Communication with IEP Team

Hi D..
I would go higher up. Go talk to the principle. If that doesn't help go to the school district. Keep going until you get help or until they listen to you.

Unless the IEP is not working for your daughter, I have to agree with the team at school. Why such a need to helicopter? I mean we ALL want to make sure our child is getting everything they need at school, and sure, checking in once or twice between report cards seems reasonable, but these people are INCREDIBLY overworked. I have an ADHD daughter and I work part time at her school, so I'm very familiar with the whole process. Please try to keep lines of communication friendly and appropriate for the situation, it's in your daughter's best interest. Calls and emails should be done at school and during business hours, please don't call or text teachers/staff at home, that's really crossing a line :(

Well, I'm a former Special Ed teacher, and do you understand how much paperwork they have to do on a daily basis? Unless everyone agrees to make daily progress reports part of your child's IEP (which would be highly unusual), then you shouldn't expect them. I understand you being concerned about your child's performance, and that's wonderful, but you should really try to work something out on a weekly or bi-weekly basis. Special Ed teachers in most systems have been asked to add even MORE case loads to their already bulging pile due to economic downturns and lack of funding. They're some of the most over-worked teachers you'll ever find. No one needs to be texting daily -that's for sure! I'm sure rather than being intimidated, they are simply exasperated.

If they cave and start doing all of this for you and your child, then they have to do it for EVERY SINGLE CHILD. That's completely impossible. As a parent, you are primarily still responsible for your child's education, where they receive it and how they use it. The school functions as a place for learning and learning facilitation, but it's not the whole package. It's wonderful that our schools now have a system set up for special needs children, because for many years they did not. However, given the limited resources and money -they can't do everything. I don't understand why regular progress reports wouldn't keep you up to date? The only time I can see any daily communication being necessary is if you're dealing with a behavior disorder -and only then for a certain period of time.

My thoughts as reading the first part of your post were that you were probably being a bit aggressive in contacting them. I have to agree with them for the most part that you need to back off. If you have a specific question that comes up in between IEP sessions, I think you should talk to her teacher about those things. Other than that, I do agree with them that the scheduled IEP meetings and reports should likely be enough for you. Funny that you say you are a former teacher, yet you are having problems with this.

I guess it depends on how your daughter is doing. If her current plan is working well then perhaps just let it work. All parents (IEP kid or not) have the opportunity to have a quick chat with their child's teacher at pick-up time. I used to come a few minutes early and walk to my daughters' classes so I would be there when the bell rang. One kid one day, the other the next. That meant that I spoke directly with a teacher every other day. Generally this was just a quick 'hi, how'd it go today?' kind of thing, but it gave the teacher a chance to let me know if there were any unusual issues that day. If there was something needing to be addressed I knew about it right away without taking up more than a minute or two of the teacher's time. ( I also would be helping put chairs on desks, or pick up scraps of paper off the floor, etc. during our chats so I was not delaying the teacher's usual exit time. Activity also helps keep conversations more casual and less intimidating.)
The key is to show you respect their time. The class teacher has 20+ students and a resource teacher often has several more and is expected to produce written evaluations, reports, etc. for each one. They really are busy.

Having said that, if your daughter is not doing well with the current plan than a once a year IEP meeting is not enough. My nephew has several learning and behavior issues that are addressed in his IEP. During his first few years of school there was a meeting with his team each quarter to evaluate and fine tune the plan. During that meeting, they set out a new plan as well as a back-up 'next steps' type of thing in case the new plan didn't get the desired results. This gave the teachers a head's up about where things were headed if this plan didn't work, which they appreciated. Now his team meets twice a year to check in. It took a lot of work to get him to his current plan which is working much better, but if they had only met and adjusted once a year he'd still be really struggling. My SIL really had to fight for those quarterly meetings at first, but they made all the difference.

Step back and take an objective as possible look at your daughter's progress. Are her accommodations working for her? Is she progressing well with the current plan? If so, back off a little. I wouldn't agree to just report cards, progress reports and the annual meeting though. I require more than that with my non-IEP kids. I think texting should be a definite no-no. Regular voice mail and/or email is sufficient. Requiring daily notes is a lot to expect of a teacher over the long haul. If your child is experiencing an unusual situation that you would like to get a handle on, a daily check list (very simple) could be used for a couple of weeks until the child's situation has improved, but daily notes for two years straight is a lot to ask. Popping in to say hi as the kids are being picked up is a much easier solution for the teacher. If there were ever a more serious conversation needed, I would send my daughter out of the room to play on the playground to allow us some privacy. I don't know the severity of your daughters situation, but this worked for us.

