Educational Inspiration

I hear the two terms 'screenings' and 'evaluations' used interchangeably all the time.  It leads to a lot of confusion about what has and hasn't been done for a child. First, let's discuss screenings.  A screening is a quick snapshot of language or literacy skills.  These screens take about 5-15 minutes.  They look at key concepts and whether your child does or does not exhibit risk factors for those skills.  A screening is a fast way to determine if a child appears to be developing typically when compared with peers.  Screens do NOT diagnose.  They can't be used to determine whether a child is eligible for special education services.  Screenings don't look at every skill, just a few important ones and because of this, screenings can sometimes miss kids who actually do have language or literacy problems.  If you have concerns about your child, tell the speech-language pathologist about them so she can consider those concerns while she does the screen.

Response to Intervention (RTI) has been a hot topic for about 5-15 years in most schools, depending on when they decided to take the plunge.  If your child has been flagged as requiring an intervention through RTI, you may have done some googling and found some rather unpleasant things written about RTI by other parents.  Now you are wondering if this is something you should let the school continue doing with your child or whether you should insist on the good old fashioned evaluation that used to be done when a child was suspected of having a disability.  The answer?  It depends. The theory of RTI is based on a medical model and has excellent research behind it.  The idea is that if a child is showing signs of difficulty, we want to try to find what level of support he needs to be successful.  So, your child may struggle, but may not require a self-contained classroom setting with other special education children.  Maybe they just need a little help, not the whole enchilada.  So RTI

Last week we visited about DIBELS reading screens and what happens after the screening.  Typically some kind of intervention is put into place after it is determined that reading skills are below grade level.  So now you have met with the teachers and discussed the screening.  Then you and the school worked together to put a plan into place to improve reading.  But what if that plan has been in place for a month or so and things don't seem to be getting any better?  Now what? You aren't alone.  Many parents are asking the same thing.  Here are some questions you can ask about your child's intervention.  These are very basic, but it is a good place to start to make sure things are beginning on the right track. As with all things, presentation is everything. We want to build a partnership with the school and teachers. Most teachers and schools want to help.  Yes, there are horror stories out there about terrible schools and teachers.  It definitely happens and I have se