I’m hoping a foreign language teacher here can help.
My 7th grade son was diagnosed with Retrieval Fluency Disorder in the 2nd grade. He has been going to the same private school since K. Lower school priciple was most helpful in providing the necessary accomodations (namely, more time and cueing) for him and he did exceptional work.
Now that he has moved up to the Middle School, problems are cropping up again, particularily in Math and Foreign Language. The Math teacher has gone out of her way to help him and he is succeeding in her class but the Spanish teacher (native speaker)seems to go out of her way to make it difficult. His specific problem there is responding to oral questions from the teacher (asked in Spanish). He has asked her to repeat and speak a little slower, but she just passes over him to the next student and comes back at the end. This is not helpful to him. He wants to try and work this out himself with her (without our “interference”) but we don’t see much success with that.
Because we are a private school, there are no IEP’s as such although testing results are in his file and all teachers have been sent copies of the suggested accommodations.
Any suggestions?
Re: ?accommodations for foreign language study
That’s a great suggestion, thanks. I don’t know how she will react to that but it’s worth a try. I find that teachers who either refuse or are reluctant to accommodate LD kids generally have other issues. I sometimes think they don’t really believe that these kids have a bona fide problem and that we are all just making excuses.
Re: ?accommodations for foreign language study
Yes, sometimes they have other issues - but sometimes the main issue is “how can I do most of my stuff the regular way and not have to change everything I do?”
Her answer to this question will give you a better idea where she stands.
Foreign languages are often a formidable obstacle, so he may simply not be able to succeed under these circumstances.
is there another spanish teacher
My daughter’s first year in Spanish was an absolute nightmare. She had a great teacher who bent over backwards to help her but my daughter needed to build up her auditory memory for the spanish sounds and words. No matter what we did it just didn’t happen. She got a D- and that was a modified grade in both semesters. Otherwise she would have failed…and that won’t transfer to college so she decided to retake it this year and she has a different teacher. As she has reviewed it from the beginning she finally is getting it, her diction is much better, she now has the auditory memory for the words and can say them in her orals with the teacher. She said…it is making sense now…which is a good thing!
Here’s one suggestion but it requires the teacher to be sensitive to your son’s learning style. That shouldn’t be hard for an educator!
Ask her to let your son know in advance question she will ask him. That way he has time to prepare for it and can answer the question in the class.
I have seen that accommodation written into IEPs.