Homeschooling

A relative telling me:
- He's worried about my 9 year old son being homeschooled. He doesn't want him to have momma's boy relationship rather than progress with other kids. He could end up like a nun... secluded from the world.
-He says my daughter needs school so she can have the peer pressure to talk. Wow, really? That's the magic fix for apraxia these days?

We're going to be taking our 3 year old to school for therapies. Her IEP said:

1-"She has at least one word."

Really? That's because you only heard her say one word to ME.

2- Please spell her name the same way each time you write it.

3- My daughter is a female, so please don't use "he" in her IEP.

4-Her private speech and physical therapists wrote letters about how she shuts down, how group settings are not good for her, etc etc, but should we mention this in her IEP? No? Really???

5- Random facts were just wrong.

6- (cognitive) "Most of this evaluation is based on parent input. As such the results should be interpreted with caution."

For real? The cognitive part was THEM doing it, I had nothing to do with it. Her 0-3 teacher says this area is normal, her private therapists say it's normal, I say it's normal, THEY are the ones saying she's cognitively delayed. Based on what? A few minutes with a girl who is so shy she shuts down and stares off into space? And then write on the IEP that it was ME who said this? ME??? And it should be interpreted with caution? On the contrary.

Really? What are people thinking? And they wonder why I won't send them to their preschool?

Thanks for letting me vent.

You have every right to be angry--I would be, too!  People can say and do the strangest things, can't they?!

My best friend, who lives in another country, had her ex take her oldest ds to be evaluated without her knowledge.  He was sure her unschooling was ruining their ds.  Their ds tested into the gifted range for many things but her ex kept bringing up that he was "behind" in math skills.  The ex also had their ds evaluated by Children's Services and my friend received the report.  She gave me a copy to read and we both laughed long and hard.

The CS evaluation expressed concern that the kids didn't have a set bedtime and time to get up.  It said, "K. doesn't get up until he wakes up."  I couldn't stop lauging--don't we all do that?!!!  At one point the evaluation stated, "K can't identify all the letters of the alphabet" then later states, "K reads at a very advanced level".  Apparently, they missed the irony of those 2 statements ;-)  (I did ask K about it and he said he was just tired of answering stupid questions when they started in about the alphabet).

Everyone can rest easy--K is now almost 16yo and a fine young man--although I think he still doesn't get up until he wakes up ;-)

Well... I'm not impressed either.

The relative needs to "please pass the bean dip."

The evaluator/s ugh. When I had my middle son assessed, the evaluators were great (director of the rehab center, therapist, and psychologist). They did slightly under evaluate one area, but it wasn't so much that it was out of line. Otherwise, I was surprised at how they were able to assess cognative ability of a 2yo, and actually assessed him higher than I would have. *and* they took the things I said very seriously because (they said) I know him best because I'm around him all the time.

I'm sorry you had such ignorant evaluators.

Vent away!!!

   

  http://connect.ivillage.com/cl-phacademy

OMG....I love this title..."things I am not impressed with today" I so want to use that as a book title, I could go on and on! Why do we live in this sort of world!

Anyway....ALL the evaluation my child got in schools were very similar, very biased, ignorant, wrong, same ith the judgements imposed on me by school evaluation. We decided to go outside of schools for evaluation and had better evals with Dr's and other places set up to evaluate without predisposed judgements...yet, even they did not see the whole her as far as how very truely gifted she is and how very bright a child....but that is more difficult to judge in a child not reciving supportive education the majority of her time in a school like setting plus my eval part probably did not point out all the problems in the classroom I could not see, but just the frustration I saw occasionally in the home or when I was trying to observe in the class, and by peer reaction. Plus OT stuff and Learning stuff is greatly affected by a rushed loud classroom than in a private office setting.

Yes,schools have bad evaluations, and 5 minutes with a child is not the same as 5 years with a child. Plus classroom vs. one on one with a trusted person is a HUGE difference in learning about a child esp. a young perhaps shy, bright learner.

I wish you luck. I know how ANGRY I was and how it still makes me mad to think about it, especially that I did not pull her sooner from such a negative place. Yet, we sure did learn alot from all the failures around us! I work at home to provide REAL services and education they work at school to provide baby sitters and paychecks to teachers who say stuff like " I am not left handed, so I just can't lefties" Ohhh...can't teach, but you get PAID to be a teacher! I am right handed....guess what I taught that lefty, OT stuff and how to write and even draw and paint....when they could NOT TEACH my child. It is very frustrating but just keep that anger inside and use it as energy to TEACH as yes, you can do!

Many blessings it is SO hard to be where you are!

Heather