Try to find a good middle ground. One that addresses your need to stay informed, but also respects their time.

I am updating in response to the additional info that your daughter is deaf. Do you think the school is equipped to handle this specific challenge? If not, you need to get the support of your audiologist and document exactly what sort of support/education your daughter needs to become a proficient communicator. If you have the resources to provide her with private support (lip reading, sign, etc.) that is a good idea. However, the school is legally obligated to provide her with an appropriate education for her needs. If you can not afford your own extra support the school must provide it. In this era of cutbacks and extreme lack of funding, they will fight this with everything they have. (not that I blame them) If you can afford it, the school would appreciate your supporting them in this way. If you can't, fight them for it. You have to document that is is necessary, not just desired. I have a friend who's son attends a private school for severely Autistic children and the school district pays the tuition, as they were not able to provide her son with an appropriate education.

Seek first to work with the team and repair the relationship. Take an objective look at your expectations and try to separate 'necessary' from 'desired'. The school is responsible for necessary only.

Good luck with this.

Before having our 2 boys, I worked w/kids w/disabilities for almost 20 years. The last several years, I was an aide for kids who were included in the regular ed. classroom. I don't know what kinda classroom setting your daughter is in but I'm gonna have to say, I agree w/most that you might be asking too much of this IEP team. As others have said, your child is not the only one on their caseload. I also agree that texting is not an appropriate form of communication. For most of the kids I worked with, part of my responsibility as the child's aide ( as well as support for a handful of other kids) was to keep a daily communication log w/the parents. I didn't write in the log daily, just when needed. Based on what you've said, you have the yearly IEP, the report cars (probably 3x/year?) & the progress reports.....how frequent are these? You also have the calendar for the teacher to write in weekly. Plus, you hav P/T conferences so anything beyond this does seem a bit excessive. I just cannot imagine what else/more would need to be said beyond these forms of communication. I also wanna caution you from getting overly-involved. I have a very dear friend whose oldest son has a severe developmental delay. She became his strongest advocate which is a parent's job, disability or not, but she stretched herself too thin & her 3 other younger kids suffered from this. Meetings several nights a week, conferences, board meetings etc. I admire her greatly as she not only opened the door for her but for other people w/disabilities but it was too much. Once he it high school, I had a serious talk w/her about her need to be involved in every aspect (some of this stems from her now control-freakness!) & that she couldn't be there for EVERYTHING. She had to step back, let nature take it's course & remember no new is good news! I wanna encourage you to think about this as well. If you start now feeling the need to control so much, it will get exhausting....for everybody. It sounds like you have all of the appropriate forms of communication going on right now so I suggest you stick with that. Best of luck!

It would be a concern for me if the team was saying they are limiting communication to the report cards, IEP and progress report. Maybe they are overwhelmed. I have an IEP for 2nd son for reading (just began in February) and one for my kindergarten daughter for speech.

I would refrain from texting the teachers. Emails are fine if something comes up and it's something that we use frequently. Maybe a weekly overall report would work better for everyone.

Are you working on your daughter's behavior? I have only seen a daily report filled out when behavior is an issue. If she only sees one specific teacher or therapist once a week then maybe they could send their report on that day (ex: speech therapist if she's in an oral program).

If something isn't working then they need to work with you to try something else. They can't just say 'I don't know what else to do.' They asked what you want so decide what would be acceptable to you...weekly progress note, email (no texting), etc. Just try to be reasonable...they have other kids at the school not to mention families of their own!
Remember...you can call for an IEP whenever you feel it is necessary. You do NOT have to wait for the annual one. If you feel it needs to be quarterly or by semester then call for one. It is your right. It is the law!
Good luck.

While reading your post I have to be honest and thought that you make contact quite alot , an email to ask a question is one thing , but texting? That is the kind of thing you do with your friends not teachers and the special ed team , my son has an IEP and I know what the goals are , if they are having an issue then they make contact with me , or if I am seeing something at home that is a concern I will call and leave a message asking them to call me back , which they do and we discuss it , and if need be then arrange a meeting , I think they have a point , they have a whole school to deal with , with many kids that have an IEP so no , they do not have enough hours in the day to talk with you as you would like. My advice would be to back off a little , if your school district is anything like the one I am in (which is very good) then I doubt you have any reason to be concerned with what and how much they are doing.

D.,
Here is a website that you can check out. It's the law! Your school district is required by law to provide you any services that you ask for! It comes out of our house taxes! Good Luck to you! You are the only person who can fight for your child! ~ Lucy B.

