Are there any other issues? What type of dyslexia?

Anonymous wrote:The FCPS is likely going to want to do some of their own testing. They shouldn't redo certain tests that have time frames on how often they can be done. They will particularly want to do ones that show Academic level. I know for my daughters they did the KTEA. Not sure if that one goes up to middle school or if there is another educational level testing tool. The one thing to note is they have 60 business days to do the testing. It could be a while to get an IEP in place. You might see if you can get a 504 as interim at least for extra time and have them continue on the IEP process. We got our original 504 with our private testing and no additional testing but that was COvid times. Good Luck. Are your working with your school or the summer clinic?

I’m not familiar with FCPs, but in MCPs often if you come with comprehensive testing, they won’t do more because it’s just work for them.

Anonymous wrote:The FCPS is likely going to want to do some of their own testing. They shouldn't redo certain tests that have time frames on how often they can be done. They will particularly want to do ones that show Academic level. I know for my daughters they did the KTEA. Not sure if that one goes up to middle school or if there is another educational level testing tool. The one thing to note is they have 60 business days to do the testing. It could be a while to get an IEP in place. You might see if you can get a 504 as interim at least for extra time and have them continue on the IEP process. We got our original 504 with our private testing and no additional testing but that was COvid times. Good Luck. Are your working with your school or the summer clinic?

I just walked out of the LSC and this is exactly where they landed, a 504. DD has made it work this far but as the words get longer, the content denser she is getting further and further behind… she failed the SOL the last two years.

They explained 504 would be best first because she will have accommodations on day one of the school year but that it could be revisited if the accommodations are not making a difference. I can understand that.

We had so much back and forth that we could not complete the meeting and have to have a second part in two weeks but I did waive the testing check box so that we could move forward with 504 for the beginning of the school year.

We were always planning on getting a private OG tutor but I am certainly frustrated. I brought up concerns so many times to teachers over the years regarding her reading but kept being told “she is fine…”
DD is a VERY hard worker and she swam against the current for YEARS at school to compensate, I want to help her get what she deserves. Even with the private testing results I felt the committee was dismissive because she has done “fine” except for SOL’s… we seem to have a fundamental difference of what “doing fine” means. To me it seems they are overlooking the incredibly amount of work DD has to put in relation to her peers, the tutoring and the work we do with her at home. Sigh!

I have two kids, both struggling with Dyslexia. The older we are now moving to private because his elementary school's Special Ed department was completely inept and refused to implement OG strategies despite them being in the IEP. The younger was just diagnosed privately in a neuropsych eval showing Dyslexia and major learning loss, but FCPS testing showed grade level, no issues. I have zero trust in FCPS and urge you to get private testing and a private tutor who specializes in Orton Gillingham teaching. FCPS is not willing to truly help kids struggling with dyslexia and their schools are completely inconsistent in terms of teachers and special education. I know others have had good experiences, but our particular elementary school is a complete disaster and I've heard the middle school is too.

In terms of the middle school elective, you need to find students and parents at that school because the strength of the class is really dependent on the teacher teaching the class. We are not confident, based on other student/parent feedback, that the class would help our older student at all. In fact, parents of students with a similar profile to ours told us not to even bother with the public middle school. Our IEP advocate was not sure either.

Again, everyone's experiences are a bit different because all the kids are a bit different. However, for us, we have no confidence in FCPS and the schools we are zoned for, so we have private OG tutors and are pulling our kids and putting them into specilized private schools.

The FCPS is likely going to want to do some of their own testing. They shouldn't redo certain tests that have time frames on how often they can be done. They will particularly want to do ones that show Academic level. I know for my daughters they did the KTEA. Not sure if that one goes up to middle school or if there is another educational level testing tool. The one thing to note is they have 60 business days to do the testing. It could be a while to get an IEP in place. You might see if you can get a 504 as interim at least for extra time and have them continue on the IEP process. We got our original 504 with our private testing and no additional testing but that was COvid times. Good Luck. Are your working with your school or the summer clinic?

And one more question!

In advance of the LSC meeting tomorrow, should I push for no more testing given that we did comprehensive testing already or let them do testing if they want to? DD is dreading any additional testing because she found the private one so exhausting but she will adapt as needed.

Thank you to everyone’s feedback, this is so valuable as I navigate this.

Follow up questions:

- How effective are these literacy electives? Is this something that would actually provide the support she needs as in dyslexia-appropriate literacy instruction? DD will be disappointed to lose an elective given that the ability to choose electives that cater to her interest is something she is very excited about. But if this is going to provide useful support she can benefit from during the school day then we will work with her to help her understand its benefits.

I appreciate the recommendations and will look at the list of accommodations.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Is this for an IEP or a 504?

Tomorrow is the first local screening committee meeting. With dyslexia I am trying for the IEP.

Okay, good--lots more options with an IEP.

