Clustering of special Ed kids in gen Ed

[Anonymous]

My child's worst year was when a supposedly NT child kept having behavioral issues and the teacher was at a loss to handle because the parents denied anything was wrong. This child continually lost it in class, was defiant and disruptive to everyone and the parents did nothing to control the behavior.

It's not the kids with IEPs that are the issue. Having an IEP means the school and the parents recognize there's a challenge and are working on it. The worst is those parents who deny anything is going on.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My child's worst year was when a supposedly NT child kept having behavioral issues and the teacher was at a loss to handle because the parents denied anything was wrong. This child continually lost it in class, was defiant and disruptive to everyone and the parents did nothing to control the behavior.

It's not the kids with IEPs that are the issue. Having an IEP means the school and the parents recognize there's a challenge and are working on it. The worst is those parents who deny anything is going on.

At our school, those kids gets pushed into the cluster class too

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:At our school they seem to put all the special Ed kids in one Gen Ed class. It’s not fair to the other regular kids who get placed in with that group. The class is usually poorly behaved and the teacher is overwhelmed. This is called clustering and I thought this practice was outdated and frowned upon. Why are elementary schools clustering special Ed kids now in one class instead of spreading them out among 3 different Gen Ed classes? Can parents request for their child not to be put in the special Ed class?

This is my first year working in a school (fcps elementary school). If it makes you feel better, behaviors are an effing nightmare across the board, not just the “iep” kids.

Thank you teacher.
I don't know why everyone keeps blaming the IEP kids. The worst behavior at our school occurs from the kids without IEPs.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:They don’t have enough aides

+1

They use the well behaved kids to try to outweigh the not so much. The well behaved kids become the aides.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:They don’t have enough aides

+1

They use the well behaved kids to try to outweigh the not so much. The well behaved kids become the aides.

This happens in AP too.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My daughter had a horrible third grade experience because there were a few kids who were very badly behaved with special needs. The teacher was experienced but she could not handle it and she would yell at all the kids or just disappear into the copy room. She quit the next year. It was very unfair that my well-behaved and academic daughter was sacrificed as were the many other kids in the class who behaved and didn’t have issues. The school clearly put all the easy kids with the challenging kids in that class.

Your daughter is not that “academic” if she can’t handle a few special needs kids in her classroom. Fact.

This makes no sense whatsoever.

I think the point PP is trying to make is this is your daughter's issue and that she can't be that academic if she's bothered by something that's really normal and that is part of real life.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:At our school they seem to put all the special Ed kids in one Gen Ed class. It’s not fair to the other regular kids who get placed in with that group. The class is usually poorly behaved and the teacher is overwhelmed. This is called clustering and I thought this practice was outdated and frowned upon. Why are elementary schools clustering special Ed kids now in one class instead of spreading them out among 3 different Gen Ed classes? Can parents request for their child not to be put in the special Ed class?

This is my first year working in a school (fcps elementary school). If it makes you feel better, behaviors are an effing nightmare across the board, not just the “iep” kids.

Thank you teacher.
I don't know why everyone keeps blaming the IEP kids. The worst behavior at our school occurs from the kids without IEPs.

Sometimes their parents deny them IEPS, and the teachers are forced to use the well behaved kids to help teach and instruct 1:1. More parents need to be aware of this practice in FCPS. There just are not enough aides, or enough parents willing to do what is needed.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:They don’t have enough aides

+1

They use the well behaved kids to try to outweigh the not so much. The well behaved kids become the aides.

Yep and this has been going on for decades. I remember I was always paired with the disruptive kid when I was in school. It wasn't fair and made group projects a disaster. I typically just had to do most of the work myself.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The best years my gen Ed kid has had have been in inclusion classrooms. The unfounded judgment of kids with IEPs is disgusting.

It's not unfounded for many kids in these inclusive classrooms who have had very negative, even traumatic experiences.

My kid had to see a therapist for anxiety related to going to school in her inclusive class. Why? Because two students in the class regularly had meltdowns that caused the classroom to be evacuated. These meltdowns included lots of yelling, throwing items, and in a few cases, outright assault on the teacher and aide.

It got to the point where their class was evacuating the classroom weekly. The one student's behavior just got more and more destructive to the point where he trashed a classroom one time and the kids had to finish out the day in neighboring classrooms.

That's UNACCEPTABLE behavior for anyone. My kid shouldn't have been scared of going to school because of two students who, and I will just keep it real, are never going to amount to anything. One student is mostly nonverbal with significant delays. I cannot think of any job that he can do in his future. It's sad, but it is what it is.

When I was in school, these types of students were in their own classrooms. That's how it should be. If you're a disruptive student, you don't get to be mainstreamed.

Why didn’t you ask for a classroom switch?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

At our ES, one SN child was asking that my son be in his class. A compliment I know, but that meant my son was with her son and the other SN students year after year. It wasn't random. The SN's parents were allowed "a say". I was not and didn't know this was happening until years later.


Parents like you are horrible for sns parents to deal with. Assuming that the class with a sns kid is somehow undesirable is vile.

