Carter's IEP

I met with a speech teacher a couple of weeks ago to discuss Carter's new IEP (Individual Education Program).  Ms. Rholanda wrote the IEP but our meeting was the day she was having her baby so another speech teacher that services other schools in the county went over it with me.

There was nothing surprising in the meeting since Ms. Rhalonda had already discussed Carter's new goals with me.  This IEP is for one year.  Carter should continue to receive services once he starts kindergarten (but it will be with that school's speech teacher).  He will be due for a new evaluation at the end of that time (they do a full evaluation every 3 years).

Here are some highlights from the IEP:

Present Level of Performance - Speech/Articulation:

Carter has mastered his previous goals and has generalized target sounds into conversational speech.  He was recently working on s vs. sh at the word, sentence, and conversational level.  He has made great progress, but needs to continue being monitored in conversational speech.  Carter's speech is characterized by substitutions for /l/.  At this time, he is stimulable with modeling.

Measurable Annual Goals and Benchmarks/Short-term Instructional Objectives for IEP and Transition Activities:

1. Carter will carryover /s/ and /z/ into conversational speech as observed in 3 3-minute speech samples with at least 90% accuracy.
2. Carter will eliminate the phonological process of gliding (produced /l/ and /l/ blends) in isolation, syllables, and words with at least 80% accuracy in 4/5 opportunities.
3. Carter will articulate /l/ and /l/ blends in phrases/sentences with 80% accuracy in 4/5 opportunities.
4. Carter will generalize /l/ and /l/ blends into structured conversational speech as observed with 80% accuracy in 3 3-minute speech samples.

Like I said, no surprises.  Carter will continue to go to therapy twice a week for 30 minutes for the remainder of the school year.

The boys have had the substitute speech teacher who is filling in for Ms. Rholanda during her maternity leave for 2 weeks now.  Ms. Jill worked at Crockett in the early childhood classroom as a speech therapist up until this year so she is familiar with the environment.  (She now normally works at a private facility like our speech teacher from last year.)  Ms. Jill seems fine but isn't as loving and open as I usually expect preschool teachers to be.  She's pretty stiff and almost shy but the boys haven't complained so I think it's going fine.  They haven't really moved on to anything new yet but Ms. Rholanda didn't move on very quickly either.  Again, this is a free program and I can't complain (private speech sessions are crazy expensive!).