If you are just beginning local screening, you won't come up with any accommodations tomorrow. It will just be an eligibility meeting (unless they plan to run two meetings back to back which is unusual IME). You have time to gather thoughts and wishes.

In my years as a general education math teacher, dyslexic kids have had accommodations such as pre-printed copies of notes (no copying problems from the board), access to graph paper to do problems (1 digit per box), and access to teacher notes (this is usually through schoology as I have so many kids who need this for one reason or another). It is also common to have read aloud/read on demand for assessments. If in a team taught class, there are often a small handful who will go to another room to have questions read aloud if it's a paper test. If it's a computer test, it generally has built in read aloud functionality.

If you end up with an IEP, the school will likely suggest a literacy class for one of the electives.

Mine has an IEP rising 7th grader. Private testing pointed to Dyslexia before the start of 2nd grade, virtual school year. We were only able to get a 504 Denied IEP at beginning of 3rd grade, finally got in and in Place a week and half before the 3rd grade SOLS, which I'm sure wasn't a coincidence. For my second Dyslexic Child we easily got an IEP in mid 2nd grade.

Anonymous wrote:Mu child has audio books on Learning Ally. We got it for 6th grade. It took me about two years to get it. They are putting my child in a literacy elective to continue working on reading skills which causes the loss of one of the fun electives. DC gets read aloud on a lot of tests, etc. often via the computer. I really want an ATS consult, we were supposed to have had one at the end of 5th but the SPed teacher was out that day and it was cancelled. It never got reschedules as it was mostly for learning ally. I'm trying to be open minded but I'm afraid it's goinf to be a shit show. Also my child is small group SPED only classes for 3 of the4 main subjects, ADHD issues also mostly of the inattentive variety and we've tried a number of meds without much success and we have major weight issues with Stimulants. I'm curious to hear others experiences.

FWIW, you can qualify directly with Learning Ally, although you would have to pay yourself and try to get reimbursed. It's less than @200 annually. Not cheap but do-able for some.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Is this for an IEP or a 504?

Tomorrow is the first local screening committee meeting. With dyslexia I am trying for the IEP.

with dyslexia you should absolutely have an IEP. The requirement for an IEP is 1) disability 2) adverse impact on education and 3) need for special instruction.

Dyslexia is the disorder, which obviously has an adverse impact on education by making it difficult for a student to sound out complex unknown multi-syllabic words, and even if they can do that they are usually slower and spending more energy on decoding so they don't have as much cognitive energy to spend on comprehension. And, it is well known that dyslexic children need special dyslexia-appropriate reading instruction that explicitly teaches them the sound-syllable connection, in decoding (reading) and encoding (spelling), plus as they get older they need explicit vocabulary acquisition instruction about prefixes/roots/suffixes, so they can elucidate meaning of unknown words.

I would go to the mat for an IEP, because it has more protections, and a dyslexic student should clearly qualify -- even if they have "good grades" and are "taking advanced classes". Those are not the only metrics for "adverse impact". Or are "not behind grade level" (the real question is if there is a significant discrepancy between their IQ and reading achievement in any of the areas of reading -- decoding, rate, fluency or comprehension.

For accommodations, please ask your team to qualify you for Bookshare -- your DC can get almost any book (not just literature but math, tech, history, etc.) digitally and with different reader voices. Also Learning Ally is good. I believe it costs between $100-200 a year, but it gives access to a lot of human voice books synced with text. It is expensive to try to buy a lot on Audible.

I would ask for extra time (I often see dyslexic students with 50 or 100% extra time), quiet/non-distracted room for testing, extra breaks (should go with extra time)

BTW, extra-time means extra-time for everything -- not just tests, but in and out of class work, homework, projects, etc. That means that the student should also have the ability to re-order deadlines in consultation with the teacher (this doesn't mean asking permission, because the "permission" is already asked at the IEP table). Some dyslexic students need highlighters or cards to keep their eye on the text.

There are more accommodations here -- https://www.fcps.edu/academics/academic-overview/special-education-instruction/high-incidence-disabilities-team-k-12-22

Anonymous wrote:Is this for an IEP or a 504?

Tomorrow is the first local screening committee meeting. With dyslexia I am trying for the IEP.

Is this for an IEP or a 504?

Mu child has audio books on Learning Ally. We got it for 6th grade. It took me about two years to get it. They are putting my child in a literacy elective to continue working on reading skills which causes the loss of one of the fun electives. DC gets read aloud on a lot of tests, etc. often via the computer. I really want an ATS consult, we were supposed to have had one at the end of 5th but the SPed teacher was out that day and it was cancelled. It never got reschedules as it was mostly for learning ally. I'm trying to be open minded but I'm afraid it's goinf to be a shit show. Also my child is small group SPED only classes for 3 of the4 main subjects, ADHD issues also mostly of the inattentive variety and we've tried a number of meds without much success and we have major weight issues with Stimulants. I'm curious to hear others experiences.

What accommodations have you been able to get your child’s MS to agree to in FCPS?