Bonnie

Ever since I informed my daughter’s teacher that we suspect she has ADHD and that she is on a waiting list to have tests done, her teacher seems to be worse with her rather than more understanding. In fact, she no longer has time for her. She’s constantly shouting at my daughter now for struggling with her work and not getting it finished in time and getting it wrong. She is even giving my daughter extra assignments as a punishment for it. My daughter is really stressing out about this and she stays up late refusing to sleep until she completes this work. Is it just me or is the teacher doing the opposite of what she should do?? What should I do?

Pamela

Whether your daughter is diagnosed with ADHD or not, her teacher is responsible for teaching her and creating an environment that is safe and conducive to learning. It might be that your daughter’s teacher is feeling overwhelmed with the possibility of teaching someone that doesn’t fit into her square peg or round whole, so to speak.

That being said, you do have your work cut out for you. It sounds to me that you need to do some educating of the teacher, although I don’t know how receptive she will be.

There are two issues going on here. One is the ‘yelling’ or ‘shouting’ at your daughter. The other is the additional homework assignments. Short of sitting in the classroom all day long, you are limited at this point to some extent with changing the teacher’s behavior.

First, set up a meeting with your daughter’s teacher and say something to the effect of, “I know that you are being pushed at times by your daughter’s name and I know you know her ADHD is what is interfering with her learning and it can’t be helped until we get the official diagnosis and develop a plan to address it. In the meantime, I was wondering how we might be able to work together to help your daughter’s name cope better in the classroom.”

Coming in in a non-confrontational way and ‘giving her the benefit of the doubt’ by saying that you know she realizes it’s the ADHD should put her in a more receptive mood.

If that doesn’t help, you might want to enlist the help of the vice principal, principal, or counselor and ask them what they suggest you do. I would go in saying you know your daughter’s teacher is qualified, but your daughter and she seem to be having some issues. You think it might be related to the fact that you told her that you suspect your daughter has ADHD.

I know this sounds a bit ‘nice’ when you must be fuming, but you always get more accomplished when you ‘sugar coat’ things as best you can.

If you do not get any assistance with them, you can contact your County Office of Ed or your state advocate. (Most states have them – give the Dept. of Ed a call to find out.) Sometimes just mentioning the name of the state advocate gets the ball rolling for you with a school.

Regarding the additional homework…

One thing you need to do to start with is to judge for yourself if the additional homework is beyond the typical amount of homework that a student in her grade should have. So, put the ADHD aspect aside for a moment to measure the amount of time that students should spend on homework. Students should on a normal basis not have more that 10 minutes per grade level of homework per night (3rd grade – 30 minutes). Then, realizing the complications that the ADHD adds to your daughter’s focus, add some additional time to that (30 to 60 minutes).

The National Education Association along with the national PTA suggests adding 10 minutes of homework per night incrementally with each grade level, as a general rule of thumb. Thus, a first-grader gets a total of 10 minutes, a second-grader 20 minutes, a third-grader 30 minutes, and so on, not to exceed two hours per night total in high school.

For high school Spanish teacher Michael Bolyog, homework is designed to reinforce what happens in the classroom, but should never be used to supplant class work. He sees the teacher’s role as similar to that of a sports coach: The player can go out and practice on his own for hour after hour, but the best learning occurs when the coach is right there with him, to immediately correct any flaws. Therefore, more than 30 minutes of homework per class may be an exercise in futility because the student can feel overwhelmed by the quantity of work, get distracted or bored, and end up giving it a halfhearted effort just to get it done.

Just a few more rambling thoughts…

You can share this info with the teacher, saying something to the effect that the National Education Association as well as the PTA supports this, so that is what your daughter will be doing from now on. You might also let the principal know that you have been having some issues with this, so you are going to do this from now on. You can have your daughter present when you talk with the teacher, so she knows what has been discussed and will feel stronger about not overdoing.

You might want to ask the principle or your school district office what the policy on homework is and what is the school policy about punishment is for the ADHD problems -then talk with the teacher.  (Get your information first – then approach the teacher) You can say something to the effect that: “I thought the school policy or school district policy was ___________. Am I wrong here? Or Correct me if I’m wrong, but _____________.”

Once a diagnosis is made, you need to see what kinds of adjustments need to be made in the classroom. You might request a student study team meeting or suggest a meeting to set up a 504 to see what can be done to help your daughter succeed in the classroom.

There are a number of easy accommodations that can be put into place to help your daughter throughout the day, making learning easier and less stressful for both her and her teacher.

