Accomodations for selective mutism (MCPS)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Hi op - I am facing the same situation and wondering how kindergarten went. Was your daughter in pre-k? We just received an official diagnosis and she will be starting K in the fall. She’s always been in full time daycare / preschool and she can talk but very quietly in the classroom (is totally fine on playground). I don’t think her case is extremely severe but I am worried about her ability to communicate and learn in K and ask to go to potty…

Hi! So our DD will start K this year. She no longer has SM after working with a SM therapist, SM camp and doing lots of exposures and setting up a reward system for brave talking . She does still have anxiety, so still want to do an extra visit to meet the teacher if possible but are pretty hopeful she will be fully verbal.

I would definitely lean into treating the SM. SM is both very impairing and treatable. Get the Overcoming Selective Mutism book - I found it so helpful.

Which camp did you do?

The Confident Kids Camp through the Rockville Therapy Center, which was excellent. Brighter Outlook has another camp called Kids Out Loud. We were advised that both of these camps are very similar and to just choose the one that worked best for our schedule.

[Anonymous]

Just a quick note that I'm an elementary school general ed teacher, and I can definitely imagine doing a few 15 minute visits ahead of the open house. I would recommend trying to be as respectful as possible of the teacher's time (since teachers are generally very busy during the week before school starts), making it clear right away that each visit would only be 15 minutes (and then sticking to that), and explaining clearly and concisely what the teacher can/should do to make it successful.

[Anonymous]

Reviving this thread, as I have a rising Kindergartner with SM. Some posters have mentioned private schools with experience in SM. Would people be willing to share names of specific schools? I thought DC would be fine in MCPS, but now I'm starting to worry. The class sizes of our local school's K are larger than I thought. I'd like to explore other options.

[Anonymous]

It will be.tough for a SM kid in an mcps kindergarten. Even with a great teacher and administrative support, there will be 20 plus kids in the class. Your quiet non disruptive child won't get much in the way of attention or accommodations. The SM kids i have encountered have been very entrenched in not speaking....it can last for many years.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Reviving this thread, as I have a rising Kindergartner with SM. Some posters have mentioned private schools with experience in SM. Would people be willing to share names of specific schools? I thought DC would be fine in MCPS, but now I'm starting to worry. The class sizes of our local school's K are larger than I thought. I'd like to explore other options.

Dominion Christian (Oakton). Kid started in fall 2020, definitely not the ideal time for scaffolding. Hid under his desk for the first couple of days. But things got better and better, and by kindergarten graduation, he read something out to the whole class and the assembled parents. Never would have believed it at the start of the year - he couldn't even be on the stage during preschool.

[Anonymous]

It’s really school dependent so talk to school before you decide. My DD was older when we found out, we had meeting with school but no accommodation nor support at all (we had our own outside therapies, like 13 sessions), no iep nor 504 was granted, and even the report stated “parents didn’t continue therapy” etc. What a joke.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It will be.tough for a SM kid in an mcps kindergarten. Even with a great teacher and administrative support, there will be 20 plus kids in the class. Your quiet non disruptive child won't get much in the way of attention or accommodations. The SM kids i have encountered have been very entrenched in not speaking....it can last for many years.

1. Not all MCPS kindergarten classes are that large. Ours has 16 kids. Look for focus schools that receive allocations to lower class sizes.
2. SM is treatable. The challenge is that MCPS is a large system and doing things differently can be hard. If a child is still in private preschool/daycare, I would recommend leaning into treating SM now. Hire a therapist with experience in PCIT-SM (Meredith Polsky and Lindsay Scharfstein are each amazing) to do fade ins at the school. Learn PCIT-SM skills and do exposures outside of school, set up a reward system for brave talking outside of school. We did this and it felt so hard at the time financially and logistically but it was 100% worth every penny and all the time and energy. Try to get into an SM camp over the summer if you can. That will set them up for success in public school.

Once you get to MCPS it will be much harder to get a private therapist into the school and they don't know how to treat SM. That being said, they do have some amazing teachers, and if you are lucky you may be able to work with the teacher to get them to incorporate some elements of PCIT-SM to supplement what you do outside of school. Go through the IEP/504 processes but know they are long and very underwhelming. You will spend many hours discussing your kid with the school staff and getting unsolicited and unhelpful parenting advice, and you won't get out of it an evidence-based plan to overcome the SM, just maybe to accommodate it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Is she on Prozac? If she is not on a small dose of Prozac, may I ask why?
Ds had it and Prozac was a life saver. At a young age small dose can require the brain chemistry and then child develops better social behaviors and talking becomes what is normal for the kid.

DD was diagnosed very young - around 2.5 - which is too young for medication. She has responded fairly well to PCIT-SM therapy, and I suspect it's because of that her therapists have not yet recommended medication. However, we have experienced progress and then plateaus where she is verbal but not fully verbal in school. Some of it may be our fault for not being as diligent as we could be with exposures and playdates. We are looking forward to building our skill set during the parent training component of the camp and also getting tips from the other parents. I really appreciate your comment because it is a reminder to ask about medication. Anxiety definitely runs in our family and I myself recently started an SSRI which has been a game-changer for me personally.

