{"id":8,"date":"2008-04-16T08:45:05","date_gmt":"2008-04-16T13:45:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.wrightslaw.com\/wordpress\/?p=8"},"modified":"2017-01-09T14:29:24","modified_gmt":"2017-01-09T18:29:24","slug":"fifth-grader-is-reading-at-27-grade-level-should-he-be-tested-for-spec-ed","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.wrightslaw.com\/blog\/fifth-grader-is-reading-at-27-grade-level-should-he-be-tested-for-spec-ed\/","title":{"rendered":"Fifth grader is reading at 2.7 grade level.  Should he be tested for Special Ed?"},"content":{"rendered":"<div style=\"padding-bottom:20px; padding-top:10px;\" class=\"hupso-share-buttons\"><!-- Hupso Share Buttons - https:\/\/www.hupso.com\/share\/ --><a class=\"hupso_pop\" href=\"https:\/\/www.hupso.com\/share\/\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/static.hupso.com\/share\/buttons\/gallery\/share-button-gray.png\" style=\"border:0px\" alt=\"Share\" \/><\/a><script type=\"text\/javascript\">var hupso_services=new Array(\"Twitter\",\"Facebook\",\"Google Plus\",\"Pinterest\",\"Linkedin\",\"StumbleUpon\",\"Digg\",\"Reddit\",\"Bebo\",\"Delicious\");var hupso_icon_type = \"labels\";var hupso_background=\"#FFFFFF\";var hupso_border=\"#FFFFFF\";var hupso_image_folder_url = \"\";var hupso_twitter_via=\"wrightslaw\";var hupso_url=\"\";var hupso_title=\"Fifth%20grader%20is%20reading%20at%202.7%20grade%20level.%20%20Should%20he%20be%20tested%20for%20Special%20Ed%3F\";<\/script><script type=\"text\/javascript\" src=\"https:\/\/static.hupso.com\/share\/js\/share.js\"><\/script><!-- Hupso Share Buttons --><\/div><p>We received a question from a tutor about testing a child. The real question is &#8220;how can we teach him to read?&#8221;<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>I am Orton-Gillingham\/Project Read trained and tutor a fifth grade boy. I gave him the Woodcock Reading Mastery Test. His standard score was 85, age based percentile was 14-19, and grade equivalent was 2.7. He was given Reading Recovery in first grade and taught to &#8220;guess&#8221; when reading. This boy has average ability in math.<br \/>\nThe mother wants more help with her son&#8217;s reading\/language skills from the school. Last year he attended another school in the same district and the process for special education services was started. Now that this boy is in a different school the process seemed to have stopped. How should she request this help? Does she want the school to test him for special education services?<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>The big question is whether anyone will teach him how to read if he goes into special ed. Several factors are working against him in special ed.<!--more--><\/p>\n<p>* Most special ed teachers are not trained to teach children to read. If they have training, it is superficial or they are working in K-3. The colleges that turn out special ed teachers do not teach them any particular method, nor do most teachers get training later from their school district.<\/p>\n<p>* After 3rd grade, the focus of schooling changes from teaching a child to read to the child reading to learn.<\/p>\n<p>This parent needs to ask many questions before she decides whether to allow the school to put him into special ed. Once a child is in special ed, is almost impossible to get the child out.<\/p>\n<p>If the school didn&#8217;t teach him to read by the end of 3rd grade, who will teach him now? What are their qualifications and training? What method will they use? How will the school measure and monitor his progress? How much progress will they view as sufficient? What will they do if he doesn&#8217;t make good progress?<\/p>\n<p>Has he had a comprehensive psycho educational evaluation by a psychologist in the private sector who has expertise in learning disabilities including dyslexia?<\/p>\n<p>If he didn&#8217;t learn to read when the school used Reading Recovery, that doesn&#8217;t mean he has a disability. It means he didn&#8217;t learn to read because many children who are not disabled don&#8217;t learn to read with RR.<\/p>\n<p>What would happen if he had daily tutoring with an OG trained tutor? How long do you think it would take for him to get up to grade level since he is now about 2.5 years behind? (The evaluator can probably answer some of those questions).<\/p>\n<p>Bottom line: We have worked with thousands of youngsters like the one you describe. If he was my child, and his only deficit was in reading, I would never allow him to go into special ed. I would mortgage the house, beg the grandparents, go into debt to get him<br \/>\ntutoring by an expert or place him in a private program with other kids like him.<\/p>\n<p>Pete has severe dyslexia, dysgraphia, and several other learning disabilities. The public school staff always told his parents that he &#8220;wasn&#8217;t college material&#8221; and that they needed to lower their expectations for him.<\/p>\n<p>His parents did not accept this. They searched for a specialist who could work with him and found Diana Hanbury King. Diana King was the top expert in remediating children with dyslexia in the early 1950s and later founded the Kildonan School in Amenia NY. Pete had one-on-one tutoring with her every day after school for two years. He also<br \/>\nwent to a residential program in the summer. Because he received that intensive help when he was young, he reads faster writes more legibly than I do. At that time, his parents were young, just starting their family and careers. It was difficult for them to pay<br \/>\nfor this tutoring but they knew they had to find a way do it. If they didn&#8217;t, Pete&#8217;s future was not good. So they did what they needed to do.<\/p>\n<p>I am not usually this outspoken in offering advice. But I have received so much correspondence from reading specialists (not special educators) who tell me how sad they are when a child goes into special ed because they know that child will never learn to read.<\/p>\n<p>Those messages prompted me to do some research into what special educators are taught to do &#8211; and it isn&#8217;t teaching children to read.<\/p>\n<p>-Pam<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>We received a question from a tutor about testing a child. The real question is &#8220;how can we teach him to read?&#8221; I am Orton-Gillingham\/Project Read trained and tutor a <a class=\"more-link\" href=\"https:\/\/www.wrightslaw.com\/blog\/fifth-grader-is-reading-at-27-grade-level-should-he-be-tested-for-spec-ed\/\">Continue Reading \u2192<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[102,5,1362,33,161],"tags":[1305,1300,32],"class_list":["post-8","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-child-find","category-idea-2004","category-learning-disabilities-dyslexia","category-reading","category-teachers","tag-highly-qualified-teachers","tag-reading","tag-test-scores"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wrightslaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wrightslaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wrightslaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wrightslaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wrightslaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.wrightslaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20495,"href":"https:\/\/www.wrightslaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8\/revisions\/20495"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wrightslaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wrightslaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wrightslaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}