Overbearing teacher

[tinamarie1]

In the past, we have had to fight for services for difficult child...how much he gets, he hardly got enough, etc. This year he started a new school and its small. Probably 200 students? Well, they have the regular teacher and then she has a Special Education teacher who is in there all the time. ALL the time....she has been assigned to this classroom permenantly. They have put all of the kids who get services on one side of the room and all the kids who don't get svs on the other. The Special Education teacher has her desk about 2 feet from difficult children. So she watches his every move. In his words, she "nags" him to death. We have never had services that were so ummm attentive? to put it nicely. difficult child is begging to be taken off an IEP. The Special Education lady of coarse does not want this. she said that may be setting him up to fail. I told him that he has to prove he doesn't need it anymore. Which I think he does still need it, but I feel like he is in full blown Special Education and not like the past 4 years where he was in a regular setting and just got help maybe 1-2 times a day. His IEP says he is to be in the least restrictive enviornment. Well...is this least restrictive? having the Special Education teacher sit beside you all day and bug the snot out of you?
Also, during math and reading, the Special Education teacher takes all of the Special Education kids out of the room and into another room for their lessons.
what do you all think about this? im not sure how or if to approach the situation.

 

[nvts]

Hey! Did you put this on the Special Education forum as well? I remember when we were looking into this type of arrangement, there wasn't allowed to be a true "distiction" between the gen. ed and spec. ed kids. Sheila and Martie would be more up on this than I am!

It seems like LRE isn't really the way they're doing this.

Beth

 

[everywoman]

This is not legal in any way, shape, or form. I would suggest you do some research on special education laws (national, state, and local). I would contact your district Special Education. administrator as well as the building administrator (building first). Do not allow them to treat your son differently from any other children. But, don't expect them to treat them differently either. Special education's role is to provide accommodation's in the area in which the child needs special instruction.

 

[flutterbee]

I agree with Beth. First thing I thought of is LRE and it doesn't seem like this is it.

 

[klmno]

We had a similar incident a couple of years ago. I informed the principal who "made it change". The first issue- being too attentive- they handled it delicately because apparently it was just a very vigilant teacher (aide)- but it stopped after I told the principal that she was driving my son nuts and he was cringing about having to deal with it. Second issue- having them sit in different areas- that's a no-no. If it is a mainstream class, and apparently it is or there wouldn't be some kids in there who don't need extra help, they are not supposed to seggragate. The other kids aren't even supposed to know who is or isn't on an IEP or in collaborative classes. That was one of our issues too and I also brought that up to the principal. They will probably tell you that it's so the teacher can keep a better eye on the students "to offer help when they need it", but no matter- it's not kosher and needs to change.

 

[Wiped Out]

I would be FUMING!! No way, no how should they have Special Education kiddos on one side of the room and regular ed kiddos on the other. I have 8 Special Education children in my class. They are in no way segregated (I too don't think this is legal). The kids are our (Special Education teacher & me) kids-all of them. The kids in my room seldom know who is getting extra services because we really team-they think the Special Education teacher is just another teacher.

Reading this really makes me angry!

 

[tinamarie1]

should i request an IEP meeting to discuss this? Esp the division of the "iep kids" in the classroom. and what if they say they can't disrupt the entire classroom, like this is the setup for a bunch of kids and they won't change it? should i suggest they move him to another classroom?

 

[klmno]

I would try just contacting the principal first. I say that because the problem doesn't seem to be anything written or not written in his IEP, for one thing. Only the principal can redirect that aide (or perhaps the main teacher- I'm not sure) but there is a problem with the main teacher agreeing to segregation of students. Document any converstaion you have with anyone though, just in case it doesn't change and you need to pursue it further. In our case, the principal wasn't even aware that these things were happening, so I was glad that I didn't call her angry at her, I was calling to "express a couple of concerns and ask what could be done to correct the situation".

 

['Chelle]

I know that here that would be illegal. When there's an aide in the classroom, they're not even allowed to tell anyone which child the aide is there for. You can usually tell, but not always. I know for difficult child you wouldn't think the aide was there for him. Here, the aides tend to help the teacher with all the students, though of course they usually do help that specific student more as they need more help. As klmno said, express your concerns to the principal, and then go from there to ask for an iep meeting if nothing changes after talking to the principal

 

[Needsupport]

Another source for information that you can go to online is Schwablearning.org. You can email questions and you'll receive an answer to your specific question. I wish you the best of luck. I don't think the way that the school is handling your child's situation fairly or appropriately.