Barton and HWT

[ukj]

I am considering the Barton System and Handwriting Without Tears.  Any feedback, successes or failures with these programs?  Also, would welcome any suggestions for at home programs that will help with Dyslexia, Dysgraphia and handwriting.

Thanks!

kj

[bros]

Is your child seeing an OT for the dysgraphia?

How severe is the dysgraphia?

[beth]

How old is your child? We used Handwriting without Tears. I feel it works best for a young child who doesn't have many established poor patterns.

[ukj]

Very long story but basically, the school is refusing to recognize ANY SLD. A principal two years ago said she wanted him evaluated for autism. The school then became fixated on the theory that he had autism and has refused to budge and will evaluate no further. The school psychologist sat in our IEP and asserted that she "suspected" autism having never even MET my son. They proceeded to "test" him for autism with no input from us because we refused (the tests they wanted us to take should only be administered by a licensed psychologist or psychiatrist and they expected us to self administer which made any results invalid.) When we refused this method as invalid, they then allowed his teacher and speech-path to self administer the "parent" portion and used those results instead. These actions violate EVERY tenant of professional ethics of reputable psychologists. He has had contact with 2 PhDs in psychology and both considered him so far removed from autistic that it was ridiculous to test him. Why the school is most likely doing this to us is a form of retaliation which is an even longer story but most importantly private. As a result, we have revoked our consent to sped and cancelled his IEP. Thus cancelling his SpeechPath and OT. It was basically useless anyway because the speech path refused to do anything to help his enunciation issues and was only concentrating on (accord. to his IEP) talking louder and his "social skills" which were explained to us as his ability to order off a menu by himself at a restaurant and turn taking. His OT was doing nothing with his writing specifically and was simply having him play with playdough and tying knots (something he has no problem with - he assembles the tiniest Legos with speed and ease). The one thing they did agree to (because they knew they would disregard the results) was an evaluation by a CALT, LDT. She administered WJ III DRB; GORT 4 and CTOPP2. I then showed those results to a M.S., CCC-SLP, CALT, QI, LDT who said the results indicated that my son was in the "therapeutic" level of dyslexia. We have been unable thus far to have him formally evaluated for dysgraphia.

My son is 8 1/2 years old and is in 3rd grade. We are desperately under the gun right now because of a new state law that involuntarily holds 3rd graders back if they can't pass the state mandated reading test. We want to avoid holding him back if at all possible.

My belief that he probably has dysgraphia stems from his barely legible handwriting. He doesn't capitalize at all really (including even his own name). His letter spacing is nonexistent. His punctuation is rare and often inappropriate when there. He completely ignores the lines and letters are almost always incorrectly above or below the line (g's above, e's below i.e.) He tries to avoid writing at all cost and tires very quickly. He often says "it makes my head hurt" when reading and writing. These are some reasons I strongly suspect dysgraphia but in the absence of a specific diagnosis and testing, I can't say for sure or how severe it is.

Sorry for the long post. As you can probably infer, I am beyond frustrated and overwhelmed at this point. Any help at all would be GREATLY appreciated. I am trying to do as much as I can myself as sending him for therapy is extremely expensive. But if it's not possible for me to give my son what he needs, we will find a way to pay for it.

Thank you!

kj

[bros]

You should have kept the IEP - you know that the school was violating IDEA in so many ways, right?

You could've filed due process for those egregious violations of IDEA.

Does his hand hurt when he writes?

[ukj]

