One thing you look for when your child is starting pre-school or school

[stenickar]

I am taking a course-Foundations in Early Intervention. I have to do an observation and am trying to develop a checklist of things to look for and questions to ask during the observation. I was wondering if any of you would be willing to post 1 question that you feel is most important to ask when looking for a new "school" for your child with differing abilities. Thank you for your help

 

[SueM in MN]

I can't think of anything right now (it's storming and this is our puppy's first thunderstorm).

I am going to move this to the disABILITIES Community Board where hopefully you will get more people looking at it.

 

[swimlib]

haha I think you are taking the same class that I just finished!

Some questions to think about:

Is this an integrated preschool or solely special needs?
how are therapies done at the preschool? In class or pull out?
Group or individual therapy sessions?

Those are only 3 I could think of off the top of my head.

 

[KirstenB]

Our 2 1/2 yr old is transitioning from EI to special ed preschool this fall. One thing I wanted to do, and requested was to visit the preschool for the morning to see how the day is scheduled. I got to see how the teachers worked with children of differing abilities, I got to see how/when the therapists pulled the kids out, etc, I got to see how they transition the children to/from various activities.

I know I'm not answering your question, but it's hard for me to come up with one specific question. To actually be able to see the class in action really answered a bunch of questions for me.

 

[BeckyScott]

I don't have one specific question, but I can tell you what we did...

The preschool was thru the school district so really not much choice on that-- I mean we could have sent him to a private preschool, but the public one is reverse-mainstreamed and all the therapists we'd been with in First Steps were also at the preschool...

The spring before kg, we had the transitional IEP meeting at our "home" school. The preschool teacher attended the IEP meeting also. In the meeting we found out-

1) the SpEd teacher had never worked with a child with autism before
2) she had never heard of a visual schedule and suggested maybe the preschool teacher or I could make one (like I know the school schedule)



That was it. DH and I called the district SpEd coordinator and arranged for tours of the other local elementary schools. We had the option of requesting a different school within the district, and we took that and ran with it.

I am more of a technicalities and list-making person. I asked a lot of questions about what kind of staff was at each school, where the SpEd classroom was (because often here they are "out in the trailer" still, and I have a real problem with that), what kind of autism-specific training the staff had (mostly very little). You can tell a lot about a school by where they put the SpEd room. If you go to one school and the SpEd room is in the main hallway in the middle of the regular classrooms, and you go to another and the SpEd room is in a trailer stuck behind the school, I could be wrong, but that speaks volumes about how the school views special education. I know all schools are crowded for space, but I'm still amazed at how often the SpEd room is stuck in a place where they wouldn't even consider putting a regular classroom. If Mrs. Jones's 2nd grade class was out in a trailer in the parking lot, parents would throw a fit, but apparantly it's acceptable to put the Special kids out there.

We toured during the school day and got to peek in the rooms and you could tell a lot from that- one school there was a group working on a "cooking" project and having a blast, one school the SpEd room was cluttered and noisy and no real structure. My DH is more of a "vibe" person. Each of us having our own specialty, we both agreed on the same school. I have learned since DS was diagnosed that instinct is legitimate. My gut instinct has served me well and I wished I listened to it sooner.

After our change of schools had gone thru, I said something to the preschool teacher that had been at the IEP meeting with us. She couldn't say anything during the IEP meeting because she's also an employee of the district, but she flat-out told me that it had scared her half to death, she liked DS and it horrified her that he would be attending school with a very clueless SpEd teacher. She was really relieved we'd changed schools.

 

[stenickar]

Thanks for your responses. I actually was able to use your suggestions of what you did -I'll see how they do these things at the program I am observing.
Becky-I totally agree with you about the location of the SPED room. They wanted to put my son with autism in a trailer. This is a child with trouble with transitions-there is no bathroom in the portable , he would have to go inside for therapies and specials, he would go in for lunch. We live in Maine so for 5 months of the school year he would have to go through the whole boots, coat, mittens and hat routine each time he had to go in and out of the building. Some days he would have to do this at least 3 times (plus any bathrooms trips) There was absolutely no way they were putting him out there, PERIOD.
He doesn't go to that school anymore.
Again thanks for your replies.

 

[of2dbeach]

Thanks for your responses. I actually was able to use your suggestions of what you did -I'll see how they do these things at the program I am observing.
Becky-I totally agree with you about the location of the SPED room. They wanted to put my son with autism in a trailer. This is a child with trouble with transitions-there is no bathroom in the portable , he would have to go inside for therapies and specials, he would go in for lunch. We live in Maine so for 5 months of the school year he would have to go through the whole boots, coat, mittens and hat routine each time he had to go in and out of the building. Some days he would have to do this at least 3 times (plus any bathrooms trips) There was absolutely no way they were putting him out there, PERIOD.
He doesn't go to that school anymore.
Again thanks for your replies.

on the flip side having my son who is 15 and Autistic we did the whole portable deal a few times and he was ok with it. they put them out there sometimes because it is alot quieter for them. i think the portable he had when younger had a bathroom in it and last year it did not but he also had to learn to do things on his own aat this point and i understand your child is younger. try not to hinder his progress because of your fears.i think it depends on the teachers and the school. i had one school in Orlando the teacher had just finished school and never taught Autism before mike would come home each day with his backpack filled with movies. finaly found out why.. she didnt know how to teach him. I went in and showed her how to make a PECS schedule taught her some sign lang . etc. She was a very good teacher just lost in the system.just putting in my 2 cents on the subject

 

[BeckyScott]

Sometimes "new" teachers are fine.

