Wednesday, October 18, 2006
Ambushed!!!
It wasn't just a meeting with the teacher. I walked in and thought to myself, here we go! There was the principle, the reading specialist, the school psychologist and some other specialist, and the teacher. They are concerned about his attention, his lack of focus, his reading comprehension, comprehending directions. Areas of concern checked on the paper are reading, attention, written language, work habits. They claim he engages in a lot of repetitive behaviors. He fidgets alot and spends a lot of time tying and untying his shoe laces. In the reading class he rolls the pencil back and forth a lot.
His hand writing sloppy....I explained how it was much better until he started going to school and how he can still do very well if he takes his time and is prompted when necessary. Teacher showed me a page of cursive writing words that he did which is very nice. Well he can do the same thing in printing if he has the word on the left and copies it directly to the right or underneath. And that is what I would have him do daily if he wasn't spending 6 hours a day in school. I can't get him to do it daily now.
Then they established goals which are
1) improve sentence mechanics (capital, punctuation, etc) and following directions.
2) listen and follow through on directions
and Interventions as they call them, ways to reach the goals, and most of these came from the school psychologist:
1) preferential seating
2) repeat directions back to teacher, give a signal prior to giving directions (some sort of signal to arragned between them)
3) highlight answers in text prior to answering questions in reading and grammar work book or notebook
4) when appropriate break assignments down or shorten them
5) positive feedback
follow up meeting in one month.
They didn't really ask for my input on anything. so this was just a political meeting with what long term goal in mind, I wonder?
This is all very frustrating to me, to say the least. I would rather have him at home where I can work with him at his pace and his interest level. I told them that he is there because he wants to be and that I would rather have him home. I didn't tell them it is my hope he will not be IN school by the time the next meeting rolls around.
the attention, lack of focus and following directions are nothing new, these are things he has had all his life and dh is the same way for the most part. a one on one environment tailored to his needs would be better for him. however I will let him continue there as long as he wants to be there. the sentence mechanics are not something we worked on much last year. I didn't like the LA guides that I had at all and wasn't about to force him to do them if I didn't like them either. I have found something I think we will both like better that I'd like to try.
its also very irritating to me that dh would rather have him in school than at home. if he was off at work every day i'm sure it wouldn't matter at all to him. i think its more convenient to not have the boy around, then he doesn't have to deal with him. i want him at home and i wish he had never spent one day in any school. his mother is coming next week, and she said to me over the summer, well he *needs* to be in school! needless to say i don't appreciate her interference. maybe that is too harsh a word. she has a right to her opinion. just don't expect me to abide by it! I know what my children need and don't need. I wonder how long she is staying...*sigh*
His hand writing sloppy....I explained how it was much better until he started going to school and how he can still do very well if he takes his time and is prompted when necessary. Teacher showed me a page of cursive writing words that he did which is very nice. Well he can do the same thing in printing if he has the word on the left and copies it directly to the right or underneath. And that is what I would have him do daily if he wasn't spending 6 hours a day in school. I can't get him to do it daily now.
Then they established goals which are
1) improve sentence mechanics (capital, punctuation, etc) and following directions.
2) listen and follow through on directions
and Interventions as they call them, ways to reach the goals, and most of these came from the school psychologist:
1) preferential seating
2) repeat directions back to teacher, give a signal prior to giving directions (some sort of signal to arragned between them)
3) highlight answers in text prior to answering questions in reading and grammar work book or notebook
4) when appropriate break assignments down or shorten them
5) positive feedback
follow up meeting in one month.
They didn't really ask for my input on anything. so this was just a political meeting with what long term goal in mind, I wonder?
This is all very frustrating to me, to say the least. I would rather have him at home where I can work with him at his pace and his interest level. I told them that he is there because he wants to be and that I would rather have him home. I didn't tell them it is my hope he will not be IN school by the time the next meeting rolls around.
the attention, lack of focus and following directions are nothing new, these are things he has had all his life and dh is the same way for the most part. a one on one environment tailored to his needs would be better for him. however I will let him continue there as long as he wants to be there. the sentence mechanics are not something we worked on much last year. I didn't like the LA guides that I had at all and wasn't about to force him to do them if I didn't like them either. I have found something I think we will both like better that I'd like to try.
its also very irritating to me that dh would rather have him in school than at home. if he was off at work every day i'm sure it wouldn't matter at all to him. i think its more convenient to not have the boy around, then he doesn't have to deal with him. i want him at home and i wish he had never spent one day in any school. his mother is coming next week, and she said to me over the summer, well he *needs* to be in school! needless to say i don't appreciate her interference. maybe that is too harsh a word. she has a right to her opinion. just don't expect me to abide by it! I know what my children need and don't need. I wonder how long she is staying...*sigh*
# posted by Anne @ 12:06 PM 
