I live in MS. Here before a child can be evaluated, he has to go through a series of interventions lasting no more than 16 weeks. Well, my 11 yr old is on his second intervention with no success.
At the beginning of the year he was a good student who kept up ok in his other grades except for math. He has become very frustrated and angry, calling himself stupid and dumb. Now his other grades are slipping and he has started to get into a lot of trouble.
The lead teacher at his school, who is the one I have to go through, seems to think the behavior and academic problems are totally unrelated. My husband agrees. My son has never been a behavior problem, but has struggled with math since the third grade. This year has been especially hard and he knows there is no way he is going to pass.
It seems so clear to me that all this frustration has got to surface somewhere. Am I totally off base here?
Yesterday, Erik was written up again and I was in class and the school could not get me, so they called my husband. They wanted to know if they should suspend him or paddle him. My husband said paddle him. I was so angry. He is already angry and frustrated enough.
Help me out here. Is this normal? He is being punished, but should I be harder on him. I feel like I should hold back until something can be resolved at school.
Mary
Ebeth,
Please take your son to a private educational psychlogist and get an evaluation on his math skills. Certainly it is possible that his behavior and learning problems are associated. But you need to get the academic problem taken care of. The school will not do it. Lindamood-Bell also has some good math remedial strategies in their On Cloud Nine program.
Janis