When DS was in preschool, the teacher was new enough (2-3 years) she hadn't had any kids with autism, and like I mentioned before it is reverse-mainstreamed, over half the kids had some sort of IEP. But she wanted to learn. And there were several teachers at that school, the rest of them had worked with kids with autism so she had a resource right there if she had questions. She did great with him.

She was also quite thankful, because DS was in her class the year before the "epidemic" really hit here, the next year she had 4 or 5 kids with autism in her class. Most of them were more low-functioning with more behavior problems. It was sort of fun for her, because you know the drill, she'd never dealt with a 3-year-old that already knew the alphabet, etc, so it got her thinking "out of the box". He came home one day drawing me parallelograms and trapezoids, because he already knew the basic shapes and she didn't know what to do next!

Ah, then that elementary school SpEd teacher. This lady was not New, in fact she was only a couple years shy of retirement. I don't think I should know more about autism than the SpEd teacher. Not about my son specifically, of course I should know him better, but autism in general. I was just not in the mood to teach a teacher, especially not a career SpEd teacher. What really threw me was her not knowing what a visual schedule was, since it is used for more than autism. But there were other things she said during the IEP meeting, I can't remember them all now, that were just like a big flashing stop sign.

I think our town is running a bit behind the curve on the epidemic thing. A few kids here and there, yes. But the real increase is hitting about two years younger than DS.

 

[mechurchlady]

I do not have kids but was thinking of the wording or your question.

One question what would it be? I would ask them something like "Do you mind if my son sings out loud while the teacher talks?" Bad example but past my bed time. You get my point. A really bad teacher or administrator of a school would sigh, cringe, gasp OH NO, or show disdain. A caring person would start explaining how to help the child, what options there are, and posssible hidden undiagnosed things with the kid. A caring school would ask questions and almost read the kid and know things ahead of time.

 

[barkley]

i would ask what the minimum educational requirements are for THEIR staff and then follow up with asking what the staff (if degreed) are degreed in.

my reasoning for this (in preschools and private schools) is because in some states preschool staff can be asst. teachers with very few units of any type of education training-or only currently enrolled in ece classes. at some private schools while they will advertise that all of their staff is college educated or degree holding, they don't nesc. have educations or degrees relative to teaching or what they are teaching (i worked in private schools and it was shameful when admin. misled parents this way-we had several 'teachers' whose degrees were in cosmetology, dental assisting and what could be best described as 'secretarial training', these were people who had no training in teaching what so ever and had often been rewarded with teaching positions by virtue of their association with the schools as admin. support personnel or by virtue of leading sunday school classes in the associated church).

 

[BeckyScott]

Much the same way as regular ed teachers that did some 4-hour in-service about autism 5 years ago. A friend of mine whose son is ADHD, his regular classroom teacher had gone to a workshop (I don't think it was even 4 hours) to learn everything she needed to know about ADHD. It was a very long year in that classroom.

Especially since with both autism and ADHD, the numbers have increased dramatically over the past 5 years or so, and also the research and potential causes have changed/developed.

Now, in that way, sometimes a younger and less experienced teacher can work out better. Because they're fresh out of school and more likely to have gotten more time learning about current stuff. Whereas if you think about it, a teacher that went to college 20 years ago, probably autism and ADHD were just barely discussed. That teacher would have had to seek additional training after college, and that doesn't always happen, since there is going to be some flexibility in what you'd choose for professional development.

Just this last week I was in a meeting with the autism specialist for our school district, and told her that we'd taken DS to a DAN dr. Now I realize DAN has nothing to do with education and one wouldn't expect a SpEd teacher to be well-versed in DAN protocol. However, it was nice to be able to say DAN to her, without then having to explain what it was. Or, this year DS's regular classroom teacher had a student the year before who was gf/cf, so she pretty much already understood the drill. Although his diet doesn't have to do directly with her teaching, it also isn't uncommon for kids w/ autism to be gf/cf and it's something she's probably going to keep encountering.

 

[Ali]

I don't have one specific question, but I can tell you what we did...



We toured during the school day and got to peek in the rooms and you could tell a lot from that- one school there was a group working on a "cooking" project and having a blast, one school the SpEd room was cluttered and noisy and no real structure. My DH is more of a "vibe" person. Each of us having our own specialty, we both agreed on the same school. I have learned since DS was diagnosed that instinct is legitimate. My gut instinct has served me well and I wished I listened to it sooner.



This is interesting because in my district this is called "shopping for a school" and completely not allowed at all. A child is staffed into the home school and they have the option to take the placement or not - pre-school is voluntary and parents do not get to go looking at schools because it is a violation of student privacy to have strangers coming in to observe them. If your child is in the class you are legally alowed to come in and observe but you certainly can't just observe random classes to find the best teacher.

you certainly got different treatment than most people.

 

[BeckyScott]

I was confused about it myself, honestly. Because our school district won't even allow parent volunteers in the classroom. Not so much shopping for the best teacher, but allowing outsiders in the building. With DS switching next year to the "spectrum classrooms" we asked at a meeting about parent volunteers, and were told it was unlikely because of FERPA. (is that right? I think it's FERPA) So how I got a tour is beyond me.

I wonder if something else was going on "behind the scenes". Because let me tell ya, that was one horrible IEP meeting. One of those scenarios where there are eight people sitting around a table and one of them says something so incredibly unbelievable... the staff trying not to look shocked... and me with my mouth hanging open... and a preschool teacher sitting there that knew I'd practically memorized the WrightsLaw book.... If the SpEd coordinator got word of it (it's a small district) that might explain their willingness to accomodate. Not to appease the parent, they certainly wouldn't do that, but perhaps it became apparant that the "home school" wasn't really FAPE.