Hi everyone, I have a 10 year old son who was diagnosed with ADHD at the age of 5. There have always been challenges at school so I am used to fighting the system to get Jake the supports he needs.
I transferred Jake to a new school this past September and was extremely lucky and got him into the 5th Grade class. It is a small school with 15 students per class, 1 head Teacher and 2 aides… a perfect classroom for him. It is also an inclusive program so the staff are special ed certified.
I had Jake go through a complete Multidisciplinary/ neuropysch testing in August because the curriculum writing demands are impossible for him to meet. His writing, spelling, spacing etc etc are well below grade level and the more work that is demanded the more his anxieties have him shutting down or falling apart.
Anyhow this was 2 full days of testing…he loved every second of it because he loves the 1:1 stuff. The team came back with an updated diagnosis of ADHD, Anxiety Disorder and Disorder of the Written Expresssion.
I gave this report to the school and they preceeded to do their own testing including the WJ III.
In the meantime I have been trying to connect with Jake’s teacher to have a sit down meeting with her to explain a little about my child to her, he is a new student to the school… she ignores the requests or tells me we will meet in December when she has conferences. I have tried to talk to her about his 504 plan and the reasons why he has it, I have reminded her via email that she is not tailoring his homework, allowing him to work on his alphasmart, getting a scribe for his state testing etc etc…she is ignoring me. I have tried to reason with her about the homework that will take his peers 20 minutes but can take up to 3 hours for him to complete. I have asked her to allow him to highlight (zeroxed) chapters instead of making him re write chapters from his reading book..no she refuses. She tried to bargain with my son, she offered to let him go to his afterschool program with no homework if he did his homework during recess time !!!!!! There is a lot of strain between us :)
To get to the point…this teacher did the WJ III testing and where the hospital had him scoring at 2nd grade level she has him testing in the superior range. For writing sample she scored him at college grade level and yet I have pages of pages of written work that I cannot read that he has brought home from school.
Do you think that it is a conflict of interest for the classroom teacher to test a child who they are woorking with? shouldn’t this be done by a neutral person? If so what can I do about the situation I am in? Any advice would be wonderful help…thanks!
Re: I could use some advice
The best thing for you to do is to call an IEP meeting immediately. You have the right to call an IEP meeting any time. This would do several things in one fail swoop. First, it would force the meeting with the teacher because you would need request her presence. Secondly, it would address the lack of consideration for your child’s IEP and goals. And, it would lay all the cards on the table for everyone. As your child’s advocate this is key to his success. Then if you don’t get any satisfaction after the meeting, read up on your rights and your son’s rights and the next step to get them to pay attention to your child’s needs.
I would think it was a serious conflict. I would also wonder why the school psychologist didn’t do the testing.
If the teacher isn’t responding well to you, go up the chain of command to the principal. Explain the situation, what you have been doing, and ask for help in resolving this issue. I would also bring up your concerns about the teacher testing your son.
Document, Document, Document!