which causes reversals. You may want to inquire if they will evaluate for laterality issues and address them.

Get an OT and a speech eval. Ask the therapists what they know about reversals and laterality.

Don’t just accept the eval from the school psych make sure the therapists are involved as well. My experience is that a psych will give you a lable but the therapists are better at directly addressing the underlying deficits which is definitely the way to go with a child this young.

Also inquire about reading programs. You want something based on either wilson, phonographix or linda mood bell. Make sure that the program they use to help her with reading is intensive and based on developing phonemic awareness. Anything that sounds like whole language is a waste of time. I also don’t have much use for a very popular program that is used in schools called reading recovery.

My child is certainly dyslexic or was dyslexic but he could learn to read well with the correct reading methods done intensively and vision therapy. I think if you start young this could be done with almost any child. I am not saying it can be done easily but that it can be done.

There could also be memory issues involved. She hears correctly but simply can’t keep it in her mind long enough. HOw is her digit span?

Give her a random sequence of numbers, allowing 1 second in between. Have her repeat it back after you have said it ONLY once. I would expect her to be able to do 6 at her age

There is no reason to sign the IEP on MOnday. Feel free to ask to take it home and discuss it with family, doctor, folks here,etc.

They are most likely going to want you to sign Monday and, in all fairness, they are under legal time constraints, but if you truly want to wait, WAIT!

Is your cousin worried she wont be in enough programs or that they will put her in something she doesn’t need? Are you on the same page as she is?

IMO the school will give you the bare minimum and you do not have to worry about getting services she doesn’t need

between her vision, auditory and executive functioning issues all impacting her successful acquisition of reading.

If her processing speed is low that could be indicative of executive functioning issues (ADD in layman’s terms). I had all 3 issues myself as a child. Don’t leave any stone unturned in order to give her the foundation she needs for success.

They currently have my child in what is called “achieve” for reading. They tested all the kids in the beginning of the school year and she was flagged for help mostly based on problems with visual memory. I immediately started questioning why she was having difficulty and started with an eye exam because I know she is slightly nearsighted. From there we were sent to a vision specialist. Inbetween this the classroom teacher asked about doing the speech language evaluation as a place to start on their end. Since then we’ve found out about the vision and processing problems. The only person in the schools to do any evaluation has been the Speech language specialist. I am having a private evaluation done and bringing the results to the school in December. I’ve been told by the school social worker that most likely the cst will just take the results that I bring (which will be from both doctors) and work from there.

The Achieve program is multisensory and seems to have made a difference. My daughter also works with another teacher in a very small group of students on reading in the regular classroom. She has made great improvements and is now at grade level in reading. However, I know she is there only because we are very lucky to have very caring teachers and she has had daily one on one or very small group help. My thought on this was to wait for a diagnoses and then seek out a program that will fit. Her teacher is very concerned about her reversals. If the teacher tells her to go to page 25 she will go to page 52.

My cousin’s point was to not let the school determine or diagnose my daughter but rather my doctor. She works in the district and is an early childhood expert. Her feeling is that at times when they decide what something is they don’t easily change their minds if you come in and say it’s something else. As far as being on the same page, I don’t know. I trust her and will be talking to her again this weekend. This whole thing is new to me and if somebody had told me a year ago or even three months ago we would be where we are now I would not have believed them. However, in retrospect all of those little quirks and odd things that we all just thought were my daughter’s personality now fit a puzzle and make a lot more sense.

Linda, please clarify what you mean by “laterality issues.” I have done tremendous amounts of research helped by the fact that I am an educator. However, like I said, it’s all new to me! Actually, the same thing I went through when my older child was diagnosed with asthma!

marycas, I don’t think we are talking about an actual iep yet. It was a check box that had next to it “to discuss the IEP, basic plan and instructional guide.” As of right now, there has been no CST involvement. We have an i&rs meeting in December where all of this will be addressed and there will be some decision on how best to help my daughter.

Which brings up another question. Is she better served by a 504 plan or an iep? Everybody seems to have a differing opinion on this one. As an educator myself I have seen plenty of both plans. I like that a 504 covers everything where an iep doesn’t always cover all classes. However, I am hearing it is harder to have a 504 enforced even though it’s enforceable by court because of the differences in funding. Any opinions here.

I know I’m getting longwinded here. Sorry! This is my baby I’m talking about! My thought is to hear what the evaluation results are and the suggestions. Take it with me if it’s anything I’m not sure about and just hold off on decisions until after our private evaluation the following week. All suggestions are greatly appreciated and I thank you in advance.

