The CSE and Our Bottom Line

Today the girls quarterly Program Review CSE meeting finally took place. We made my before Thanksgiving deadline. Hope was my primary concern this time. My will-not-accept-no-as-an-answer position on Hope was she needed to receive more speech. They gave us more speech.


GB's meeting was a pleasure. They were able to explain to me all of the details for her current reading program and which person is accountable for each piece of it. The reading specialist, who is the new member of the team, said she thought that GB would mainstream into third grade beautifully. I didn't have to say anything as the rest of GB's team told the reading specialist that GB couldn't function in a classroom with that many  people. Everybody  commented on the big difference they have seen in GB the last 4 weeks. I took notes, and nodded at each person. Mr. Teacher told the rest of the committee about the medication change and his opinion that getting GB off Invega and Risperdal had a lot to do with it. Her current IEP did not have her social goals well spelled out. The committee took the time to spell them out and assign responsibility for overseeing them. We will meet again the end of January.


Hope's meeting was not a pleasure. While Ms Very Young Teacher was reporting on the difficulties Hope has been having, the speech teacher interrupted several times to say that Hope's emotional and behavioral difficulties were responsible for Hope's difficulties making herself understood. The speech teacher also asked about mainstreaming as Hope had been mainstreamed last year. Ms. VY Teacher said Hope was starting to be comfortable enough in her class that her problems were easily apparent and she would not recommend mainstreaming until Hope developed more appropriate coping mechanisms. The therapist strongly supported her position. We spoke about the ongoing battle over home work. It was decided that we would set a timer and tell Hope she had 30 minutes to complete her homework. When the timer goes off, homework will go into her book bag. Anything not complete or incorrect will be completed at school the morning during the class' free time. The therapist also suggested using the timer at dinner. Set it for thirty minutes and when the timer goes off, her dinner is over and the plate removed. I agreed to try it. The speech teacher reported that Hope was not progressing as fast as she should because she was a "slow starter" and for the first 10-12 minutes of every session it was as if Hope had never had speech before. Since the sessions are only 30 minutes long, that mean the first 1/3 of every session is nonproductive by the speech teacher's own report. The speech teacher did not see the need to increase Hope's speech sessions because she only tests with a moderate articulation disorder. The rest of the committee used her words (and my analysis) to justify increasing her speech. If I still do not see progress by the next meeting, I am going to request that either Hope be moved to GB's speech therapist, or an outside, independent evaluation be done. Hopefully, speech 3 x a week will be enough to make some progress. I let the CSE know that Hope is being weaned off the Risperdal, with no replacement med in sight, so I expect things to get more difficult.

We are now free to enjoy the holidays. Our next scheduled battle meeting for both girls is the end of January, 2012.