Thank you, Brant, and on some level I am relieved that "stalling out" at
2-3rd grade isn't atypical.

Though my daughter is already in special education, I don't think it would
hurt to have her re-evaluated.  The last time she went through any kind of
IQ, psychological or LD testing, she was six years old. She is now eleven
and will be entering junior high next year.  If she needs increased pull-out
time, I would like to get that started now.

On Thu, Nov 5, 2009 at 11:20 AM, Brant Hayenga <bhayenga at rrps.net> wrote:


>  Katherine:

>

> Unless your pediatrician has indicated some health problem there is never

> any need for an MRI or any other brain scan to diagnose and plan remediation

> for a possible reading disability. Is your daughter receiving special

> education services? You may request an evaluation form the school district.

> If you attend private school, but live in a public school district, you may

> request an evaluation from the public school where your daughter would

> attend.

>

>

>

> Andrea is correct about the urgent need to know what reading skills your

> daughter already has, and which ones she still needs to acquire. *Do not

> delay*. That she has stalled out at the 2-3 grade level is very typical.

> Students with reading disabilities can often attain this level, but pushing

> beyond this level is very difficult without a more intensive and systematic

> intervention, which is almost never available in a general education

> setting.

>

>

>

> *All evaluations are not created equal. *You need information about your

> daughter’s phonemic awareness skills, letter/sound association knowledge,

> vocabulary knowledge, reading fluency, reading comprehension, and her

> receptive and expressive language skills. There are cognitive processing

> skills that are strongly associated with reading acquisition that should

> also be measured (auditory/phonological processing, verbal working memory,

> executive attention, long term retrieval fluency, etc.) The evaluation might

> include the Woodcock-Johnson III Tests of Cognitive Abilities (WJ Cog III),

> the Wechsler Individual Achievement Test III (WIAT-III), the Comprehensive

> Test of Phonological Processing (CTOPP), and the Gray Oral Reading Test IV

> (GORT IV). Ask specifically for the skills and processes to be measured and

> ask if the tests the evaluator has selected will yield scores in those

> areas.

>

>

>

> *All intervention teachers are not created equal. *Even if you get a

> proper evaluation, the next step is to plan an appropriate intervention. The

> plan must include measurable goals (i.e. today she can read this many words

> correct in 1 minute from a second grade level text, with this percentage of

> words read correctly. Next month she needs to be reading more words

> correctly). Don’t settle with vague goals such as “Will be able to read

> grade level text for comprehension.” That is a nice goal, but it is hard to

> measure, and if you can’t measure the progress the chances of wasting time

> are high. She needs to learn more than her peers in order to get caught up.

> You must always keep in mind whether or not she is catching up. If not, the

> intervention needs to be changed somehow. Your daughter should be able to

> catch up in her ability to read words and her ability to comprehend (unless

> she has a *rare* low-incidence problem such autism, and this is very

> unlikely. If she had an obvious disorder such as that she likely would have

> been diagnosed long ago). However, it is likely that she will always be a

> slow reader. That is ok if you can normalize her ability to read words

> accurately, and to her ability to comprehend what she reads.

>

>

>

> *Your daughter likely needs help restoring her self-confidence. *This is

> critical. She needs to work harder than her peers in order to get caught up.

> She will need a lot of motivation and self-confidence in order to sustain

> the level of effort needed.

>

>

>

> *Self educate! *You need to be an expert advocate for your daughter. A

> good place to start is with the FREE publication form the National Institute

> for Literacy, *A Child Becomes a Reader: Proven Ideas from Research for

> Parents, Kindergarten through grade 3.* This can be downloaded for FREE at

> www.nifl.gov , or you can call 800-228-8813 and have a free copy mailed to

> you. This is a great publication! You should read the whole pub, but focus

> on the second grade section for ideas about what you should do at home, and

> what to look for at her school. There are many other good titles available

> for free.

>

>

>

> Hope that helps.

>

>

>

>

>

>

>

> Brant Hayenga

>

> Educational Diagnostician

>

> Stapleton Elementary/Rio Rancho Middle School

>

> (505) 896-0667 ext. 226 (District Office)

>

> (505) 891-8473 ext. 519 (Stapleton Elementary)

>

> bhayenga at rrps.net

>

>

>

> Please note that RRPS email addresses have changed. Please update your

> address books or distribution lists.

>

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>




-- 
Katherine Mercurio Gotthardt
Community Writer for NEWS AND MESSENGER
www.insidenova.com
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