Hope this is helpful,

Bonnie Terry, M. Ed., BCET

Hi Bonnie,

We spoke with the principal at my son’s school this morning. The talk went well and he seemed very concerned about our son. But, the bottom line is, the school is reluctant to give my son 504 because it will stick with him for life (though they offered today if we really really want one). They are going to test him soon for gifted so that we can include additional accommodations in an IEP or 504 if necessary. What is my next step? Should I go ahead with a 504 Plan?

Candi

Having a 504 Plan in place is not a stigma, it is protection and accommodations for your son that will help him learn with greater ease. What is wrong with that? If the school needs to implement specific accommodations to help your son that is what needs to be done. The beauty of it is that it will carry him from one year to the next but can be changed and adjusted as your sons needs change. It will ensure that attention is brought to his learning needs. If at a later date – which may be a year or years down the line and he no longer needs them, fine, you don’t have to have him covered by a 504 at that point.

Here is an informal comprehensive learning difficulty/disability screening tool you can do as a parent and get a great picture of the underlying causes of your kids learning problems available. This tool actually helps you to understand why your child struggles, which may be accerbated by his ADHD. There is usually some underlying cause that may not be enough for the schools testing to show that there is a specific learning disability, but it is still actually interferring with their learning with ease.

For example, each of my own kids tested to be gifted, but they each had an area that made learning harder than it needed to be. Once we understood what that or those areas were, learning became easier for them.

Hope this helps,

Bonnie Terry, M. Ed., BCET

P.S. Don’t forget to sign up for the FREE teaching & homework tips!

Bonnie Terry

I just came across this article on preparing for an IEP and wanted to share it with you.

As a parent, do you approach IEP meetings with fear and dread? If so, here are some suggestions to help you feel more at ease and able to participate as a full member of the team that plans your child’s special education program.

Before the Meeting:

• Build a positive relationship with at least one person on the IEP team, such as the classroom teacher, principal, or school psychologist, before the meeting. Such a relationship will help you feel more comfortable and know someone else hears your point of view.
• Plan ahead and put your thoughts down on paper, so you won’t forget to mention what’s important to you during the meeting. Complete the IEP Planning Form before the meeting. Know the purpose and format of the IEP meeting and who will be there ahead of time. That way you won’t be surprised by the number of people around the table or the process being followed. IDEA 2004 contains new provisions that you should be aware of, including who can be excused from IEP meetings, and alternative ways to hold IEP team meetings.
• If you wish to share the results of a private evaluation with the IEP team, send copies of the reports to the team ahead of time so they can be familiar with the data before the meeting, rather than take valuable time during the meeting to review them. In some cases parents may feel that sharing this report (or particular aspects of the report) will not be of benefit to the IEP process; it’s your choice whether to do so.
• Review current reports, last year’s IEP (if applicable), and Parents’ Rights and Responsibilities sent to you annually.

For more, go to: Tips for a Successful IEP Meeting

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When preparing to attend your child’s IEP meeting, it is important to have a complete understanding of your child’s learning problems. One way to do this is to use an informal assessment tool. With it you gain the understanding of what the specific problems are and how they impact learning in the classroom. It empowers you to speak knowledgebly about your child’s struggles.

Hope this is helpful,

Bonnie Terry, M. Ed., BCET

I received an email today where a parent stated “I think that if you have a choice that you should definitely do the IEP because it make the school more accountable and you have to be included in the review.”

Actually, both a 504 and an IEP are legal documents and must be complied with, and as a parent you must be involved in either meeting and you need to sign off on the plan. Since they are both legal documents, both 504′s and IEP’s hold the schools accountable.

An IEP is more encompassing than a 504 plan. If your child is under an IEP, in addition to specific measurable goals and extra services with a specialist, there are usually specific accommodations written regarding the child’s time spent within their regular classroom. These are things like extra time to do the assignment, modified assignments, planners, or recording answers to tests on tape recorders if writing is a problem. In effect, the accommodations that are written into an IEP are what a 504 plan would have. (The IEP should have anything in it they would put in a 504 plan + the goals and time with a resource specialist or other service provider).

A 504 is typically used for students that do not qualify for an IEP because there is no significant discrepancy between the IQ and performance of the student, BUT the student is struggling in the classroom.

The following paragraph is an excerpt from the book From Emotions to Advocacy, written by Pam Wright and Pete Wright

To be eligible for protections under Section 504, the child must have a physical or mental impairment. This impairment must substantially limit at least one major life activity. Major life activities include walking, seeing, hearing, speaking, breathing, learning, reading, writing, performing math calculations, working, caring for oneself, and performing manual tasks. The key is whether the child has an “impairment” that “substantially limits … one or more … major life activities.”

