Need help - received my son's IEP progress report

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Have any of you received a report that stated a goal was not addressed?
What if a goal was not addressed but I know it is already accomplished at home?
Have you ever had progress listed only as "progressing"?

I guess I need some help with tact because it's not my strong suit. Some of this makes little sense to me. "Progressing" really doesn't offer a lot of information.
My son is happy and seems to be doing well in that environment. I'm kind of wondering if I should request we re-write some of this as the goals are now outdated and parts of some of them seem to be accomplished. I'm just not sure what would be totally appropriate to ask for at his age level. I guess I need to look at some developmental articles.

Sorry this is rambling...

"Progressing" means that observable progress is being made but there's nothing interesting to say about it. If it shows up in places where your son is having trouble or excels, it may mean the person who wrote it is being lazy.

When was the IEP last reviewed? When is it scheduled to be reviewed again?

This is his first IEP. He is three and just transferred from Early Intervention to the school district. It's not scheduled to be reviewed until next year.

I'm not really sure how to proceed with it. One of the goals was reached and I was annoyed about the goal in the first place. He was to successfully match object to object, picture to object and picture to picture 75% of the time. He has been able to complete this task since he was 18 months. I'm not even sure why I didn't protest it at the time. There isn't anything to replace this goal. The other goal is to correctly answer WH questions 75% of the time. At the time this was written (August) he still had some processing issues that seem to be resolving nicely. I wasn't sure what he was able to decode so I didn't ask a lot of WH's outside of "What's this?" (he liked an ESL series that used this question frequently). The only WH he can't grasp right now is "why" but I am not sure what a simple "why" would amount too so I can work on it with him here.

Those are the only two goals that I can say I can understand and follow. There's a goal that says "Attend to tasks presented in a one on one setting with a teacher/therapist for 10 minutes or until task is completed" and I'm being told "He works well one-on-one with increased cooperation in attempting new activities. What does that mean?

I don't want to make too much of a stink because he's very happy and I know that his teacher really is doing her best. It's very frustrating. There are 8 kids in his class - all with different issues and she's there with an aide. That's it. I think the PT, OT and ST come in ever so often (I see them once a week, once every two weeks and rarely, respectively). I wish they had a better program. He really should have accomplished everything on his list in this amount of time. I know my son, and he was in an intensive program once before. They had to re-write his goals every two weeks at the most.

Sounds like he's doing great, and you're really on top of things. "Why" questions are not a realistic goal for a couple of years, in my opinion. I think you need to call, and ask these questions:

1) In the home environment, he is able to both match pictures and answer "WH" questions. Have some date to back that up ready if they ask or seem not to believe you. Is he able to do both of those things at school? If not, where are the problems, so you can work at home. If so, what's the process for setting new goals?

2) Since he is able to do those things at home, it makes sense to move on to new goals there, while continuing to reinforce the skills related to the first two goals. Ask what else they are working with him on. Ask what the next goals might be so that you can start working with him at home. Mention that you don't understand any of the other goals well enough to work with him on them and ask if there are any specific skills you could work with him on at home to support them.

What the goal you mention means is that it's still hard for him to sit for ten minutes working one-on-one with a teacher or therapist. The comment means that he is making good progress toward to goal-- he's trying and they're seeing improvement-- but he isn't there yet.

Thank you very much. I was really lost - I needed someone to point me in a direction. This was very helpful. I'll talk it over with my husband tonight. I might send her an email instead of calling. I like to have things in writing because of what I do for a living, hahaha...

Email's better: because of my autism (clumsiness and anxiety), writing is sometimes very difficult for me, so I always call and my mind runs that way. But email gives you a paper trail, and they know that. So it's always good.

Thanks for saying this was helpful. I'd like to know what happens if you have time and energy to share.

I will most definitely let you know. And you're quite welcome. It really was and I appreciate it more than you might realize, lol...