Micro dose of Prozac for a few weeks before school started and then weaning off w/n 6 months plus requesting he be assigned a low key experienced teacher (versus high energy rapid fire talking teacher) and having him visit the classroom the week before school started 2x greatly helped more than therapy or the selective mutism summer camp. We paid for an advocate to assist us before our meeting with the school to present our request at the 504 meeting the prior April before DS started K. Also the cost of the psychologist who wrote report after observing ds in prek class and answering questions over the phone. Thankfully the microsdose worked and was a life changer for us.

who can prescribe prozac in DMV area. DS is 2.8 months.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Is she on Prozac? If she is not on a small dose of Prozac, may I ask why?
Ds had it and Prozac was a life saver. At a young age small dose can require the brain chemistry and then child develops better social behaviors and talking becomes what is normal for the kid.

DD was diagnosed very young - around 2.5 - which is too young for medication. She has responded fairly well to PCIT-SM therapy, and I suspect it's because of that her therapists have not yet recommended medication. However, we have experienced progress and then plateaus where she is verbal but not fully verbal in school. Some of it may be our fault for not being as diligent as we could be with exposures and playdates. We are looking forward to building our skill set during the parent training component of the camp and also getting tips from the other parents. I really appreciate your comment because it is a reminder to ask about medication. Anxiety definitely runs in our family and I myself recently started an SSRI which has been a game-changer for me personally.

Micro dose of Prozac for a few weeks before school started and then weaning off w/n 6 months plus requesting he be assigned a low key experienced teacher (versus high energy rapid fire talking teacher) and having him visit the classroom the week before school started 2x greatly helped more than therapy or the selective mutism summer camp. We paid for an advocate to assist us before our meeting with the school to present our request at the 504 meeting the prior April before DS started K. Also the cost of the psychologist who wrote report after observing ds in prek class and answering questions over the phone. Thankfully the microsdose worked and was a life changer for us.

who can prescribe prozac in DMV area. DS is 2.8 months.

For a kid that age I would call Dr Bhavin Dave at Children's.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My child will be starting kindergarten next year (2024). She is receiving therapy for selective mutism and has made great progress, but I want to do everything possible to make her transition to kindergarten successful. Her therapist recommends that we do "sliding in" sessions before school starts.

In an ideal world, what this looks like is DD and I would be in the classroom playing, I use strategies to make sure DD can be verbal there, then the teacher comes in, sits to the side, we make sure DD can be verbal with the teacher there, then prompt the teacher to get closer and eventually ask DD questions. The goal is to get DD comfortable being verbal with the teacher. We would ideally do two or three of these sessions. Probably at least 15 minutes each.

Can something like this be done in the real world in MCPS/public school systems?

We did this in a small private school at K during covid when they had learning pods of 9 kids and 1 teacher. It was WONDERFUL!!! DD talks at school like all the other kids. She's 10 now and still has problems in some situations, like asking the librarian for help at the public library. Other than these minor hang-ups about once a month, she interacts normally and is happy/healthy.

Can you put her in a small private school where she will get to know everyone really well? You can also orchestrate playdates and explain to the other parents what's happening. Our community was so helpful when I told them about DD's communication struggles. I'm so grateful to some of the other parents and all the kind children who went out of their way to include her.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My daughter has selective mutism and we send her to a small private school with experienced teachers - similar to Beauvoir but different city. We've been blown away at the progress she's made. All the faculty and staff know her and have gone out of their way to make her comfortable. She will be in 5th this year and at school you would not notice a difference between her and the other children.

She was diagnosed at 4 years old and still gets triggered in some environments, school is not one of them. When she was diagnosed I made an appointment with the HOS, dean, principal, and her 2 teachers. Ever since then, the school ensures the right mix of kids in the class and teachers that will be best for her (and all the other students). Please take the time to get this right for your daughter; our progress has been amazing.

I'm not sure any public school has the capacity to do this for all the students they have. My other children are bright social kids and benefited from this thoughtful class selection too. One of the teachers at the school told me "I believe all children have a special need". She was trained as a GT teacher, but at the time was teaching 2nd grade.

+1
I just responded to OP, but same situation here. Our private is similar to Beauvoir and DD was also diagnosed at 4.

[Anonymous]

My daughter (3.5) has just been diagnosed. Currently at a private preschool that has been so helpful in allowing push-in support and teacher training. My daughter still has two more full school years before kindergarten. It’s all still overwhelming to me! I am currently focusing on making sure the preschool she’s in next year (whether we continue at current school or switch) will support fade-in’s at the start of the school year. Can anyone offer me optimism on what happens after that? Will we need that same support into prek and then k, or will she outgrow it, or does it just depend?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My daughter (3.5) has just been diagnosed. Currently at a private preschool that has been so helpful in allowing push-in support and teacher training. My daughter still has two more full school years before kindergarten. It’s all still overwhelming to me! I am currently focusing on making sure the preschool she’s in next year (whether we continue at current school or switch) will support fade-in’s at the start of the school year. Can anyone offer me optimism on what happens after that? Will we need that same support into prek and then k, or will she outgrow it, or does it just depend?

Many kids do outgrow selective mutism. However, it is important to do what you are doing and intervene early, because there is a risk of it persisting and/or developing into other mental health issues. If you haven't already, work with a therapist trained in PCIT-SM and learn how to do exposures outside of school. Look into the selective mutism camps (e.g. Confident Kids, there are others as well) which can be truly transformative.

SM is really tough. We got an autism diagnosis later on and I have to say that for me as the parent, the SM was much more distressing and stressful.

DC is 6 now, verbal in all settings now without any in school supports, and a happy kid.