I usually suggest to parents that they not sign off on the plan at that meeting and say something to the effect, “we’ve talked about a lot of details today, it is a lot to absorb. I would like to go over them with my husband/spouse/ significant other or if you are both there – we need to go over them and review them.”

You may see some ‘jaws’ drop, but this will help you to be sure you are getting what you need. This does give you time to really look over the document and be sure it contains everything you need for your child. And, sometimes you realize you really need an additional service. Sometimes the additional service or accommodation is added without a problem because the school needs to get the IEP or 504 completed in a timely manner.

To help you have a better understanding of your child’s difficulties and the underlying causes of them, you will want to use a parent friendly informal LD dyslexia assessment tool.

Hope this is helpful.

Bonnie Terry, M. Ed., BCET

Hi Bonnie,

I would be interested to know more about how you make your
visual clocks and what they look like.

-Susan

Susan,

As a teacher of K- H.S. age, I have a lot of resources and supplies. I’m a learning disability specialist and educational therapist as well as parent. I have ADD & have worked with ADHD kids for over 30 years. So, I have a number of telling time work sheets that are blank as well as a large blank clock stamp for making clocks.

The stamp can be gotten from

https://educationalinsights.com/Merchant2/merchant.mv?

And, I just did an online search and found this site where you can program in your times on the clocks and then print the sheets.

http://www.time-for-time.com/worksheets.htm

After making them, I would copy them on card stock paper to make them more durable and cut them from the sheets so I can tape them across the top or side of their desk.

You can even color code the hands of the clock or copy them on different colors of card stock to make it even easier for your kids to follow.

Hope this helps.

Bonnie Terry, M. Ed., BCET

P.S.: Don’t forget to sign up for the 10 FREE homework & teaching tips – right above my photo.

Back to School…

What can you do to make your life a lot easier? Anna Weinstein from education.com contacted me earlier this week and asked if she could interview me about what parents of LD children could do to help there kids have a great start to the school year. We recorded the interview, so you can hear it here.

Here are a few of the highlights that you will hear Bonnie talking about:

At 4 min: There is a special tip regarding school supply tips to help your child be more organized.
At 6 min: How do you organize your homework area
At 7:29 min: Specific supplies that help the homework time
At 15:53 min: How much time should kids spend on homework – especially when they have dyslexia or LD?
At 17:30 min: How do you talk to teachers?
At 21:05 min: Specific things to tell the teacher to set your child up to have a great year
At 25:40 min: Can you just contact the teacher via email or does it have to be in person?
At 29:44 min: Isn’t there a system put in place already for me to meet all of my kid’s support team?
At 31:54 min: Doesn’t the teacher already know what my child needs – he was pulled out last year for services?
At 38:45 min: Why you want to have a clear understanding of what is going on with your child
At 40:00 min: Ways to keep track of your child’s assignments
At 42:40 min: Parent self care & support for parents
At 47:30 min: Evening family routine
At 51:27 min: Best way to speak with the teacher or principal

Listen to it here!

Whether your child is being evaluated for LD or dyslexia you need to know the type of questions to ask the specialists. I just read this article that was posted on LD Online. It gives a lot of great information and I thought you might be interested…

Written by: Great Schools Editorial Staff (2007)

Hiring a private specialist to conduct a psychoeducational evaluation of your child is a big commitment of time, effort, and money. To find someone competent, ask other parents or school staff for their recommendations. You’ll probably want to interview more than one specialist before choosing the person who will work with your child. If you get a recommendation from someone outside the school, make sure the private evaluator has the qualifications and/or credentials your state or district requires.

Before hiring a specialist to conduct psychoeducational testing, you will want to interview her about her professional qualifications, procedures, and fees. The responses will allow you to screen a prospective specialist to see whether you feel comfortable with her, and to discover any potential “mismatches” with your child’s needs. The conversation can also help you prepare your child for the evaluation process.

You’ll be better prepared to interview an evaluation specialist if you have some background information on evaluation for special education eligibility and/or learning disabilities.

In order to get the most benefit from your initial conversation with a psychoeducational evaluation specialist, you’ll want to have a good basic understanding about why and how evaluations for learning disabilities are conducted-and how to understand the results.  For the rest of the article, go to LD Online.

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Get the parent friendly LD Dyslexia Screening Tool to help you identify your child’s learning problems.

Hope this is helpful.

Bonnie Terry, M. Ed., BCET

Yes, it is here! Spring is here, the tulip tree is blooming as is the manzanita tree, daffodils, the wild violets…And the Learning Difficulty/Disability Assessment Tool and Informal Comprehensive Identification Tool has arrived!

You will now be able to get your hands on it and be able to informally test your own child or student. You will know the specific areas of strengths and weaknesses of your child. You will know if you need to pursue formal testing, and you will know what kind of formal testing should be done.

