placement for kindergarten

January 27, 2002

Kimsterf,

I love the way people who are looking for information have to specify " positive

results " or " good stories " .....ha hah hah ha hah........that is my cynical side

coming through!!! I think the reason they have to specify is because there are

so MANY problems with our special ed. system that it is hard to find positive

stories. I have run into this problem over and over.....when my son gets what

he needs he responds well and improves enormously....to the point where they

want to reduce or eliminate services and then he regresses (not really regresses

but doesn't make the same RATE of improvement thus falls further behind). It is

INCREDIBLY frustrating to me.

To answer your questions:

School districts have all different ways of providing the services on an

IEP.....some contract out with local agencies so that their PT for instance

comes to the school on Tues. and Thurs.......others hire their own PT on their

staff as full-time or part-time...others have a district wide PT that travels to

different schools. Some therapists prefer to work one on one INSIDE the

classroom and others pull the child into the hall and others have a special

therapy room.

My feeling is that is is highly unlikely they will be able to reduce your

child's services by that much if you protest. For instance the aide: if the

one he has now can't go with him they will have to hire someone to do it. The

therapies should all remain. Do they have a transition kindergarten class? If

not they may try to put him in a regular kind. classroom.......you should

observe this this year ......is it small enough? what does the teacher need to

know to meet your child's needs? can you meet with her ahead of time? If you

don't feel he is ready for kind. will they keep him where he is for one more

year and then transition into public kind.? (we decided to hold my son back a

year....he has global apraxia and SI and hypotonia....and it was one of the best

decisions we made .....he is thriving in a regular classroom with no aide but a

sensitive and observant teacher and only 14 kids) It is hard to comment since

we know so little of the picture....have you met any other parents of special

ed. kids in your local school who have kids slightly older? You might try

talking to them...even if their child doesn't have the same dx it can help you

get to know the system. Best wishes! Carol

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