Retention of students with learning disabilities

The conventional wisdom is no. We did it in fourth grade after years of trying to play catch up. We switched him from public to parochial school which was face saving. It was one of the best things we did for him. He fits in better socially and has become a solid student.

We used the time to continue therapy and tutoring. Doing the same thing twice doesn’t work with LD children. That is why most people say don’t do it.

Beth

One argument against retention is that the IEP is supposed to provide whatever is necessary for the child to reach the goal, and the goal should be designed to produce the progress needed for advancement. If the child isn’t making adequate progress, the IEP should be revised to provide more intensive instruction or a different approach. (A related argument would be that if the IEP resulted in the child being retained, then the district didn’t provide a free appropriate public education—which sets the district up for a due process complaint.)

Hello,

After reading this topic. I am a parent of a 16 year-old LD student. Her progress report that her school sends out in the middle of a report period(which is 2 1/2 to 3 weeks before the report card came out). said “No improvement on IEP goal”. This subject is math. She is on a 2nd to 3rd grade level for math.

When her report card came out it said IEP goal met…. Question How can she have gone from No improvement in IEP goal to IEP goal met in only about 10-15 days? I am soo confused.. Her IEP goal says her goal is to reach 80% of what is on the IEP whcih includes addition, subtraction and multiplication. I had her sit down at home and she does not know her x tables or even some subtraction. I had a meeting with the LD liason of her school and they said she is progressing. Well, I do not think soo.
What can I do? Could I have a due process hearing? That is with the whole districts LD supervisor of all of the schools right?
What do I have to prove get her private placement?

Like any other question about individual students, it
depends
on
the’
individual.

Sometimes retention is a really good choice.

(In general, though, schools tend to be all too willing to resort to it. Repeating what didn’t work the first time only works if the student has changed; sometimes maturity effects these changes but often it does not.)

Or if he’s taught in a different way the 2nd time around.

Kathy G.

Unfortunately, teachers sometimes stretch the truth when it comes to the IEP so that they don’t have to redo it. I am a special education teacher and I know many people who have done just that. Noone wants to attend meetings, including many parents, so they believe that this is the answer. Not to mention the lack of time. Speaking from experience, I have no lunch period ( Unless you count watching for fights in the hallway for 15 minutes a day during the kids’ lunch), no planning period (students come for help everyday),and I tutor after school. Nevertheless, on your child’s goal sheet it should say how the goal is going to be measured, and the teacher should have proof that your child can do these things. Call the teacher on it. Ask her for the proof. It is your right as a parent, and your child’s right as a student.

I always feel there isn’t one correct answer. And sometimes, even though we have the best intentions, are choices may not be 100% correct. When I needed to make the choice, I looked at many things.
If the child was physically bigger or smaller than their peers.
The childs maturity level.
The family history (did mom and dad graduate? Do they value education? Will they have influence to keep their 19 year old in school?)
Why specifically are we looing at retention? Do they know the material, or are they just to disorganized to prove it?
When you balance all the issues, often times it becomes a much easier choice.

It used to be quite uncommon to retain students with LDs, because it was believed that it was the LD that was causing them to fall behind, and if they were getting special ed help, so the theory went, that should help them to catch up. Now, it’s become quite common to see kids even with LD’s retained, in fact in my elementary resource case load, I’d say it’s the norm. Most were retained before they were even tested, usually in K-2nd grade (I’ve even seen it listed as an “intervention”). Nobody seems to worry anymore about the research that shows retained kids usually do better for a year or two, but by the end of several years they are back where they started, along with having taken a “hit” to the self-esteem that puts them more at risk for behavior problems, drug problems, dropping out, etc.

But I would say it is an individual matter none-the-less. Some kids are better off with a younger peer group, but the decision should be made as early as possible, or when contemplating a school change, to avoid the self-esteem issue, and the fact that kids do tease each other about this.

I basically retained my own son, who had a Fall birthday, by letting him start Kindergarten a year later, on the basis of some preschool tests that showed he was about six months behind his age developmentally. I was in graduate school at the time and read a research article that showed kids with late birthdays (they were talking Summer, but in California our cutoff is December, so I assume this would apply to Fall birthdays too) tended to end up at the bottom of their respective classes by High School. So that helped to inform my decision also. Even with that and an extra year in a Preppy K, he had a tough time in Kindergarten and was identified LD in first grade. But I was never sorry I let him wait — he would have been even MORE “a fish out of water” in the year ahead!

As for the mom who is worried about her daughter’s lack of progress in high school, make sure you keep those notices about “no progress” as evidence. I think you have a very good question there about how she could be making “no progress” at the halfway point, and suddenly she is passing the goal at the next grade report? I’d ask for some strict documentation of that, for one thing, like work samples or test protocols. If your school tries to wiggle out of it by using “teacher observation” as the standard of measurement, ask when and where the observation took place, and point out that her observation doesn’t match yours!

I worked many years in resource where any kind of progress at all was touted to the parents as a big success, and no one pointed out that, even if the student “progresses” a few months in a year’s time, they are still falling farther behind their age and grade mates (and they started out pretty far behind already!)… all you have to do is compare the standard scores and percentiles to see this, but these are usually not pointed out, in fact many schools do not even test every year on standardized test. (Maybe this is why!)

Do LD kids ever catch up? Not usually, unfortunately, and I think you could make an argument that “a little” progress is not significant enough to be adequate, and certainly isn’t “meeting her educational needs” as FAPE is supposed to do. You might have to fight this out in due process, but if you’re willing to do it, you just might win, it seems to me. And what is the alternative? Things will just continue as they are for your daughter, unless you are willing and able to get some outside help, because there are programs out there that could change this picture. But you won’t find them in the schools, typically, so you either have to fight the system or do it on your own resources. Good luck, whatever you decide!