I’ll tell you why I’m sitting here at four a.m. obsessing about why my son still can’t read and writing bitter posts like the one that follows. My house is for sale, I’ve requested a leave from my teaching job where I have been for the last fourteen years, I have a contract to sign for a new teaching job…. My dear fourteen year old son still cannot read or write even though he is wonderfully bright and verbal. These past three years he has been at my middle school where I have been able to hand pick caring teachers who have provided him with excellent academics and an environment that has allowed him to grow intellectually and emotionally. For the past five years I have tried to educate my district, my school, my fellow teachers about the research into reading problems and programs to help my son and the over one hundred other students every year in the quicksand I call special education. While a few have heard and some changes have been made, they are few in number. This is one area that many people do not understand. They can read, their children can read and the future that faces us is incomprehensible. A line from a lovely Cat Stevens song plays in my head, “I have to go away, I know, I have to go.” My district and the ones around us have nothing to offer my son. Since I live in Southern California, we have at least found a path that is not nearly as hard as it could be. We are moving to San Diego so Toby can attend The Winston School where he will have reading instruction, small classes and a philosophy that he can be educated and possibly go to college. I have a contract to sign with San Diego City School to teach in a special program they have started for reading instruction ( a site where students receive FastForWord and Lindamood-Bell!!). Housing near Del Mar is very pricey, so we don’t know where to live that will make it possible to get Toby to and from school every day. So many things are up in the air, there are many goodbyes to say and many unknowns ahead. So, that is why I can’t sleep. I knew that many of you who walk the same path would understand.
Re: I'll tell you why
Hey Angela,
Sounds like you’re in charge. You have lots of changes ahead of you and lots of unknowns, but I’m guessing things will all fall into place. Moving and changing jobs are major stressors even without the reasons you have for doing so. You have made a reasoned decision to do what you believe is best for your child. Somehow, I think you’ll get through the sleepless nights and become more confident you did the right thing when your son has the kind of reading instruction he needs.
Speaking of reading, have you gone to the schwablearning.org website? I downloaded some interesting and fun ways to help younger students with reading. Perhaps you could find something on this website that would be helpful to your son. I understand that Charles Schwab is helping to underwrite some research for Dr. Mel Levine at UNC Chapel Hill. (Check out a part of Dr. Levine’s work at allkindsofminds.org) I read once that he (Mr. Schwab) had great difficulty learning to read, and whenever possible used comic books (!) to study the classics in college. The article ran a couple years ago in the Reader’s Digest. Anyway, congratulations to you for moving forward. Best wishes! JJ
Re: I'll tell you how
Angela,
Hi. We live in La Mesa, “east county” of SD. My wife drove 25 miles, each way, twice a day to Del Mar, to take our son to Winston School. We were desperate. Couldn’t afford the tuition, paid part and worked off the rest of the tuition by painting the school, landscape work…
Del Mar is a pricey area, you are correct. Best bet is to look to surrounding area and be sure to contact Winston and ask about bus routes etc., as they have children there who are funded and busing is available. Somehow, my wife ended up being the majority driver in a car pool with children who were funded (and wealthy to boot), and that was quite an irony in and of itself.
Our boy went there for 5th & 6th grades. We really couldn’t afford it, and I simply couldn’t get up the gumption to go back and beg for a third year. We found a small parochial school here in La Mesa that turned out to be quite a blessing; only a 2 room school house for grades K-8. Far more affordable, much less driving.
Anyway, he’s at Grossmont JC now, plus working 4 days a week around school hours. Doing great. Skills he learned at Winston were invaluable. No thanks to our nightmarish experience with the public schools.
Do watch out for the behavioral issues of some of the students there, if your son is well grounded, and he sounds like he is, then I’m sure he’ll do great. By the way, the campus is in a most incredible location!
Best of luck to you guys both for school and career.
Regards,
Andy
Re: I'll tell you how
Andy, I knew you were somewhere in S. D. and had battled for your son’s rights. I thought of you when I interviewed with S.D. City School District. Parents like you and your wife and children like your son have brought about changes. They are too late for your own child, but hundreds will benefit from the issues you raised. SDCD has established a school to provided the kinds of reading programs parents are requesting. They bus some children daily for two hours of Lindamood and Fast ForWord and more and then return the kids to their schools for mainstream academics. Other children attend full time in a special school setting. This is incredibly innovative for a Southern California public school district. I hope that I will be teaching there. Sharing what I have learned and learning, too. Pat yourselves on the backs for you have made a permanent change for the children that have followed in your son’s path. We do make a difference.
Re: I'll tell you who
Thanks Angela.
I encourage you to look up the SD Chapter of LDA, and I strongly suggest you specifically introduce yourself to Mary Ann Golumbesky (sp?). Mary Ann and her associates have brought about some incredible changes by “holding the district’s feet to the fire” for an impossible amount of time.
If you can locate her, she will be an incredible contact for you; furthermore, please extend my regards to her. Again, best of luck in your move.
Andy
Re: I'll tell you why
May I join this club? We’re also in the process of selling our home and relocating to a city (where we will be renters and not homeowners) with a decent private school for dyslexic students. The upheaval is taking its toll on us, and naturally the public school here has gotten it into its head that our move is responsible for our child’s problems. Typical.
Re: I'll tell you why
You’re my hero. You’re doing something I only thought of doing but never found the strength to do.
Good thoughts and best wishes to you as take the journey you’ve been on in this new direction.
Re: I'll tell you why
It is always easier for the school to look at us and our child as the problem. Then they do not look at what kind, quantity and quality program they provide. Best wishes to you and yours.