How Will Individual Education Programs (IEPs) Change Under Individuals with Disabilities Education Act .... Education Laws & Regulations · Special Education ...
www.disabilityinfo.gov › Home › Education › Laws & Regulations - Similar

As a teacher, I think your involvement with your child and her education is to be admired. I love to see when parents care about their child and the progress made in school.

I'm guessing the IEP team at your daughter's school is feeling intimidated because they may feel like you are checking up on them, not your daughter's progress (which clearly isn't the case). This can be intimidating to some, and they may feel like they're under a microscope.

That being said, whatever communication you feel is necessary for you to help your child's education should be accommodated by the school. Try talking with the team again (or at the start of next school year). Stress to them that you are not checking up on the teachers, but rather need to know what your child is doing in school so that you can support her at home. Would you be comfortable with a weekly calendar? It can be time consuming for a teacher to fill something out daily, however, if that's what you've requested they should honor your request. But, as a teacher, it would be much easier for me to do a weekly sheet (however, just because it's easier for the teacher doesn't mean they should do what's easiest for them...they should do what's best for your daughter).

Hopefully you and the team can come to an agreement!

I don't have any advice, just wanted to say I'm not surprised at all. If you don't communicate with you, they make you seem like an uninterested, bad parent. But, if you do communicate with them a little more than what they deem necessary, then you are a pain in their a##. There is no way to win with teachers. They have placed themselves up on a pedestal and feel that everyone else is less than they! I truly do not like teachers!

You sound like a real burden to teachers. It is one thing to make certain that the teacher(s) are fully aware of your child's needs and occasionally communicate with you, but think about your demands on the teacher X however many students are in the teachers class(es). Every parent would like that same consideration for their children, IEP or not. Add to that the massive preparation time to provide each child a good educational experience everyday.

One thing a teacher can do for all parents in this digital age is to provide lessons, assignments, scores of student work and updates online. They can provide PowerPoints, copies of worksheets, and other material online as well. There are a plethora of companies who have tools to provide these services that are purchased by school districts. They are for the expressed purpose of enhancing communication with all parents.

I don't blame you as a parent acting on behalf of your daughter. Truly not. You might find a private school more responsive where the impossible is not expected of teachers. They tend to have far fewer students.

I understand your concerns and your desire to be involved with what is going on with your daughter. It's more than I can say for many parents with kids who have IEP's. However, I will have to take the side of the IEP team. With the cutbacks and layoffs of many teachers, these people are extreamly overburdened with their caseloads. They cannot possibly be expected to teach the children, keep up with regular IEP's, and then also keep in contact with every parent on a regular daily basis. I would try to follow the lead of the team and trust that if there is a problem they will let you know. Progress reports are there to give you an update of what is going on. You can also keep an eye on your daughter, and if you feel something is starting to go awry then you can try to contact the team and set up an appointment. But again, please try to trust the team that is working with your daughter and let them do their jobs.

Also, if you are concerned that you do not know what homework she has and that sort of thing, then I would try to get and addendum to the IEP that states your daughter and her teacher will fill out a daily planner so that you know what is going on. But I think, even though she is 8, she should be working on this on her own, it will help her to become more self sufficiant and it also helps her to be involved in her education.

Conact DREDF or an educational advocate in your area. If you search "parents network" ou can probably find a support group where you can get information on your child legal rights in education.

Hello D.,
As an advocate for Special Needs Children as well as their parentsI have a few questions. Just what are your child's limits and is your child is a special day class or regular education? This makes all the differance in the world. One of our children has Asperger's.
I know that as my husband was a teacher he would spend nearly an hour of his time writting notes to parents that had sent what I termed volume 1 of a few "question updates" on a weekly basis. This can be very unrealistic and I am the one that is fighting for the child! Having been a teacher you know what that is like when you have 200 students a day at any given High School.
Since our son had an IEP sometimes 13 pages long so that I covered everything that I felt was needed, I would accept the progress reports, but if I had a specific concern then I made an appt. with the person that I needed to talk with and adressed only that issue and didn't drag anything else into it unless I had to. You know you can have a IEP exam every 6 months so if something isn't working out get an ademdem added to the original report. At this stage of schooling as a rule most parents don't have one on one weekly reports, so be kind and be realistic. If they are violating the IEP then make an appt with the person incharge of Special Services and talk to them. I also encourage you to join your local SELPHA and attend the meetings that are only 5 times a year. I found that after 6 years I knew just about everyone in all 4 school districts that I would ever need to contact for any reason.
**** I just read what you added and want to get you intouch with a Advocate for the deaf here in Castro Valley. Mrs. Ovida DeJulia, teaches Sign language here at Castro Valley HS, and is well respected by those in the education field. She has been of great service to many even in the legal field in understanding the needs of the deaf. So Please contact me for her information. I know she can be of great value to you.

