Reply to Advice on handwriting/OT issues

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[quote=Anonymous]My 1st grade son has trouble writing legibly and drawing accurately.  He also writes some letters/numbers backwards.  His reading skills are excellent--probably 5th or 6th grade level.  (Writing skills--other than the mechanics--are also above grade level, but not so high.)  He doesn't exhibit any other fine motor problems that we observe--in fact one of his favorite activities is to spend hours playing with little legos--but it takes him a long time to write and his writing is often not very legible.  His language arts teacher compensates by giving him extra time for tests and sometimes writing down the answers he dictates to her.

We raised this issue with his homeroom teachers and requested (several months ago) an assessment by the school's occupational therapist.  On Tuesday, the school told us that, although my son failed his initial OT screening at the beginning of the year (something they had never told us before), his handwriting had improved since then.  (I would say that it has improved, but marginally, and his language arts teacher--who was not at the meeting--still reports that that is what holds him back.)  Moreover, the school social worker and OT kept saying that his handwriting issues had "no educational impact."  When I objected and said that his language arts teacher says that it does have an educational impact, they clarified that what they mean is that it is not making him below grade level in any subject.  In fact, he is above grade level in language arts, despite his issues with handwriting.  The school says that unless he is below grade level in a subject, there is nothing they can do to provide him with extra support.

The school suggested that I look for "resources in the community." When I pushed them on what that meant exactly, they said see what your insurance will cover.  Our insurance only covers occupational therapy related to an injury, so it will be no help in this case.

Can anyone shed light on this frustrating situation?  My son is a very good student (in fact, he is being evaluated for the TAG program) so it is unlikely that he will ever be below grade level.  But it doesn't make sense to me that the school can't address specific issues unless he is below grade level.  When I was a kid, I was a great student who had trouble pronouncing Rs.  I saw a speech therapist.  It seems like this would be similar to me.

Is this "no OT support unless the student is below grade level" a common/universal policy?  We haven't been impressed with this public school overall and so are planning to move to a better school district (from Alexandria to Arlington) this summer.  Are we likely to get more support in Arlington?  Should we look in to paying for an OT privately for our son, completely out of pocket?  How much would that likely cost?

Thanks, everyone, for any insight/advice/experiences,
[/quote]

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