My child is in 4th grade - superior language arts, poor short term
memory, unorganized, trouble with math showing up more and more each
year, always needs to ask for directions/instructions twice, etc.
Noticed problem since 1st grade - long story short wasn’t till 3rd
grade she was tested via WISK III at parent/teacher request by school
psych. Took us 3 mos to get report - then it was end of school year,
summer already planned, nothing further was done. School
psychologist thought maybe inattentiveness disorder, my DH and I took
a long time deciding to go to a psychiatrist (as recommended by
school psychologist) or for independent educational testing my a
neuropsych - thinking perhaps there are learning disabilities which a
psychiatrist wouldn’t uncover. Seemed that school psychol was geared
up for “meds” fixing all problems. Meanwhile Sept comes and 4th
grade teacher is noticing difficulties and working nicely with me to
try to accomodate, but there is little she can do, and she tries to
one on one but really has little time for it. She repeats directions
constantly for DD … and DD comes home with homework (which is based
on what was done in class) and especially in math looks at it like it
is a foreign substance she’s never seen before. We work 1-2 hours
nightly on math - she’d get long division - do 1-2 problems and then
forget the sequence. Since we work so hard, she is getting it but
this is crazy working this hard with her, a LD specialist should be
doing it. 4th grade teacher and I requested that a Child Study Team
convene - (we did Conners rating scales, etc) which was done
12/03 … CST said she is a “difficult” child to analzye ‘cause of
huge discrepancies in skills … but only recommended that she be
tested by remedial math teacher to see if she qualifies for rememdial
math (she was tested, and she doesn’t qualify - actually scored in
5th grade level) … and they declined to refer her to CSE.
So, we took her for independent educational testing … $3000 (and
learned, when looking for a doc, that the school administered WISK
III was “abbreviated”, missing 4 parts of the test). DD was tested
for 12 hours over 4 days.(Wechsler Intell Scale for Children IV,
Children’s Category Test, Detroit Tests of Learning Aptitude IV, Wide
Range of Assessment of Memory a& Learning, Menyuk Syntactic Comp.
Test, Boston Naming Test, Raven’s Standard Progresssive Matrices
test, Trail Making Test, Rudel Denckla Cancellation Test, WISC III
Mazes) Test of VIsual Perceptual Skills- Revised, Benton Visual
Rentention Test, Niemark Categorization Test, NEPSY, Rey Osterrieth
Complex Figure Test, Stroop Test, Wide Range Achievement Test -3,
Gates MacGinitie reading Test, Compehensive Mathematical Abilities
Test) (Interesting with math, she scores high on these tests, but
does poorly in class on tests and in lessons).
Now I finally have the report… and have had many conversations with
the indep psych who tested her. Clear philosophy on her part is to
NOT label a kid if every criteria of a “disability” per DSM isn’t
met. So, she did NOT find inattentiveness disorder, though she found
many of the “symptoms” and recommended retesting in a couple of
years. She did NOT find “NVLD”, as (1) it isn’t in DSM and (2) she
doesn’t display the “social” aspect of that disability but does show
other aspects and she won’t “label” her or “box her in” if she
doesn’t have the full “disability”.
Wisk IV shows shows 144 (gifted) in comprenehsion, 92 perceptual
reasoning with extra time or tested beyond error limit, working
memory 110 and processing speed 97.
Essentially she concluded that these scores are a statistical
composite (with a 50+ point spread) and an underestimate of DD’s
strong intellect and a reflection of her learning disability.
Recommends that the eval should be reviewed with CSE and she should
be classified as having a LD in the “area of visual perception with
additional weaknesses in organization and memory functioning.” She’ll
have trouble with maps (5th grade work) … be lost when it comes to
geometry .. she discusses at great length the anxiety and rigidity
daughter demonstrates when “switching” gears or being overwhelmed
with too much info at once, but attributes it to a personality thing
rather than a “NVLD”. She does recommend other accomodations like
working with math specialist who can help her acquire verbal
mediation strategies to compensate for difficuties with spacial
perception and sequential operations … assitance of LD specialist
to help develop strategies for expository writing, memorizing large
volumes of factual subject matter … developing time management
skills and tackling visually oriented tasks such as reading maps and
timelines and that this help should be provided either individually
or in a small group with other very bright children, more time on
math tets … and psychotherapy to address rigidity within her
character style that is interfering with learning …
ANYWAY, what is my question here – and the question is premised I
guess in my fear that this indep eval won’t be “enuf” for the school
to agree to classify her LD and establish an IEP.