Yes, realize the violations and understand due process. Problem is that as long as he's in sped he is at great risk of being further harmed from the very top down. My local P&A is dumbfounded. They've never seen s situation where a child is "over diagnosed" so to speak. They usually have to fight tooth and nail, an uphill battle and prove that all other things are ruled out before reaching an autism diagnosis, not the other way around. The situation is that they refuse to acknowledge the dyslexia and dysgraphia so they will not put any of the accommodations needed on his IEP anyway. They put things like "...refrain from rubbing his ears during work time..." as a goal on his IEP (this stems from 2 things, 1) he sometimes plays with his ears when he is stressed because it is comforting to him - he played with his grandpa's ears while he was going to sleep since he was a little baby and 2) he went through a phase for about 6 mos. where he was covering his ears with his palms either because of some auditory processing issues or because it was just a weird kid phase - he has since stopped on his own with NO effort at correction at all on my part). This was interpreted by the "IEP team" to be a symptom of autism even though its no recorded sign of autism that I have ever found. Crap like this is what my son would be doing to "help" him instead of ANY sort of help with reading or handwriting. The COMPLETE and ONLY OT goal listed on his IEP is "...with minimal assistance 3/4 trials: 1. will copy 1-2 sentences with good letter formation, spacing, and line orientation, 2. will cut on a given design without deviating more than 5 times, and 3. will complete an assortment of manipulatives, such as stringing beads, lacing lace boards, and opening and closing lids, and functional fasteners" - my son can open his own Coke lids and zip and button his clothing with no effort by the way! And it goes downhill from there..."keeping both hands on pencil and paper", "keep his head up off of his desk and face forward towards teacher", "refrain from interrupting teacher as she is presenting material or giving instructions in smaller one-on-one settings at least 80% of the time, 5 of 5 days" (in other words, don't ask questions of the teacher and in case that wasn't clear enough, they added it in another goal "....by asking for a break within the classroom (5 min.) to cool-down and re-group before requesting assistance to complete an assignment, as needed in all classes 5 of 5 days" and they'll make sure he feels good every day by (yes, this is a goal) "...working while receiving stars on his reinforcer board for very small tasks such as finishing 5 math problems (1 star for 1 problem)..." and yes they added that in parentheses just in case the teacher was too dense to figure that out (wait, maybe that's a good idea!) They went on and on with those "Goals" and for help with his reading, an example of a goal is, "...will apply sound-symbol relationships to decode words with 75% accuracy." That is a WHOLE goal minus my son's name at the beginning. And it is to be measured "Progress Report, Quarterly, Report Card" - in other words at 5 week intervals at most and its the same for all goals. The goals continue for reading and math in this vague fashion throughout.

I say all this to explain the harm I'm referring to above. These are all things he knows how to do and does already! He puts his head down and looks around because he can't follow while the class is reading. The only thing that would be accomplished by him going back on an IEP is regression and falling further and further behind, forget any progress at all! We've basically made almost no forward progress in First and Second grades in any subject.

Yes his hand hurts when he writes I believe but I will double check that.

Thank you!!!

kj

[bros]

So from how you are explaining it, it sounds like the district never truly evaluated in all areas of disability and were/are essentially committing educational malpractice.

Do you think he would benefit from an out of district placement?

Also the goal of "STUDENT will apply sound-symbol relationships to decode words with 75% accuracy." is almost a good goal, almost. It should be measured by the teacher weekly, and an end date should be set for it. i.e. 12/1/13

[ukj]

I didn't realize there was such a thing! I've heard of medical and legal malpractice and failure to uphold professional ethics but had never heard of "educational malpractice". They definitely didn't evaluate in all areas of disability and the ones that they did, they disregarded the evaluations in favor of their "suspicion" and then "proof" of their only theory. From the general ed teachers and principal to the whole sped group, they have definitely failed my son so far (he literally has had almost no education in the last 2 years), so I guess you would call that educational malpractice maybe?

My husband and I both graduated from the school system my children attend. We felt that we got a good education and wanted the same for our children. We moved last year specifically to stay in this district. This was our first experience with sped and we just assumed the school would take care of our child. The distance to another school district would be pretty substantial (we are in a relatively large suburban district 20K+ students) and I'm not even sure how we would go about doing that, if it's even possible. It's just so frustrating and disheartening when I had always taken pride in my alma mater.

Yes, that was a primary concern, that all of the goals are not measured and reported more often. My main problem with the particular goal I mentioned is that it's rather nebulous as are all of the goals listed for reading. None are specific or measurable. The remaining goals for reading are "..will identify words rapidly so that attention is directed to the meaning of the text with 75% accuracy." and "...will interact with the words and concepts in a text to construct an appropriate meaning with 75% accuracy". These are all subjective goals. Here is an example that I found of a well-written goal: "When given a list of 50 words Scott will be able to accurately decode multisyllabic words that contain closed, open, vowel teams and vowel-consonant-e (beside, statement, remain) syllable types with 90% accuracy as measured by teacher records" This is the kind of specificity that I am looking for in the goals. If they don't know enough about what they are trying to accomplish to write good, effective goals, how can I trust them to actually teach them? There is absolutely no goal for spelling or handwriting. The remaining goals concern a couple of similarly simple math goals and the specific "behavioral" goals I listed above. That's the crux of why I pulled him out of sped. I simply don't trust them anymore to know what they are doing.

