gcvmom
Here we go again!
I'm really excited about the progress towards difficult child 2's IEP. The school psychiatric pulled me aside yesterday to share some of her results. She was almost giddy about how far she was able to take difficult child 2 through some of her cognitive testing -- got up to college level with some of it (he's in 5th grade). He's in something like the 99th percentile in his language skills. I guess I'm just delighted to have something positive to hold onto with all the junk we've been through around here lately...
Anyway, she said NO PROBLEM in qualifying for the IEP -- it would fall under "otherwise health-impaired" since they know he's clearly ADHD but does seem to have some autism spectrum qualities (but then again, I've always thought ADHD was just at one end of the autism spectrum...) and with the mood issues and his new Sydenham's diagnosis it's too complicated to start slapping labels on him. Fine with me. I didn't think she was qualified to apply a diagnosis anyway...
Tomorrow he starts testing with our private neuropsychologist for two hours, then two hours Thursday and two hours on Saturday. The school's going to share the test results and protocols with the private doctor so she can include the info in her evaluation.
Some interesting things came out of my chat with the school psychiatric, though. difficult child 2 has really good self-esteem, but he also recognizes that he has no friends and needs help with that. He also admits to being incredibly bored at school. Although he's a "GATE" (gifted) student, his school just lumps those kids with other high-acheivers and the teachers are supposed to modify their curriculum a bit to supposedly address their giftedness. Frankly, I just don't see that happening.
We talked about the ramifications of sending him to the district GATE magnet school for his final year of elementary school next year, and then sending him to the GATE magnet middle school and whether that would be the best way to address his attitudes about school and his social issues. He would have a clean slate and no social history which has been part of the problem for him at his present school (years of teasing and bullying that only this year got addressed after he brought a Swiss Army knife to school).
I talked to difficult child 2 about this and he's open to the idea. husband's main concern was that it means more driving since neither of the new schools are close to us.
The school psychiatric said she'd be happy to arrange an observation at the schools for us. I'm thinking we should do this, and we should probably act soon since there's only about two more months of school left...
One good thing is that his new IEP will follow wherever he goes
Anyway, she said NO PROBLEM in qualifying for the IEP -- it would fall under "otherwise health-impaired" since they know he's clearly ADHD but does seem to have some autism spectrum qualities (but then again, I've always thought ADHD was just at one end of the autism spectrum...) and with the mood issues and his new Sydenham's diagnosis it's too complicated to start slapping labels on him. Fine with me. I didn't think she was qualified to apply a diagnosis anyway...
Tomorrow he starts testing with our private neuropsychologist for two hours, then two hours Thursday and two hours on Saturday. The school's going to share the test results and protocols with the private doctor so she can include the info in her evaluation.
Some interesting things came out of my chat with the school psychiatric, though. difficult child 2 has really good self-esteem, but he also recognizes that he has no friends and needs help with that. He also admits to being incredibly bored at school. Although he's a "GATE" (gifted) student, his school just lumps those kids with other high-acheivers and the teachers are supposed to modify their curriculum a bit to supposedly address their giftedness. Frankly, I just don't see that happening.
We talked about the ramifications of sending him to the district GATE magnet school for his final year of elementary school next year, and then sending him to the GATE magnet middle school and whether that would be the best way to address his attitudes about school and his social issues. He would have a clean slate and no social history which has been part of the problem for him at his present school (years of teasing and bullying that only this year got addressed after he brought a Swiss Army knife to school).
I talked to difficult child 2 about this and he's open to the idea. husband's main concern was that it means more driving since neither of the new schools are close to us.
The school psychiatric said she'd be happy to arrange an observation at the schools for us. I'm thinking we should do this, and we should probably act soon since there's only about two more months of school left...
One good thing is that his new IEP will follow wherever he goes
