Well, the honeymoon is over for kindergarten. 
Hannah called another student stupid today and then grabbed her and held onto her so that she couldn't go tell the teacher. She did take her time-out quietly, but the aftermath here at home has not been so pretty. There have been persons in the past who questioned why Hannah needed an IEP when her intelligence and academic achievement are so far above normal. In fact the school district in RI refused to qualify (or even meet with us for that matter) her for one because they insisted that her social and behavioral challenges would not and did not affect her academic learning. The problem with that is that in many areas Hannah could go YEARS without making ANY progress academically and still not be considered behind or at risk. It was faulty thinking on their part, but anyway. . . . I'm so grateful that the school district here recognized that Hannah's social and behavioral challenges do indeed affect her academic learning and that she needs support to be successful. We were lucky to have gone into the school year with an IEP and had already had meetings to inform those who would be working with Hannah what to expect so that when her challenges did rear their ugly heads no one would be shocked and most important
ly, Hannah would not be written off as simply a troublemaker. From talking to her teacher after this latest incident it's looking more and more like we'll be having an ADHD reeval sooner rather than later. I'm sure I'll learn more at conferences on Wednesday, but it sounds like regardless of how much she enjoys the task, her teacher is having to redirect her significantly more often than a typical kindergartner to begin and complete her work. It's just fortunate that at the moment Hannah is able to quickly and easily complete the tasks with little effort otherwise this would be a huge problem. If her work was actually challenging she'd be falling behind or at the very least struggling to keep up already.
Hannah called another student stupid today and then grabbed her and held onto her so that she couldn't go tell the teacher. She did take her time-out quietly, but the aftermath here at home has not been so pretty. There have been persons in the past who questioned why Hannah needed an IEP when her intelligence and academic achievement are so far above normal. In fact the school district in RI refused to qualify (or even meet with us for that matter) her for one because they insisted that her social and behavioral challenges would not and did not affect her academic learning. The problem with that is that in many areas Hannah could go YEARS without making ANY progress academically and still not be considered behind or at risk. It was faulty thinking on their part, but anyway. . . . I'm so grateful that the school district here recognized that Hannah's social and behavioral challenges do indeed affect her academic learning and that she needs support to be successful. We were lucky to have gone into the school year with an IEP and had already had meetings to inform those who would be working with Hannah what to expect so that when her challenges did rear their ugly heads no one would be shocked and most important
ly, Hannah would not be written off as simply a troublemaker. From talking to her teacher after this latest incident it's looking more and more like we'll be having an ADHD reeval sooner rather than later. I'm sure I'll learn more at conferences on Wednesday, but it sounds like regardless of how much she enjoys the task, her teacher is having to redirect her significantly more often than a typical kindergartner to begin and complete her work. It's just fortunate that at the moment Hannah is able to quickly and easily complete the tasks with little effort otherwise this would be a huge problem. If her work was actually challenging she'd be falling behind or at the very least struggling to keep up already. 
2 comments:
Hi, Working as an advocate it is clearly written in the law that academic performance has no bearing on a childs need for special education. If you ask for services in writing they have 30 days to start testing. It isn't an option. fyi I'm sorry this incident occured. It is so frustrating that our children need to have something like this happen for people to notice.
Michelle, We know that A LOT of what the Rhode Island school system did was illegal. Corruption is very much par for the course throughout the entire state and it's government. We simply decided not to fight it and were going to send Hannah to a private school, but then we moved to Nebraska and the public school system here stepped up to the plate and has been fabulous! They gave her everything we could have wanted or asked for. However, I know there were some who were beginning to wonder if we were crazy parents because Hannah was having such a great start to the year. Like I said before though, the honeymoon is now over and I don't think we'll be questioned by anyone at the school in the future!
Natalie
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