I have a meeting Monday with the local school board to decide if they think my son should be tested. I have posted on here b/f under ebeth.
He is 11 and has a C average in everything but math. He has almost failed math for the last two years and is failing now. He has a 54. I need to know how to argue my point. He has just since January accumulated 32 demerits after never being a problem child. Of course, they say he is just hitting puberty.
The weird thing is he has brought his grades up about 15 points in the last month because the last chapter has been on geometry. I know the board is going to try and say this proves he can do better, but for some reason he is good at geometry. I read somewhere that with kids who have math disabilities, geometry is easy because it involves angles and logic. But I need some facts or proof to argue with.
One thing they are using against him is that a couple of his Otis-Lennon scores are good, but they are all over the board. But his geometry scores remain steady.
Also, a woman I talked to at a university suggested he may have dyslexia even though he does not display the usual symptoms. He is very intelligent in language and english but he always has a C average. She said that he may be naturally slower at math so it shows more and his adeptness at language allows him to compensate for the dyslexia, but that if it was treated, he could get better grades. Any thoughts on this? I really need help. I have fought since November for this meeting and I feel like this is my one shot.
Thanks
Mary
Post this to the “parenting children with LD” and you’ll get more & faster info :-)
Your main argument would be that while there are definitely reasons that he might *not* have an LD, there are also a mess of reasons (inconsistency in even the “good” scores, his consistent struggles and his frustration) that are official, certifiable signs of an LD. You’re not insisting on services — you’re simply asking for him to be tested.
The other main point is that, simply, bright people with LDs **do** show strengths, and gosh, you are sure that they understand that many very, very bright people in fact have significant learning disabilities — but of course they know that, they have their education degrees and everything! And that while you also fully understand that some of these bright individuals may, in fact, never need special services, some of them do, and hey, while you’ve known your son had to work harder at some things than others for years now, because of the excellent high standards of their wonderful school system, things are posing enough challenge to him that you really think there may be an LD — but of course, you aren’t the expert… you really want *their* experts to do the testing and tell you.
(If your nose grows, they won’t notice; they nefver do :-))