Re: I'll tell you why
Your message humbled me. I have been fighting the schools here for the past year for my second grade son. When I came to the point that due process was the only alternative, we pulled our son out part time to homeschool. We also have been doing private therapy. He is doing much better but not caught up.
I hit a brick wall with the district that I could not penetrate. They had their programs and it didn’t matter what his problems were or that he needed more intensive help. I hired an advocate and got a very different (and appropriate IEP) and the district wanted to implement using the same program that had not worked last year. I see how thick the wall must be when you, an insider, can not affect change any better than I could.
I wish you the best of luck.
Re: I'll tell you why
Angela,
I am a reading teacher. I am currently teaching Title 1
students, who are having trouble learning to read.
Two years ago, I was told that I was also the dyslexia
teacher at my school. I knew very little about dyslexia, so
I went to the internet to research the topic.
In March of 2000 I found and read THE GIFT OF DYSLEXIA
by Ronald D. Davis. His website is www.dyslexia.com His discussion board is www.dyslexiatalk.com I found out how to help my students. I obtained permission from my principal
and began with Orientation Counseling, which is a mental activity that you can teach a person so they will be able to better focus in the classroom. It helps!!! Not all students, but if it helps only one student, it is worth a try! I have helped MANY of my students learn to focus better with Orientation Counseling.
I also found a reading program that teaches the “whole picture”, which is the way dyslexics learn best. READING REFLEX
by Carmen and Geoffrey McGuinness was written so that
parents could teach their children to read. I was so impressed
with the book I began to teach from it IMMEDIATELY! My school
bought me additional materials from their website at
www.readamerica.net I would recommend SUPER SPELLER from their website.
Just 2 months ago I found www.picturemereading.com I ordered
“picture” ABC’s, and “picture” Dolch sight word cards.
They are wonderful! My kindergarteners are really learning from
these cards.
I am now reading RIGHT-BRAINED CHILDREN IN A LEFT-BRAINED
WORLD by Jeffrey Freed. I will definitely be using some of his
methods in the classroom next year.
There is information out there! I am continually searching
for ways to make learning easier for my students.
I really admire parents who are true advocates for their
children.
Wishing you the best!!!
Bonnie Edes
[email protected]
Re: I'll tell you where :)
Hey Angela,
Just thought I’d tell you that I drove right by Winston School today! After a cruddy, cloudy weekend (much time spent napping between meals:), the clouds have broken and Southern CA weather is back!
Winston is located about 1 block off the Pacific Ocean and it’s a beautiful location. I thought about stopping and taking a picture to e mail you, but traffic was moving, and I had to keep going… Oh well. I assume you’ve been there to check it out, what a location!
Andy
Re: I'll tell you where :)
Dear Angela,
A friend led me to your message as I too am considering moving in order to provide my child with an appropriate education. It’s always so validating to know someone else is doing what you’re considering — cheers to you!
I’ve just hired an attorney to get my district to listen to me — they were trying to force inappropriate [in my estimation] goals/objectives by insisting on holding an IEP meeting before the input of an IEE we’re in the middle of obtaining — it took the attorney just to get them to wait for the results. I’m not convinced once they know what the real issues are (which are not that my child is lazy, and would do better if he only tried harder), that they will be able to do anything better than they’ve already done.
I’m near San Jose, CA have found schools in Alpharetta, GA and Encino, CA that sound interesting — I’m willing to move, but my husband is a “bloom where you’re planted” kind of guy and I’m a “dig up the plant and replant it somewhere sunnier/shadier/cooler/hotter/drier/wetter” kind of girl. Where is the best place to locate schools appropriate to your child’s individual issues? I’ve done internet research - wouldn’t it be nice to have a parent network for referrals?
Kristy
Beautiful view
I do have pictures of Winston and the view of the ocean from the school yard. I’m showing it around school and not getting any sympathy about where I have to move to. Toby is pleased to know he will be going to school in this very nice place.
special schools
I really had no idea that there were schools for my boy. I attended a conference two years ago and met a rep from The Gow School. I was ready to move to Buffalo, NY. Then we were on a business trip to San Antonio and I looked at the phone book and found a Winston School. We visited and thought about whether we could move there. They told us about Winston in San Diego. Each school is independent, but the director in San Diego had been assistant headmaster at Gow. It is a small, special world. I know of the schools in the San Fernando Valley, but we liked the idea of San Diego better. I found some schools on line at the Peterson’s Private School Directory site.
Re: I'll tell you why
I appreciate your input. In the years that we have been looking for help for our son we did find a clinic that uses Davis. Toby is a good candidate for orientation since he has visual distortions. The Davis exercises actually made him sick to his stomach. He also seemed afraid to lose his ability to let his mind’s eye roam. As he has matured visual disorientation has seemed less of an issue. He is doing vision therapy to improve his tracking, etc. I also found a Phonographix teacher and I am paying for her to go to my son’s school during the day to work with him individually. He is making progress in chunking multisyllable words. All of these programs are things that his school could provide if they cared. As a parent you quickly discover that the programs you get at a private clinic should at least be supported by the regular school and provided during the day when a child is fresh. I have spent five years sharing what I have learned with my district in the hopes of helping children whose parents don’t know where to look. I have gotten very little response and now it is time for me to take care of my son.
I walk the same path. I am not a teacher,but a parent. I fought the public school system long and hard. I help others do the same. Where are my kids? In a private school. Small,only 20 in the whole school. They finally feel like they belong. My kids. They have learned that their are others like them. They found out that they don’t HAVE to write to be understood. I drive 40 minutes one way to get them to school,my husband drives 40 minutes one way to get them home again. This Vs. a nine hour IEP for just one kid? I’ll take it. ANY school will be so lucky to have you,god bless and good luck.