Teachers get nervous because they don't have the time to do all that they should be doing to help a child with special needs. Are you near Freemont, CA? They have the Freemont School for the Deaf. Don't know if they have day programs but it is very successful.. You might look into the group PHP.com. Parents helping parents. An organization that was born our of the lack of communication between teachers and parents.with special needs kids. Good Luck..

As a former teacher, you know how difficult it is to maintain this level of communication with a family. It sounds like the team is looking for a little more trust from you. A daily log is a good idea, if you are able to let go of the days that are just too busy to log. Trust your team to let you know when things are not going well, and belive in their ability to support your daughters needs. I totally admire your dedication to providing an awesome educational experience for your child. I also have faith in educators, and admiration for all they do.
Blessings!

I didn't follow if your complain is that the teacher is no longer giving you "green" or another color daily but if so, what if the teacher had to do that for all her 20-30 students? Maybe not a big deal but it adds up. I suggest a private school where your specific needs and desires and demands can be met given public schools just don't have the funding to support this type of individual attention. Where is the money supposed to come from?

I was a middle school math teacher in a school that had full inclusion. Daily calendars can be time consuming, but it's doable. I had several students, inclusion and non-inclusion students, whose parents I had to email and update daily and weekly. Sometimes it did feel overwhelming, but mostly I was happy to have someone working with students at home. They should be grateful to have a parent so open to communication and so interested in their child's progress. You don't mention your child's age. Is it possible that getting your child to be more self sufficient is part of the IEP...and they interpret that as not contacting you so often??? Maybe asking for a monthly (or even checking in every two weeks), rather than daily updates would be a more workable form of communication. Ask them which is easier, a calendar or email. For me, email would have been better - there is more flexibility in when I can contact parents, plus there is a written record for everyone. As for feeling intimidated???...I don't know about that one. Maybe they think you are "checking up" on them, rather than being an advocate for your daughter. I could not fathom as a teacher, specifically requesting that a parent limit their contact with me. And as a parent, hearing that request would really bother me. I don't know if any of this helps in your specific situation, but good luck!

Is your child in a special day class or included in a regular class? My son attends a non-public school where all the classes are "special day classes". The teacher and I have a note book where we send daily notes to each other. He also usually sends a check list of the daily activities my son does. I email him a few times a month, and he usually gets back to me within a day or so. I find the best way to keep in touch with the staff is when I'm on campus picking him up -- usually for a doctors appointment. (which is only a few times a month since he rides a van to and from school).

Parents Helping Parents in San Jose offers IEP trainings www.php.com

Hi - you don't specify what kinds of needs your child has, so it's hard to know exactly what kind of services the IEP team is providing. That said, I'll just respond with my experience as the parent of 3 kids with IEPs.

I agree with other responders that a verbal check-in once or twice a week at drop-off or pick-up will do wonders for easy communication about day to day issues. Beyond that, occasional emails about specific problems seem appropriate.

I've also taken the approach that I should expect to be part of the solution for my kids' education. I realized some time ago that, while my kids' teachers and resource providers do a great job, they're not doing quite enough. That means I can either hire tutors, or help my kids as much as possible myself. I can't quite afford tutors, and enjoy working with my kids, so I essentially tutor them myself. Since you're a former teacher, you have a definite advantage in this area.

If some of your daughter's issues are academic and not behavioral, I suggest that you make them your responsibility, and hope for back-up from the IEP team, not vice versa.

Good luck!

As part of my son's behavior plan, we included a requirement that his teacher and I would collaborate on a daily behavior checklist which is to be filled out by his teacher, speech therapist, etc., and sent home with him at the end of the day. We focused on our key concerns with my son such as staying on task, amount and quality of social exchanges he had with other kids (he has autism) and whether he was able to self-manage his emotions that day. This is something that we started for him when he went into first grade. Up until that point, we had a communication log (notebook) that he kept in his backpack, which was how his teacher and I were able to keep in contact.

I can see where, if you are constantly calling, texting, e-mail your daughter's teachers, it can be very disruptive to the class schedule so a more streamlined and consistent method of the information that you need to receive about your daughter's progress would help everyone involved with her care. I would highly recommend that a provision for such a checklist or communication log be written into your daughter's IEP or behavior plan because, without it, they don't have to do such reporting. But do keep on being the involved mom with your child's education. Nobody likes to do more work than they have to but it's true what they say, "The squeaky wheel gets the grease."

Hope this helps. Best of luck to you and your daughter.

Wrightslaw.com

By far the best resource. There is also a yellowpages of advocates in your area that can support you in finding a balance in communication that will make your relationship work better.