Reading & Other Learning Disabilities

The federal law governing special education is called the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act of 2004. Its regulations make clear that the IEP Team must seriously consider your concerns. The regulations say:

In developing each child’s IEP, the IEP Team must consider …  the concerns of the parents for enhancing the education of their child.

One way to ensure that the IEP Team seriously considers your concerns is to send it a list of your concerns — before your child’s IEP meeting. Below is an example.

EXAMPLE

March 1, 2009

Dear Mrs. McCormick:

Below our names is a list of our six concerns for the upcoming IEP meeting. We would like them put into the IEP exactly as written.

Please call if you have any questions.

Sincerely,

Mr. and Mrs. Brian Enigma

Parents of Kelly Enigma: Concerns for IEP Meeting of 3/20/09

1.      Kelly should have no more than 10-minutes of homework per subject per night and no more than 30-minutes total. More than 30-minutes frustrates and overwhelms her, causing emotional distress for her and the family. More than this makes it impossible for us to help her.

2.      All of Kelly’s homework should be at her independent level, so she can succeed if she makes a moderate effort.

3.      We need to know what’s happening in school. We need all of Kelly’s teachers to e-mail us, a week in advance, all of Kelly’s assignments. We also need them to e-mail us feedback on how well she’s doing in her different subjects.

4.      Several of Kelly’s classmates are taunting her, calling her “a dumb sped.” We need a program that not only protects Kelly from such taunting, but teaches her how to handle it and accurately strengthens her belief in her abilities.

5.      Kelly is becoming depressed about school; she’s losing motivation for doing well in school. For years she’s worked hard to succeed, but she’s made little progress in reading. She’s a 5th grader with Full Scale WISC-IV IQ of 124 who struggles to read 2^nd grade books.  Next year she’ll be in middle school, and we fear that because of her reading disabilities she’ll fail her classes and will be taunted and will become even more depressed about school. We want a reading evaluation from a reading specialist and a comprehensive reading program that’s monitored each week and that brings her independent reading level to 4^th grade by June 2010.

6.      We need weekly parent training in how to improve Kelly’s worsening depression about her reading disabilities and how to help her at home in ways that reduce stress and increase her optimism about learning to read.

Reference: Code of Federal Regulations: §300.324 Development, review, and revision of IEP

HM