Thursday, September 25, 2008

An Improvement (of Sorts)

I called the special education specialist at Jamie's school today. Now, Jamie does not fully qualify for special ed services, however there is some crossover with special ed on what Jamie needs to be academically successful (this is where the whole "fish tank" thing comes in). Anyway, Mrs. G. told me she had already conferenced with Jamie's teacher, who had sought her out because of my insistence that Jamie is supposed to be allowed to go to the fish tank, even though his teacher couldn't find it. Apparently, the school was a wee bit lax this year in putting out the lists of students who are allowed (i.e., required) to go to the fish tank for tests. The stipulation that Jamie is allowed to go to the fish tank is in teeny, tiny little letters on his IEP, in an apparently out-of-the-way place on the forms, buried down deep where his regular teacher never saw it. Since she couldn't find it in his IEP, and didn't see his name on a list of students allowed to go, she assumed he was not supposed to go. For that, I will forgive her (a little. Although, if I had a student who was a good kid, didn't cause trouble, and was obviously ADHD, and both he and his mother repeatedly insisted the kid was supposed to have been allowed to go, I think I would have investigated it before now instead of insisting over and over again that he wasn't. Then again, I'm not a teacher who has to deal with 21 rowdy 5th graders all day everyday, so maybe I wouldn't).

Anyhoo, it seems the fish tank battle is over... Now, let's see what we can do to get the nurse's office situation cleared up!

On an unrelated note, anyone know where I can get Jamie a 3/4 sized violin in good repair at a not hugely expensive price? Jamie wants to join the orchestra at his school, but I don't have the $$ available to buy him a new violin. Anyone have any suggestions?




1 comment:

Grace mom said...

Hey there! Glad you are getting that frustrating issue worked out for Jamie. My suggestion for the violin is ebay, actually. Our band teacher is constantly finding good deals there. First, however, talk to the orchestra teacher and get a list of his/her approved models and price ranges (be careful about sellers that try to pass off low quality models with similar names to the traditional models). OK, hope that helps a bit. ;)