Jen,

I am not sure what you meant about a 504 covering everything and an IEP does not. I’d have to say it is the opposite. You have much more with an IEP. However, the difference is that with an IEP, the child needs special education services to be successful in school. A 504 only provides accommodations.

So basically, has she had a speech-language evaluation or just a screening? If she has had an evaluation, then it sounds like they want to discuss the results and possibly do an IEP for that area if she qualifies. And she’d likely qualify with the issues you have mentioned. I can see no reason whatsoever not to go ahead and begin speech-language services. If your private report comes back in December and indicates there are other issues, then you call another meeting then. But if the strategies they are now using to help her with reading are successful, she may not need special education at this time for reading. If at some later point she qualifies in another area for LD, for example, then speech-language would become a related service.

Are you having an APD evaluation done as part of your private testing?

Janis

It sounds like she really needs different teaching — which means IEP, *if* what the school does fore “different teaching” is what will work with your child. IF you’re lucky, they’ll have qualified teachers and will figure out what she needs and teach her that way. Just don’t assume that because they *say* (and/or sincerely believe) they will do that/are doing that that it is happening.
Learning is invisible. There are lots of different models for how to work with problems and there’s a tendency for “elevator diagnoses” — depending on what expert looks at you (which floor on the metaphorical diagnostic center you get off at), you’ll get a different diagnosis and treatment recommendation. There are a lot of approaches that don’t have a lot of research backing, but succeed with a lot of people. WHen it’s your kiddo you don’t really want to wait for research.
That said, I think for reading I would investigate that auditory angle. Those kinds of slipups are red flags for a language processing problem. I don’t know about laterality and therapies for getting the brain to work with itself better.

Janis, it was an evaluation that involved several tests over a period of days. That was my understanding anyway. The private testing will include a physical, social development history, neurological exam and age appropriate cognitive testing. I believe it will be covering all areas and that’s part of why I’m doing it. Mostly, it’s a matter of speed. Also, I feel like it’s all bits and pieces right now and maybe this could help to tie it all together.

Regarding my personal experiences with 504s and iep’s— in the content area that I teach I get students that fall under both as well as regular education students. Maybe my experiences are not typical but it doesn’t leave me with a good feeling about some of the CST people in my district. Some of them I highly respect but not others. In my experience the 504 accommodations will cover the student regardless of what course they are taking and actually seem to be pretty detailed. In my school (don’t know about others) it is stressed to teachers that we are accountable by law to follow 504s.

The iep’s that I have in my desk really seem to be no more than a standard checklist of a variety of accommodations with a list of courses that can be checked at the top. The things listed are anything from the “a highly structured classroom” to “more time on work,” etc…. Anyway, the idea is that the classes that the accommodations are applied to are checked on the top. They give me these iep’s but in 9 out of 10 cases my subject area (art) is NOT one checked off. The explanation is it’s a regular education class. The student is mainstreamed and should be able to handle the class as it is. In many cases I am the only regular education teacher (except maybe phys ed) that the student has. So, I am not supposed to make any exceptions. However, I am sympathetic and I feel that if a student needs the accommodations I give them what they need to be successful—especially since my course does involve academics as well as hands on projects. I also can’t tell you how many times as the required special education teacher I’ve been asked to sign an iep without even being at the meeting because all they need is my signature. I also can’t tell you how many times I’ve made suggestions when I am at an iep meeting that I thought would be helpful to the student and found out when the new iep was written nothing I suggested was in it. Unfortunately, it is the students who suffer in all this. We have a new team in my school this year and have just started to review the ieps so maybe there will be an improvement.

So, all of that was some of my personal experiences but like I said lately I’ve been hearing more people suggesting an iep as the better of the two options. I have the feeling the school will want to go with a 504 because she is currently worked up to grade level. However, if that’s not really the best option then I want to push for what is best for my child in the long run. I also worry that a 504 will not be honored as well at the middle school level. I want to be as informed as possible when I go to meetings that involve these important issues and obviously many of you have had much more experience than I have in dealing with these issues.

Hmmm…. I think I would ask for an IEP — and then see if I could get the same papers as you have for 504 accommodations to go along with it. Since people are accustomed to those and know how to handle them, it will be routine — but in the files there will also be that IEP.
When I taught middle school we had a whole category of “self-contained” kids who took “regular” electives. There was an unwritten policy that they got C’s if they tried hard and behaved, D’s if they sort of tried hard and usually behaved. Expecations were abysmal — nobody was expected to learn anything. I suppose teachers thought the socialization was good for them or something. THey’d do “copy from the encyclopedia” assignments to make sure they had enough “passing” written grades.
Sometimes I could sneak in and get a test read to a kiddo but it was definitely not part of the infrastructure.