This is the school’s SPED busy time, they are reviewing IEPs already
in place, etc. They won’t set up a CSE meeting with me unless I
submit my independent report - and I know from speaking with a friend
that I won’t get an appointment till end of April, maybe even May. I
have no problem submitting the report, but the report by itself
leaves out so much info, like what 3rd and 4th grade teachers have
done to accomodate, meetings I’ve had with the teachers, stuff we see
at home … that the WISC done by school psych in 3rd grade was
missing tons of stuff …
I have drafted a VERY lengthy cover letter to go with the report, to
submit and request review of report and that a CSE meeting be set
up … emphasizing how time is of essense, using language hinting at
No Child LEft behind, compensations, accomodations, modifications,
(without being specific) IEP lingo, etc. and I’m not sure if I should
send letter (which has taken me hours and hours) or just a quick
cover letter saying “I am sharing this report with you, please
review, contact me so we can discuss setting up CSE”. I tried in my
letter NOT to suggest specific IEP stuff - just language hinting at
IEP, but to stress that help is needed NOW, and in 5th grade, before
middle school (which is 6th) because if DD does’t get help with
organizing, overcoming shutting down with new subject matter,
switching gears, etc. she is going to fall apart in 6th grade. DD
KNOWS something is wrong, and wants help (that is in letter). I can’t
see her anywhere but in regular classroom (or inclusion, which I’ve
heard has two teachers) and “help” by a qualified LD specialist …
when though? after school? during lunch???
I showed draft of cover letter to DD’s teacher. She liked it, it is persuasive, it shows we know our rights and the procedure and thinks it will help - but then again she isn’t very familiar with the politics etc of SPED.
My big fear is that they’ll read the report w/o my strong cover
letter and say “nope, no CSE warranted” because report doesn’t
GLARINGLY say LD LD LD LD LD with labels for each LD … OR they’ll
read report w/ my cover letter and I will have said to much and be
denied a CSE on that basis - or, cover letter will make DD a shoe in for classification and help. BTW, does IEP get created at the CSE meeting which first determines whether classification is in order. Is it possible SPED will call me and say she’ll be classified and then arrange an IEP meeting?
I’ve been working on the cover letter for 2 weeks, gave myself a
deadline of last Monday to submit it … and now it is Friday. I’m going to wait till MOnday now till I hear back from this group and others on Reed Martin.
What should I do re the cover letter. Submit the report with it or
without it?
Help please asap.
THanks in advance
Marsha
Re: URGENT! To send cover letter w/ Indep Educ Eval?
What is it that you want from the school? It sounds like you would like your child to fit the IDEA category of LD(look on this site under LD in depth, assessment and legal and legislative, and on your state dept. of ed’s web-site). Do you have achievement testing that shows her severely below average, or “X” standard deviations below? If the testing shows above average achievement and above average ability but the problem is performing in class, I would look for another eval of possible ADHD, to qualify her under Other Health Impaired for special ed. services. A big problem of outside evals is that they are not designed to qualify students for special ed. services, rather to diagnostically describe your child. What was the recommendation of the private evaluator? The school will not qualify her for special ed. on an outside eval you did on your own; so yes request in writing an eval.
one more thing
perhaps she does well one on one, specifically in the testing situation with the Neuropsyche. However, in the classroom she doesn’t have the executive functioning skills to monitor her attention, meaning she is easily distracted by other things that are happening in the classroom and gets easily overwhelmed. This is where a comprehensive assessment concerning how she uses her time in the classroom, when she checks out, what overwhelms her. There aren’t a whole lot of tests that the Neuropsyche has left for the school team to use. It looks like she pulled out all the stops…
Your kiddo sounds a lot like mine. The school has no idea what to do with him…
This *may* be a state by state thing. I very strongly recommend you contact the parent training center in your state and learn the local rules. The parent centers are listed someplace on this site but I don’t remember where. Must be my LD! :oops: On the schwabblearning.org site the state by state lists is under the “resources” tab, bottom of that page, middle column. I spend way too much time over there. Their bulletin board is the best I have found.
If your school is anything like mine, and they sure sound like they are, your cover letter will not be read. I can almost guarentee it. Here though, the DMS is ignored, more or less. A discrpancy mode is used. Achievement must be 1.75 standard deviations from IQ. They will only use their own testing. The value of the outside eval is it sets the IQ. If the school testing varies from that by much you can argue about it
The law however, if pretty clear in some respects. If you request, in WRITING, a child study evaluation, THEY MUST DO IT. And within a certain number of school days. Here it is 30 school days. I don’t know if that is state law or federal law. Again, this is something your local advocate can tell you. But, with weekends and breaks, 30 school days can be almost 8 weeks so you need to do this right away.
Good luck with which ever route you take,