That's why I was asking about Barton specifically. I've heard several recommendations among dyslexia organizations and I was impressed with what I saw on her website and demos. I took the tests for both me as a tutor and my son as a learner and we're both capable of beginning the program. I was just hoping to get some feedback from parents, teachers or tutors who had used it and what their successes or failures were. Is this even something a lay person should attempt?

Thanks!
kj

[bros]

Districts cannot diagnose, so them pursuing what they believe the child to have is wrong.

What state are you in?

www.rbs2.com/edumal3.pdf - a paper on educational malpractice. It's insanely difficult to prove, a more likely avenue of suit would be under IDEA violations.

I would suggest that you get his IEP reinstated just for the legal protection and variety of options it offers you and your son. It is reasonable that you would assume that your child's educators should and would know what they are doing.

With an out of district placement, typically if all interventions that the school tries fails, you can get the district to pay for a specialized school.

Has he had any evaluations for his dyslexia? He is at the cusp of where research says gains have to be made in order for the child to succeed - 3rd and 4th grade are very important grades.

Honestly, I am not that familiar with Barton, but from what I have heard on here, it is excellent. I'm dysgraphic myself. Going into education (Starting Student Teaching next month)

It sounds like your son would benefit from a resource room, provided that the teacher is competent.

Either way, if you get an IEP, you can always argue for compensatory education (the school reimburses you for tutoring costs etc.)

I would suggest requesting that his IEP be reinstated and that a full evaluation in all areas of disability be performed immediately.

[michellea]

Barton is a sound program that targets decoding and phonemic awareness based on the Orton Gillingham approach. Many parents have used it and find that it has enough structure to allow even a novice to implement the program effectively. Handwriting without tears is also a sound, widely used program that is relatively easy for parents to implement. However, I would caution given the age of your child, it may be difficult to break bad habits. You may want to consider starting with the cursive program (I am assuming he has had less experience with cursive and has not developed bad habits).

Regarding your situation as a whole - IDEA specifies that all special ed decision should be data driven and based on appropriate evaluations. Without such data, it is impossible to know if Barton or any other program is appropriate or the priority. If you are unhappy with the evaluations that the school has done, you have a right to an independent evaluation that team must consider. It sounds your idea of what your child needs for IEP services, appropriate goals, priorities is not in sync with the district's idea. It seems that an outside, independent, written evaluation is needed. You mention that he has been in contact with 2 PHD's. Perhaps you could engage them for a comprehensive evaluation and evaluation report to present to the team.

I agree with Bros that keeping your son on an IEP is wise. Without it, you cannot fight for services or as easily hold the district accountable.

Check with your state PTI (parent training institute - every state has an organization charged with supporting parents understand their rights and the special ed process)http://wdcrobcolp01.ed.gov/Programs/EROD/org_list.cfm?category_cd=SPT

Best of luck.

[Mayleng]

I have used handwriting without tears (HWT) with my son with success, however, he did not have dysgraphia and is not dyslexic but at the time (2nd grade) he had trouble writing and was way behind in reading. He is ADHD (inattentive). With regards to his writing, aside from it being very untidy, he would confuse his b and d, s and 5, and he would always write from bottom up. HWT helped a lot with regards to his issues.

[kewpie]

HWT is an easy enough program to try. It is relatively inexpensive and easy to implement. However it may or may not work. I used it with my boys in the primary grades and they did pages and pages of practice but their great practice sheets did not translate into better writing at school or anywhere else. They just dropped back into their old habits and their writing is still awful atho it is legible. They still print (they are college age) and never use cursive. However each kid is different and it is worth a try.

Barton is a good program BUT your child must ALREADY have a certain level of phonemic awareness to succeed int Barton or any other strutctured system of reading. Barton has a screening test but you may already have that information on the CTOPP. Look at the CTOPP and see what his phonemic scores are if they are poor then you need to use the Lindamood Bell LiPS (Lindamood Phonemic Sequencing) program. That is the only program that explicitly teaches phonemic awareness. Phonemic awaereness is the skill of hearing each letter sound with in a word. This is usually the crux of dyslexia. Phonemic awaereness is the single biggest predictor of success in learning to read.