My son’s optometrist writes in the evaluation laterality/reversal issues. These have been mostly cleared up.

Laterality is establishing a good sense of right and left. This does not mean kind of knowing right from left but really having established hand dominance along with an automatic ability to identify the right from the left.

I think the audiblox people explain this well.
http://www.audiblox2000.com/learning_disabilities/letter_reversals.htm

Okay, that’s what I thought — it’s one of those areas that are considered unproven by the Establishment. (Notice I’m careflly not aligning myself with either :-))

Jen,

Then those situations you are speaking about regarding IEP’s were incorrectly handled. You, as a teacher of that child, SHOULD be giving input as to the accommodations the child would need in your class. I imagine no one would be able to make those recommendations besides you. So my suggestion is to write a note to parents for whom you have that concern (and copy to the special ed. teacher) and tell them their child needs accommodations in your class and that you need to either be invited to the meeting or else be able to submit those accommodations. Special ed. teachers may not have the expertise in art, music, etc. to make appropriate recommendations for accommodations and the parents probably can’t either. And to be very honest, the elective teachers in my school would have an attack if they had to attend every IEP meeting for every child in the school with an IEP! Most IEP teams really are most concerned with the academic classes, it is true.

But as a parent, you can see that your own child’s IEP accommodations are appropriately written. My child would have “read aloud” for all tests in every class including computer, for example, until her reading level is where it needs to be. You can suggest all the accommodations you want for art, computer, music, PE, etc. Technically, your accommodations SHOULD be the same regardless of whether you end up with a 504 or IEP. The difference lies in whether specialized instruction is needed. And truthfully, so often we find that remediation must be done privately anyway. So you may be fine with the 504 if you intended to get private reading therapy, if needed.

Janis

You could say that about pretty much everything I have done with my now regular ed child.

I am so sorry that I listened to that, “But it isn’t proven” stuff in the beginning.”
I could have saved my child a lot of pain.

Well, today is the meeting so I should have some more definitive answers as far as what we are actually dealing with. It’s been months but I’m finally feeling better about all of this—though still confused at times—because at least we are beginning to find out where the problems are. We will also be getting the report card today!

Thank you again for all of the help!

Well, we had our meeting—sort of. The SLP called and said her car broke down or something like that so she talked to me on the phone. She said my daughter had good use of language and was fine in that area with only minor articulation problems. She said she found very definite problems with memory—all types. Also, sequencing as was mentioned here and a couple of other related things. I don’t have the report because she wasn’t there. She says she’ll have it to me next week. She wants to have an iep for SL services. However, when I asked a question about her iep and the upcoming meeting to discuss how to handle my daughter’s education (iep or 504) she decided to wait until then. She said she will attend that meeting. She did tell me that she can only test for certain things and she felt that there was more to the picture than what she could see.

Jen,

It sounds like your child will probably need an IEP unless you choose to have private services. I want to recommend that you be sure the CTOPP (Comprehensive Test of Phonological Processing) is part of her private test battery. That is one of the important tests in identifying a reading disorder (dyslexia). One of the three composite areas is Phonological Memory. If I had to guess, I’d bet the school SLP gave her something like the TAPS-R and that is where she saw the memory issues. It should show up on the CTOPP, too. If so, be prepared for further reading problems, especially if either the Phonological Awareness and/or Rapid Naming composites are low as well. I would ask if this test will be done in the private battery, and if not, I’d want to know what they are using. You need to be sure you’re getting appropriate testing if you’re paying for it! My child and one of my students happen to have the poor memory issues and that is why I am pretty familiar with that profile and the difficulties with reading. But as I think someone else said, it is important to be sure whether there are other factors such as ADD involved.

Janis

SL services means an IEP but teh SLP may not have wanted to say anything like that without checking with her bosses. Hopefully they’ll not tell her “no, we don’t want another IEP, we can’t afford any more services.”

Thanks Janis, for that tip on the type of test. I am going to write that down. The one the SLP used was the Ross Memory test—no pun intended—if I’m remembering correctly. She really was not going over things real thoroughly even though I was asking questions and taking notes. She kept saying she’s sending me the report. If by phonological awareness you mean recognizing letter sounds then my daughter will definitely test low. She can pass a spelling test but has great difficulty matching letters to their sounds when trying to write. I’m not sure what you mean by Rapid Naming Composites.

Sue, the SLP explained that in order to provide the SL services she does need an iep and she wanted to meet next week to do that. She said she can help with the articulation and memory issues. I was asking her questions about the impact of her iep on whatever is decided on 12/12 in the i&rs meeting. She explained that her iep will be integrated into the overall iep if that’s what is decided is best for my daughter. If it’s a 504 then we would have that with an iep just for the sl services. I understood her to mean that since we are meeting on the 12th to determine what services are needed overall that it made sense to hold off on her slp iep until that time since it’s only a week later.