By Linda Foster of The LINK (website review)

Without proper diagnosis, a student might spend his/her school years struggling with schoolwork and feeling inadequate. Lacking the confidence to succeed often causes students to ignore instructions and become disruptive. This scenario can occur in classroom or homeschool settings causing frustration not only for the student, but, also, for the teacher/parent. Screening Tool is an excellent guide to assessing a student.

Before any screening takes place, it is important to understand the different types of learning disabilities and difficulties that might be encountered and Bonnie Terry offers a clearly written and easily understood overview of these potential problems.

The LD Screening Tool includes two assessments: A pre-screening tool and checklists of the various processing difficulties that might be encountered. The Pre-Screening Tool consists of a checklist of possible symptoms of learning difficulties, dyslexia, or learning problems and then offers checklists of symptoms that might occur at different developmental stages. In the scoring section, it is noted that it is not unusual for students to exhibit one or more of the symptoms at one time or another and this is not a cause for alarm. Exhibiting three or more of the symptoms, though, over a period of time may signal a learning difficulty or learning disability.

The LD Screening Tool provides information on what to do if a potential learning difficulty or learning disability has been determined. It offers parents and teachers insight into the cause and effect of learning difficulties and learning disabilities on student abilities or behavior in the classroom or the homeschool setting.

It also has two sections designed to offer students and parents alternative resources to assess and manage specific types of learning difficulties and learning disabilities.

Private testing can be very expensive, anywhere between $300.00 and $1000.00. I promised you a reasonably priced informal assessment tool, one that even in today’s tight ecomony you would be able to avail yourself of. You would be able to informally assess your own child in the comfort of your own home. So, it’s not $300.00, not $100.00, not even $50.00. Just go to the LD Screening Tool and order your own copy today for only $37.00.

Bonnie Terry, M. Ed., BCET

Today, I’m covering two very important areas of visual processing and one of them is one of the most common reading problems. There are actually 9 areas of Visual Processing that affect learning. The two areas that I’m covering in this post are visual tracking and visual language association.

The students I have worked with over the years had a variety of problems. Some of them were  ‘falling through the cracks,’ they did not qualify for additional help within the school system. Some of the students had identified learning disabilities (LD), some were ADD or ADHD, others had asperger’s syndrome or were in the autism spectrum. Some of these students were homeschooled, some were in private schools, some in public schools.

And, over my 35+ years of teaching, approximately 90 – 95% of the students I worked with had visual tracking difficulties.  It is a VERY common problem! If a child mispronounces words while reading aloud they are making phonetic mistakes that often stem from auditory processing difficulties or a combination of auditory and visual memory difficulties.

Visual Tracking: The ability to track one’s eyes from left to right in an efficient manner; it enables the task to be completed quickly. When your child skips or repeats words when they read aloud they typically have visual tracking difficulties. Visual Tracking is critical to reading fluently with ease.

1.Tracing Activities

2.Dot-to-Dot Activities

3.Do larger muscle movements, drawing on a chalkboard, following from left to right draw different shapes.

4.Play rolly-polly with a ball, rolling it back and forth to each other.

5.Play catch with a ball or bean bag.

6.Find the abc’s in abc order on a page. There are books that are set up to do this.

7.Use reading drills like Five Minutes to Better Reading Skillsthat is set up for working on visual tracking as well as visual closure and rapid naming simultaneously.

8.Use Maze books. They come in a range of difficulty, so pick one that is appropriate to your child.

Visual Language Association: The ability to formulate associations between pictures of objects.

1.Create a set of 4 or 5 pictures or objects. Have one of the group NOT belong to the group.

2.Pick out the picture that doesn’t belong and explain why.

3.Find all of the objects in the room that have 4 corners, 3 corners, and circular, etc.

4.View an object or picture of an object and state where the object would belong e.g. trees, plants, shoes, boots, books, pencils, etc.

5.View a picture of a scene and create a logical story that describes it.

6.Give directions to the student by pointing such as point to the door and motion for the student to close it. Have the student tell you what they should do or have them do it.

7.Show students an object and then have them tell as many things that would go with it e.g shoe – sock, salt – pepper.

8.Match pictures with words.

9.The Sentence Zone game associates words with parts of speech according to colors to make sentence writing easier. Can be played from 1st grade – 12th.

Definitions of the areas are excerpted from the Learning Difficulty/Disability Pre-Screening and Informal Comprehensive Identification Tool.  The book contains more information on the impact difficulties in these areas have in the classroom as well as how to determine if your student has difficulties in any of these areas.

