It's a New Year, full of hopes and dreams, annd maybe just a littl fear.
My grandson turns 3 next month. That is a joyful time. But, it is also scarey. You see he has a speech delay problem. Right now he is working with a wonderful speech therapist. She is great with him an cares about him almost as much as I do. But, when he turns 3 he falls under the realm of the local school district for his speech needs.
Having been a teacher working in the public schools, I know what he is about to face. Public schools have Special Education programs ( which he will fall into) which don't really serve children like him. At best, he will be placed in a preschool class with 20 other children with a host of mental and physical problems. There he will get half an hour of speech therapy once or twice a week.
There isn't a problem with the size of the class. He just isn't in need of being in a special ed classroom. What is recomended for a child with his speech delay is one hour of speech therapy 3 to 5 times a week. He has no delays in any area other than speech. So, he will be in a class where the children are learning skills he has already mastered. And he will become bored IN PRESCHOOL.
There is a second possibility, he can stay in the preschool program he is in ad receive speech therapy for 1/2 hour twice a week. Neither choice is good as far as I am concerned.
As the grandmother, there isn't anything I can do. I have made suggestions to my daughter. She has listened. I give her lots of credit for that. And, I can tell her what the school district should be able to do. But, when she is in the meetings and it's her against the special education team, who has to deal with a budget, there isn't a lot she can do.
They will tell her," these are the programs we have set up." We don't have room for him in the program he needs, we will place him in this more restrictive classroom because of space. We will move him when space opens up." Or they can only provide x number of hours of therapy when he should be getting more.
There is so much BS they will be giving my daughterand she will have to fight. As a regular classroom teacer, I only know part of what special education depts can do. But, I know how they try to get parents to agree with their "plan" even if it's not the best for the child. They justify it by saying these are the programs they have or they have limited funds or some other lame excuse.
My grandson is a happy outgoing child. The least restrictive inviornment for him is to provide him the speech help he needs 5 days a week and place him in a regular education classroom. I hope my daughter can stand up to the pressure the Special Education dept. of the local school dist. is about to apply.

Well I sat on this post for a while. I wasn't sure if I should post it. Things have changed. Not only an I going to help, but I have started a new buisness to help other parents work their way throught the maze of public education. Things do seem to work out.