Transfer to another public school

The ramnifications of this are rearing their head now…Her self-esteem is suffering from this already…My daugther was behind like yours was and I didn’t retain, I provided extra support and did some homeschooling on the side to keep her going…I

Send her on and provide all the tutoring and special support you can and that way the emotional sad effect won’t be as severe…

Some schools still push retention — it is NOT always appropriate. In my opinion, it is rarely appropriate, unless a child is also behind developmentally, small for age, socially immature, etc. Given your daughter’s reaction, I am thinking this might not be the best path for her. School is NOT just about academics — and this unhappiness will not just disappear. I agree with Patti — IMO, it is better to remediate, and not hold her back. Holding back could cause more problems than it solves!!!

Check into this — don’t just accept the school’s word/advice on what should be done. This retention could haunt you in far worse ways than a few years of ‘bad’ marks, and remediation is entirely practical provided you don’t depend on the school alone to get it done…

I hope you will keep posting here…there is lots of info on this site, and many good participants with loads of experience. Try posting on the ‘teaching a child with LD’ board, many great teachers there will give you their insight also…

Don’t retain! It’s a short term solution to a long term problem!

Okay, now I am having second thoughts about signing to say it is okay for her to be retained. As a parent in a room with all school personnel stating that they could not see passing her to the second grade because she could not comprehend the first grade material I felt that I didn’t want her to struggle either. As hesitant as I was I still signed for her to be retained. Now that her self-esteem is so low because of it, my heart is breaking for her.

With all of the summer tutoring and tutoring in the new school year could it be possible for her to be moved to the second grade during the school year? Or can I reverse my decision of retention if I have already signed?
They know I was very hesitant in my decision but felt pressured. Is this reversable?

I wish that she could just go to another school in our region so that she would not have to face her friends who have all passed on to the second grade. I am getting a letter from her psychologist that recommends a transfer due to her emotional state; does anyone know if this would be helpful?

and as a member you have the option of changing your mind at any time you darn well please in regards to your daughter’s educational program. I have some questions for you. Could the person who is doing the summer remediation program do an assessment of your daughter to see where she is now? Do you know what your daughters IQ is? Have you had her language and auditory processing tested? I am a speech pathologist so I understand the language and auditory processing piece very well.

Also, is your daughter being treated for her attentional issues that are interferring with her educational progression? If so is it working? Do books on tape to keep her up with her peers if her reading skills are interferring with her progression. I would keep her where she is and possibly do a home/school program so she can stay with her peers and also get her learning differences remediated. If she is comfortable with her peers her motivation will increase so she can learn and catch up with her peers.

To another school district or another school in your district? It’s entirely possible to transfer to another school in your district if your district allows it and I think you have good reasons for doing so.

Our district allowed our younger son to transfer from our nearest elementary school to one in the district slightly farther away - they even bused him to the new school.

Good luck.

My son, now 11, was just like your daughter. He basically ended first grade without reading. At the time, they told me not to retain. What I understand now is that they thought he’d never catch up anyway because he is LD.

Second grade was really a struggle. We did intensive tutoring and finally pulled him out mid year. School was just a baby sitter. He could not do the work at all. And he knew it and socially it was also difficult.

We had him repeat fourth grade after years of playing catch up. In retrospect, we wish we had had him repeat first grade. But the political climate at the time was no LD kid should be retained.

He did move to a different school…the parochial school his siblings were already at. He was mad at us for quite a while, even though he participated in the decision (and then changed his mind and we wouldn’t change ours).

For our son, it was a good decision. Socially, he does much better with the kids a bit younger. He has many more friends than he ever had with his age mates. We also had run into trouble with math and the extra year gave us time to remediate some of the underlying processing difficulties.

What repeating does is give you the gift of time. It takes years to make up what they lost in first grade. What I didn’t realize when he was in K and first grade was how far he really was behind…it doesn’t look like much but my son anyway really didn’t have the prerequisite skills for school. So he was always behind, less each year, but still behind. Now he is only behind in English and spelling—combination of never being taught because of pull out in public school, and language based disabilities, and handwriting (which will never be average). He was on the honor roll for the first time in his life.

But clearly the most important thing is what you or the school is going to do to remediate her difficulties, regardless of what grade she is in. Doing the same thing twice does not work, as you might guess.

Our neighbor child repeated third, after years of summer school. Their only regret was not doing it earlier. He is ADHD but not LD and was young for grade. He did not change schools and seems to not had any ill effects from it.

Beth

Thank you all for your great opions and advice; it truly helps to hear from others who have been there.

I signed for my daughter to be retained because I did not want her to struggle in the second grade. It is going to be hard enough with school all day and remediation in the evenings. I guess the only bright side to this is that she now has an IEP with 504 accomodations. It is just really scary for a parent who really doesn’t have the trust in the school system to do what they are supposed to. I know it is up to me to monitor that things get done but truly what parent is there with their child at school. My daughter seems to see the classroom as a social event and not a serious learning room and then top that off with a LD along with ADHD and ODD.

It is just really heartbreaking to find out that your child has these diagnoses and the only true dedicated education that is available to her is through specialty private schools for LD that cost thousands of dollars each year. It seems to me if your child is diagnosed with an LD that there should be better benefits for them other than special services in the public school system that take long enough to get in the frst place and with a tremendous fight and while trying to get these services your child is falling more behind.

I am truly emotionally exhausted in trying to do what is best for her without her falling behind.

If she doesn’t get the remediation and behavior modification she needs to succeed. If she isn’t focused in the classroom like you stated she sees it as “a social event” she won’t be learning if she is tuned out during instructional time even with retention.

Is she on the young side for her age?

I guess you could say she is on the young side for her age, late June b-day and a little immature. She is on Adderal 5 mg for concentration in the class but still if she is not getting the one on one she doesn’t do well around others when it comes to learning. I have had her up to 10 mg but it totally put her in a zombie mode. Maybe I will try 7.5 mg this year. Her IEP is pretty much written to help with her focusing issues. Hopefully this will help.

Regarding the transfer issue, we are in Montgomery County, and have had friends who tranferred their children to different schools for a variety of reasons, although it is getting increasingly difficult to do this. The best way to go is to plead a hardship case with a letter from the psychologist stating that your child needs to transfer schools for her psychological well being and that staying in the current school will cause psychological harm. We were able to get a hardship transfer for her child because of a combination of daycare and our child’s physical issues. Factors that sometimes affect transfer decisions in schools are impact on school diversity and whether or not the school population is at, under, or above capacity.

Before you get a transfer, be sure to investigate the other schools in your area and their track record with special ed kids. Talk to other parents in your county. If you are in Montgomery County, consider joining MCNeeds (go to yahoogroups.com. The name of the group is [email protected]), a list group of special ed. parents in the county. You can ask parents about their experiences at various schools and learn a lot about MCPS. A Yahoo group has just formed for PG county parents, called [email protected].

On the issue of whether or not to hold your child back, one thing to think about is her maturity and whether or not she is ready to handle the increased demands that on put on children as they progress through school. How is she doing socially? Is she on par with the other kids her age? We found for our children that the demands on second graders weren’t much different from first grade, but the demands on third graders were significantly higher in terms of work load and academic and social expectations. And the expectations grew significantly in 4th and 5th grades also.

Middle school is a few years away for your daughter, but one thing that I’ve noticed with my children and their friends (I have a 7th grader & a 9th grader) is that the kids who struggled through elementary school with social, academic, and organizational issues had an even harder time than the other kids getting adjusted to the demands of middle school.

Have you had your child tested? If so, what does her educational psychologist think?

In the end, follow your gut instincts.

Best of luck with everything

Lori