Feel free to pass this article along. Remember the above activities are easy for any parent to implement to help their child with visual tracking and visual language association, whether their child has an identified learning disability, LD, dyslexia, or reading problems. Because the activities are so short in duration they are perfect for those children with ADHD too.

If you haven’t already signed up, get your FREE teaching & homework tips by filling in the form in the upper right corner.

Till next time,

Bonnie Terry, M. Ed., BCET

P.S., Don’t forget to get your FREE homework & teaching tips – just enter your email in the upper right hand box.

]]> http://www.bonnieterry.com/blog/index.php/2009/02/visual-tracking-one-of-the-most-common-reading-problems-7-activities-to-improve-it/feed/ 14 http://www.bonnieterry.com/blog/index.php/2008/10/educational-problems-caused-by-addadhd/ http://www.bonnieterry.com/blog/index.php/2008/10/educational-problems-caused-by-addadhd/#comments Fri, 10 Oct 2008 21:00:35 +0000 bonnieterry http://www.bonnieterry.com/blog/?p=14

ADD/ADHD obviously affects performance in a school setting, as well as affects other parts of their life.  Children and adults with ADD have neurological gaps that interfere with the cognitive processes of memory, concentration, and attention span.

In other words, those with ADD/ADHD have often missed out on instruction because they were distracted and attending to other things instead of the instruction that was being given.

Assignments, especially homework may be missed because they were distracted and attending to other things instead of the assignment that was being given. When kids aren’t paying attention in class, they often miss bits and pieces of skills, content, and the easy tricks to becoming efficient learners.

Dr. Daniel Amen, author of Windows Into the ADD Mind states that school problems can include:
o    Restlessness
o    Short attention span and distractibility
o    Impulsiveness
o    Procrastination
o    Trouble shifting attention
o    Forgetfulness
o    Writing disabilities
o    Reading disabilities
o    Visual processing problems
o    Auditory processing problems
o    Unusual study habits
o    Difficulties with timed situations such as timed tests.

Specific accommodations regarding ADD/ADHD can be implemented in the classroom so your child is not penalized for issues arising their ADD. A 504 Plan can be implemented for any child that has a diagnosis of ADD when it is impacting their performance in the classroom.

The first step to set up a 504 Plan for your child that has a diagnosis of ADD is to request in writing an evaluation from the school regarding the impact your child’s ADD has on their classroom performance. They must meet the Section 504 definition of disability to be protected under the regulation; in this case meeting the definition would be learning being limited due to issues arising out of their ADD.

Once that is done, a 504 Plan can be implemented. A variety of accommodations can be written into a 504 Plan. Here are just a few suggestions:

1.    Additional time for assignments.
2.    Allowing tests to be done in smaller class settings.
3.    Providing the students with the opportunity to perform the assignment or activity in a variety of ways  such as on tape, with a calculator, or orally.
4.    To NOT require the student to complete the assignment or activity in one sitting.
5.    Require that assignments done incorrectly for any reason be redone.
6.    Preferential seating.
7.    Provide the student with shorter tasks given more frequently.
8.    Give directions in a variety of ways.
9.    Stand next to the student when giving directions.

Additional Resources:

For more recognized accommodations that schools can implement, refer to the Pre-Referral Intervention Manual published out by Hawthorne Press. It lists thousands of common learning, ADD, and behavioral problems that are encountered in the educational environment.

Bonnie Terry, M. Ed., BCET

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Here is more information regarding qualifying for a 504 with ADD/ADHD problems from  http://www.wrightslaw.com/advoc/ltrs/eligibility_add.htm

Passing Grades

Although school personnel told the parent that her child is not eligible because the child was “passing,” this is incorrect. Children who receive passing grades and advance from grade to grade can be eligible for special education. The IDEA regulations clarify that schools must offer a free appropriate public education to any child with a disability who needs special education, “even though the child has not failed or been retained in a course or grade, and is advancing from grade to grade.” (see IDEA Regulation 300.101, page 204 of Wrightslaw: Special Education Law)

Children with Other Health Impairment & Learning Disabilities

Most children who have ADD/ADHD are found eligible under the “Other Health Impairment” or “Specific Learning Disabilities” categories.

The legal definition of “Other Health Impairment means having limited strength, vitality, or alertness, including heightened alertness to environmental stimuli, that results in limited alertness with respect to the educational environment, that … is due to chronic or acute health problems such as … attention deficit disorder or attention deficit hyperactivity disorder …” (See regulation 300.8(c)(9), Wrightslaw: Special Education Law, 2nd Edition , page 194)

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Please let me know if you have specific topics that you would like addressed.

Bonnie Terry, M. Ed., BCET