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The school release my child out of special ed too soon.

Submitted by an LD OnLine user on

At the age of 4 my daughter was seen by a developmental Doctor because of a language delay. He told me to contact my local school and asked for her to be evaluated for a speech delay. My daughters started school at 4 years old and was given speech therapy. After only one year I was told by the speech therapist that my daughter may not be at the level of her peers but that she was more advanced then the other students the therapist was working with and she released her from special ED. after a year. When she was in first grade my husband and I went to her teacher and asked if my daughter should be evaluated by the OT because of the way she was holding her pencil and the fact she was mixing up her “B’s and D’s.” The teacher told us it was common and that she would eventually get it. My child is now in second grade and she is still holding her pencil in a fist and still getting her “D’s and B’s” confused. Some of the words that she mastered she is forgetting how to spell them. I took my daughter back to see another developmental doctor and I was told by her that my daughter has mixed expressive/receptive disorder and that the school took her out of speech too soon. We were told by the school Psychologist that there needs to be an academic need for services to be provided. That’s the problem because my daughter’s current teacher is not taking off for the errors my daughter makes unless it’s a spelling word. My daughter has problems making sentences for her spelling words one night I tried to get her to make up her own sentences and she told me she couldn’t do it. I type some sentences on the computer and printed them out and asked her to copy them down on her paper. It took her two hours to copy 15 short sentences. When she showed me her work there were several errors with spelling. Her work was sloppy and she made errors like in stead of saying “I walked the dog” she wrote “I walked the bog.” Teeth was spelled “teth” and please “Plas” and because “becas.” That was the finally straw for me. My husband and I went to the school the following day. We spoke to the assistant principal at the school and show him some of my daughter work and I show him a site I found on Dysgraphia and at the time he seemed concern and willing to help us. Later that day I received a call from him stating that he talked to her teacher and other teachers and they all said my daughter was fine and that basically I was over reacting and looking for problems. He told me that the teachers know better than me because they held degrees and I didn’t. I would like to add that I have a totally of four children. My eldest son has ADHD/PSC/GERD/hypothyroidism. My other daughter has PDD and my youngest has Autism. All my children except the eldest, who is from a previous marriage, all had a speech delay. I went through a whole lot of battle with the school because of my eldest son and believe me, I would be the last person who would like to go down that road again but we (my husband and I and my eldest son), know sometime isn’t right with my daughter’s work. I am not sure how I can convince the school there a problem. I don’t see them doing that since that would involve them admitting they made a mistake when they released my daughter from special ED. That would open them up a possible law suit but that doesn’t interested me only making sure my daughter gets the help she needs that what important to me. I just don’t where to turn from here. I am sorry this is so long and thanks for listening any idea is greatly appreciated.

Submitted by scifinut on Fri, 11/30/2007 - 2:29 PM

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Write a letter requesting an evaluation. In the letter you may wish to include the assessments of the developmental doctors. Send a copy of the letter to the school and another copy to the district special ed department. Go up the “chain” as far as needed to get the attention this needs. It may also be necessary to get an educational advocate to help with the process. This can let the school know that you mean business and are not “just a mom”. :)

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