Jen,

I don’t think that is correct. If she has an IEP which states her needs, all her needs and accommodations would be listed on that. You would not have both an IEP and separate 504. Even if she only qualifies for speech/language services, those deficits STILL have an impact on most if not all academic areas. So the needed accommodations for every subject will be specified on the IEP…even if the only service is speech-language. But, if the private testing, for example, identified a learning disability, then LD would become the primary category and speech-language would become the related service. But there is still one IEP which addresses all the needs.

If you are interested in the CTOPP, here is a nice article which explains it.

http://alpha.fdu.edu/psychology/comprehensive_test_of_phonologic.htm

Janis

There’s sort of a semantic issue — an IEP should also include any accommodations such as those that would be included in a 504. The civil rights you get with the 504 are the same ones. So if the way they handle the paperwork is to stick a 504 onto the IEP, ***if*** it’s not a “here’s our menu, we don’t care about the kiddo, pick from it ‘cause it’s what we offer” situtaion, should be an acceptable way of managing accommodations. (don’t know of lawsuits about it or anything so this is not a “legal opinion”…)

Janis, thanks for the article. It did answer my questions.

Could the iep thing be a state or district difference? When I signed for the SL evaluation she told me that her services fell under spec ed but had nothing to do with the CST. Therefore a regular education student could have a SL iep and receive spec ed services just for that but not be classified a spec ed student overall. I believe that is how we could have a 504 with only a SL iep. However, as you stated if there is an iep overall it would include the SL services as part of that iep.

Yesterday the 504 coordinator for the school also explained that the biggest difference would be that with an iep my daughter would be eligible for more services that she may need but both plans would make the same accommodations. The more I am finding out the more I am thinking she will need an iep. It seems that at every turn the cards are stacked more against her. However, I am more amazed at her intelligence. I knew she was bright and that’s what clued me in on day 1 that there was a problem. I knew it couldn’t be just for no reason that she was having trouble. Granted she struggles but to think she can be doing as well as she has been is amazing to me!

Jen,

There certainly are some differences in states, but I still think that if your daughter only has the S/L IEP, the intent of the law is that all her needs be addressed there including accommodations in all classes. If they are not doing this, then I think they are completely misunderstanding the whole meaning and intent of an IEP. See, an IEP does guarantee section 504 rights, so it is totally unnecessary to have a 504, too. I just saw Sue’s post, and I think we see it the same way.

Here is some information about 504’s vs. IEP’s:

http://www.wrightslaw.com/info/sec504.summ.rights.htm

Let us know what happens!
Janis

Wow! Janis, thanks again! I get what you are saying. So, at my next meeting I can bring this up and be even more informed. Just makes me wonder more about what I am dealing with sometimes. The SLP definitely told me what I stated last — 504 + iep for SL services!

Jen,

Let me say that she may be right that the district does it that way. It’s just that I think it is incorrrect. It does pay to be an informed parent, because schools DO tell parents wrong information all the time. I am a special ed. teacher and I have seen it happen from the inside. I also have a child with a speech-language IEP (and APD), and all her classroom and testing modifications are on that IEP, as they should be. I am considering changing her to primary LD, though, depending on how the school testing turns out. I think we can place her based on our private testing, but I want ot be sure there will be a benefit before we give her the label. And I’m quite sure that is at least partly what your family member was thinking.

Janis

Just an update on this post. My daughter had a complete neurodevelopmental exam. The results are AD/HD inattentive with primary area of concern being temporal/sequential working memory. The doctor started her on Concerta and already in just a few days seems to be helping her. I’m skeptical that there is not more to this picture as far as perceptual issues but I am not a doctor. My daughter does have to be remediated but in many of the tests was able to perform at a 3rd grade level (she’s in 1st). Because of this diagnoses we will most likely have a 504 plan since she does not need any more services than she already has. The doctor advised against the speech language services because the medication should address the memory issues and the articulation problems are very minor. However, the doctor’s biggest reason is that my daughter also has some pretty significant anxiety issues and so at this point it may be better to have as “normal” a routine as possible since she already does VT and it taken out of the class for remedial reading help. The one thing the doctor said was to make sure that it is written into the 504 that the plan be open for revision at any time for any reason.

Jen,

I am so glad you got an evaluation! I hope you find the medication very helpful. It can make a hige difference for the kids who really need it. And hopefully that will take care of the academic issues. Let us know!

Janis

Thanks Janis! We are very hopeful and have seen some very positive signs already!