I'm in favor of inclusion but should it affect my son's placement EVERY year? The other Mother determines his placement every year? Without me knowing about it

Exactly. I have a type-A rule follower and he was routinely sat next to the most disruptive kids to be a “peer model” until I asked for it to stop. Non-identified kids have needs too

I have one of these kids too and I only heard a slight grumble once early on about Larlo being difficult to work with. I quickly put a stop to that saying that it's part of school and learning for DC to work with all kinds of kids including those who don't do as well in cooperation or who may struggle with certain tasks. Sometimes kids with some types of SN think more creatively or out of the box than others and if have a partner who can pull those ideas out of that child you may one day have a cure for cancer or AIDS or global warming.

I would never ask a teacher to "stop" this grouping because it's just part of normal school and teacher's job trying to create groups that will be productive.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There should be sped schools, the way they have AAP centers.

Least Restrictive Environment be like: do I mean nothing to you?

But what about the rights of the other students to learn?

They are still learning… it may not be at the pace you want but that isn’t specified by law. Admin and teachers have to follow the law before the needs of the the other kids. Sorry, it is what it is. You should lobby for more flexibility for students to be transferred to other programs/schools; because now, it is virtually impossible to do that without SPED parents suing the district.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

At our ES, one SN child was asking that my son be in his class. A compliment I know, but that meant my son was with her son and the other SN students year after year. It wasn't random. The SN's parents were allowed "a say". I was not and didn't know this was happening until years later.

Parents like you are horrible for sns parents to deal with. Assuming that the class with a sns kid is somehow undesirable is vile.

I'm in favor of inclusion but should it affect my son's placement EVERY year? The other Mother determines his placement every year? Without me knowing about it

Why is it that you never filled out the same form that she did asking for the students to be separated? The current teacher also has a say. So if the current teacher saw that request and didn’t see a problem, that’s another reason why they stayed together.

My child was in a classroom with a cluster of children with IEPs for many years. DC is easy going and academically ahead. Maybe another child requested DC or maybe it was random. Never saw it as a problem. DC learned just the same.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The best years my gen Ed kid has had have been in inclusion classrooms. The unfounded judgment of kids with IEPs is disgusting.

It's not unfounded for many kids in these inclusive classrooms who have had very negative, even traumatic experiences.

My kid had to see a therapist for anxiety related to going to school in her inclusive class. Why? Because two students in the class regularly had meltdowns that caused the classroom to be evacuated. These meltdowns included lots of yelling, throwing items, and in a few cases, outright assault on the teacher and aide.

It got to the point where their class was evacuating the classroom weekly. The one student's behavior just got more and more destructive to the point where he trashed a classroom one time and the kids had to finish out the day in neighboring classrooms.

That's UNACCEPTABLE behavior for anyone. My kid shouldn't have been scared of going to school because of two students who, and I will just keep it real, are never going to amount to anything. One student is mostly nonverbal with significant delays. I cannot think of any job that he can do in his future. It's sad, but it is what it is.

When I was in school, these types of students were in their own classrooms. That's how it should be. If you're a disruptive student, you don't get to be mainstreamed.

Your child already had anxiety to begin with PP. Your child is probably the only child in the classroom who reacted this way. This does happen in the lower elementary grades across the country because of increased demands of K and 1st and is not that different from behavior you'd see in preschools.

Instead of making vile comments about how kids with SN will not amounting to anything you should be focusing on how to help your child so she does not have this type of reaction to other hardships she encounters in the future.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There should be sped schools, the way they have AAP centers.

Least Restrictive Environment be like: do I mean nothing to you?

But what about the rights of the other students to learn?

They are still learning… it may not be at the pace you want but that isn’t specified by law. Admin and teachers have to follow the law before the needs of the the other kids. Sorry, it is what it is. You should lobby for more flexibility for students to be transferred to other programs/schools; because now, it is virtually impossible to do that without SPED parents suing the district.

+1 Hey, more opportunity to tell people about the law!!

Schools only must provide a “serviceable Chevrolet,” not a Cadillac, to afford a student a free appropriate public education (FAPE). The analogy is often associated with the seminal U.S. Supreme Court case known as Rowley, which said that public education requires only a “basic floor of opportunity,” not that schools “maximize” a child’s educational potential. The “Chevy vs. Cadillac” analogy was coined and used by lower courts after Rowley, and suggests that schools need only provide a bare minimum of services to afford a student FAPE.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There should be sped schools, the way they have AAP centers.

Least Restrictive Environment be like: do I mean nothing to you?

But what about the rights of the other students to learn?

They are still learning… it may not be at the pace you want but that isn’t specified by law. Admin and teachers have to follow the law before the needs of the the other kids. Sorry, it is what it is. You should lobby for more flexibility for students to be transferred to other programs/schools; because now, it is virtually impossible to do that without SPED parents suing the district.

+1 Hey, more opportunity to tell people about the law!!

Schools only must provide a “serviceable Chevrolet,” not a Cadillac, to afford a student a free appropriate public education (FAPE). The analogy is often associated with the seminal U.S. Supreme Court case known as Rowley, which said that public education requires only a “basic floor of opportunity,” not that schools “maximize” a child’s educational potential. The “Chevy vs. Cadillac” analogy was coined and used by lower courts after Rowley, and suggests that schools need only provide a bare minimum of services to afford a student FAPE.

That's true, but parents and other kids don't have to be happy about being in one class that moves far slower than the other classes.