Advocating for your child, especially if they have dyslexia or other special needs, can feel daunting.
While parents advocate with their heart and soul, mistakes can occur.
Here, we’ll explore three common advocacy pitfalls parents might face and how to avoid them, so that you can advocate for your child with confidence!
Mistake 1: Not Participating as an Equal Member of the IEP Team
One of the most significant missteps parents make is not viewing themselves as equal members of the IEP team. The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) makes it very clear that parents are essential to the team and that their input should be considered when making IEP team decisions. It is critical to remember that you bring unique insights into your child’s needs, strengths, and personality~ all of which are important in making educational decisions.
How to Avoid This Mistake:
Prepare in Advance: Teams should provide the family with a draft of their proposed IEP at least 2 days before the meeting. We encourage you to review this document fully before your meeting, noting any areas of disagreement or any questions you may have. Knowing what the team will propose at the meeting, gather any relevant documents that would support the discussion to take with you to the meeting. This might include tutor or therapy notes, test reports, parent-collected data, and examples of your child's work. This preparation empowers you to speak confidently about your child's needs.
Follow this easy checklist to help you prepare for your next IEP meeting.
Ask Questions: If you don’t understand something, don’t hesitate to ask for clarification. Questions not only demonstrate your engagement but also encourage a collaborative atmosphere. For instance, ask how specific strategies have worked in the past or what data supports the proposed interventions. Never sign an IEP that you do not completely understand and agree with.
Set the Tone: At the beginning of meetings, express your desire for collaboration. Use phrases like, “I look forward to working together to find creative solutions so that my child can make meaningful progress.” This establishes a cooperative dynamic, emphasizing that you are a knowledgeable partner in the process.
Mistake 2: Underestimating the Importance of Data in Decision Making
Data plays a crucial role in advocating effectively for your child. Unfortunately, many parents either overlook its significance or feel intimidated by it. However, data provides a clear picture of your child's present levels and progress, which is critical for making informed decisions about their educational goals and services.
How to Avoid This Mistake:
Request Data: Don’t hesitate to ask for state and district assessment reports (not just scores), quarterly IEP progress reports, curriculum-based measurements, and any other data relevant to your child’s needs. It is important for parents to become familiar with the types of assessments school districts give to monitor progress in their child's specific areas of need. For example, students with dyslexia often struggle with reading (decoding) and spelling (encoding). To ensure that your child is making progress in those areas, parents should request frequent assessments of high-frequency word decoding and encoding, decoding and encoding by syllable type, and phonemic awareness. Tracking your child’s performance on standardized assessments as well as the curriculum-based assessments specific to your child's areas of need will help the IEP team see your child's progress and make informed decisions about their educational goals.
Turn Worries Into Needs: We understand first hand that worrying about your child’s education can keep you up at night. However, sharing those worries with the team will not necessarily result in meaningful changes in your child’s IEP. Instead, seek out data to support your worries so that they can become needs that are addressed in your child's IEP with goals and services. For example, if your child is not a fluent reader, you might be worried about them being embarrassed in class and falling behind their peers. If so, you should request data to show underachievement in reading fluency. Ask for passage reading fluency measures that you can compare to age and grade level norms. When we can show the IEP team that the student’s reading fluency is below grade level, we have taken our worry and proven to the IEP team that the student has a need in that area.
Document Present Levels of Performance: Every student’s IEP includes a section dedicated to describing the child’s present level of academic, developmental, and functional performance. This is the critical backbone of the rest of the IEP. Ensure that your child’s IEP team includes all of the data that points to both your child’s strengths and needs. Check to make sure that each of your child's goals have present level data documented to support it.
Mistake 3: Agreeing to Goals and Services That Aren’t Individualized
One of the most critical aspects of advocacy is ensuring that your child’s goals and services are tailored to their unique needs. Many parents, in a bid to reach an agreement, might feel pressured to accept generic goals that don't truly reflect their child’s capabilities or individualized needs. Remember, the "I" in IEP stands for individualized! IEP teams should never take a “one size fits all” approach to creating IEPs.
How to Avoid This Mistake:
Know Your Child’s Strengths and Weaknesses: Understand your child’s unique profile. Even those with similar diagnoses work at different levels and have different strengths and needs. Your child’s unique needs should be documented in their present levels of performance and should be referred to again and again when crafting individualized goals and services. It is also important to be clear about your child's strengths and consider how these can be leveraged in their learning.
Make Goals Measurable: When reviewing proposed goals and services, ask for measurable goals based on your child’s present-level data. For example, instead of a broad goal like “improve reading skills,” request something measurable, such as “When provided an unfamiliar grade level reading passage, the student will increase reading fluency from 60 words per minute (taken from their present level data) to 104 words per minute with at least 95% accuracy in 4 out of 5 opportunities measured quarterly.” The specific measurable goal and consistent fluency checks will easily inform the team if the child is making progress in this area.
Link Goals and Services: IEP goals are written for what your child should be able to do in one calendar year given the support of effective specially designed instruction and accommodations. Therefore, your child should be provided an appropriate amount of time for their special education services, in a special education setting if that is what is required, to help them reach their goals. For example, students with dyslexia who receive specially designed instruction with a structured literacy approach should be provided specially designed reading instruction in 45-minute blocks at least 3 times per week. Research has proven that this is what is needed for the intervention to be provided with fidelity. Remember, your child is entitled to recieve the special education services he or she requires. That means that school staffing issues and class availability are not determining factors when considering services. Ensure that your child has the services that fit their needs so that they can reach their goals!
Want to avoid more mistakes?
Join us LIVE as we uncover more common mistakes and help parents avoid them!
We have only scratched the surface in sharing important advocacy tips and strategies!
Mark your calendar and click the link to register and learn directly from Lorraine Hightower, Certified Dyslexia Advocate and Consultant.
As a dyslexia advocate with over a decade of experience, Lorraine has worked with countless parents who have run into roadblocks when advocating for their child in school. She will join us to share the most common mistakes she has seen parents make and how to avoid those mistakes. Her advocacy strategies and tips will help you move from confrontation and stagnation with your child's team to collaboration and meaningful progress.
Are you worried that your dyslexic child is falling behind in school?
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While it isn’t always easy, it CAN happen, and we will support you every step of the way.
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