My son is 5, and he started in the public system at 3 as well. I know the P for progressing thing really doesn't tell much, but I guess at 3 yrs old, that is what is to be expected.

From what I have found, sometimes my son can do things better at home when it is one on one with me, and he is not distracted. So, he may be having difficulty completing tasks in the school environment. I know my son does. I feel your frustration. There are a lot of things that I know my son can do that just isn't showing up at school. I really don't know what to advise you to do except like Vector said, just stay in good contact with the teacher via email.

I can see that being an issue as far as attending the more I think about it. His teacher has expressed that he has trouble on the days where the other children are loud and fussy and she seems to have quite a bit of that. They also are rotating kids in and out regularly because they age in or out and that always causes a commotion. I don't know what she's doing with him one on one. She started working on articulation today again because she mentioned he had much better lip closure. I really haven't been doing too much with him there.

They were putting vests on him for a little while, then she stopped talking about that. She did expressing feelings with him. They did some counting exercises which are worthless outside of presenting the material in a formalized setting. Lately most of what they've been talking to me about was working on getting him to interact appropriately, and that is a very big deal. He's got a lot of trouble with being grabby when he doesn't have something to do.

I really wish the services were better. And I wish this woman had more help. She's wonderful and I have nothing but praise for her, I just wish she had a few extra hands. We're very lucky I guess because he is in pretty good shape. I don't know what we would have done if it was hard for him to reach us and other people.

Thanks for responding.

I've sent them an email, just waiting to see what they say. They're usually quite prompt so I should know in a day or two.

My son was in the same situation when he was 3 and 4 in the public school special needs pre-k. When children with more severe behaviors than him came into the class and were non-verbal and screaming, I think he developed coping mechanisms of making noises himself to block out the loudness of it all. He did get very distracted as well.

But this year, now that he is 5, he is in special needs kindergarten with only 4 kids in class total and 2 teachers. I think it is a much calmer environment. However, he still has trouble attending and is continuing to make noises at inappropriate times. But overall, the benefits and the progress we have seen seem to outweigh the negatives.

Well, it seems we're having a revision meeting on Tuesday. What I was really excited to hear is that we're going to formally add the OT piece to his plan.

Sounds like you're early enough in the process to make use of this:

The Complete IEP Guide

One thing this book says is that you're entitled to ask all the questions you want, never let 'em say you can't. It advises never ticking anyone off if you can help it, but once all diplomacy fails, it also tells how to litigate. Never had to do that... yet.

Thank you for this.

The most difficult part of the process for me has to do with two different factors. Firstly, I have AS myself which makes interactions with people very difficult, and I grew up in a different part of the country. People here don't seem to feel bound to laws and dislike formality. It's very hard for me to cope with because there was a tremendous amount of formality where I grew up and protocols were followed. I find that requesting people follow protocol here tends to backfire, regardless of how nicely you ask. I would imagine they'll have the IEP written for me when I show up Tuesday. I really have to figure out what appropriate goals would be for him more than anything so I don't have a repeat of a goal that he's accomplished. I think too that they have a much better idea of what they're dealing with where he is concerned as they've had him in class for nearly three months.

Well, I can tell you this. I am terrible with people. I can assume a sort of cooperative stance with them, tend to say too much, but I do best if I try to remember we're supposed to be working together for the same goal. What I have learned so far from the book is that it helps to think ahead of time about what it is you want to accomplish since they set goals in an IEP. They are supposed to give you a copy in advance (and if they don't you can ask to reschedule until you have familiarized yourself with what they propose). And you don't have to sign anything except the paper that says you were there, until you agree with all the goals and statements.

Part of what's good about the book (it was recommended by our psychologist, who also used to advocate for IEP meetings) is that just reading it helped me to understand what my role was and what approach I should take. I hope it helps when I ask for an IEP for my older child in school, who had a meeting a few years ago, when I didn't know what I was doing, and was refused services despite her intelligence test scores that indicated high intelligence but low cognitive ability. I think I'm getting the words right there...