Carter's IEP

A few weeks ago I met with Carter's speech teacher, the vice principal of his school, and Carter's kindergarten teacher for his annual IEP (Individual Education Program) meeting.  Carter has been getting speech therapy for three years now.  Usually after three years, additional testing is required to stay in a program.  However, Carter's speech teacher said she had enough data to know that Carter should continue getting speech therapy so additional testing wasn't necessary.

Mrs. Elrod (Carter's speech teacher) decided that she'd like to see Carter two times a week for 15 minutes (instead of once a week for 30 minutes).  I like this schedule better so that he hopefully retains a little more.

Here are some excerpts from the IEP ...

Present Level of Performance

Carter has made great progress on his speech goals!  He has mastered the goal of using /l/ and /l/-blends in conversational speech!  His accuracy is consistently above 80% for these sounds.  He was 88% accurate on this goal in January (data from 01/09 & 01/13 combined).  Carter is very close to mastering his /s/ in conversational speech.  He was 87% accurate and 73% accurate on 01/09 and 01/13, respectively.  Carter demonstrates some difficulty with "sh" in conversational speech.

He also demonstrates difficultly with /r/ and "th".  However, these errors are developmentally appropriate at this time.

Carter's speech sound errors continue to impact his ability to communicate effectively in the classroom environment.

Measurable Annual Goals and Benchmarks/Short-term Instructional Objectives

Goal 1: During 5 minutes of conversational speech, Carter will correctly produce /s/ in all positions of words with 80% accuracy in 4 consecutive sessions as measured by observation and data collection.

Goal 2: During 5 minutes of conversational speech, Carter will correctly produce "sh" in all positions of words with 80% accuracy in 4 consecutive sessions as measured by observation and data collection.

If Carter masters these goals, he would stop going to therapy.  However, when he turns 7, there are new age appropriate sounds that I am not sure if he has yet or not.

Carter's kindergarten teacher (Mrs. Colasso) was in the meeting to supply input on how his speech impacts him in the classroom.  She said that his peers don't seem to have any trouble understanding him.  Usually it is adults that need him to repeat himself.  Also, his speech seems to have no effect on his educational performance.  For example, on the Star Early Literacy and Math tests he recently completed, Carter scored in the 99th percentile on both.

I am glad that Carter will continue to get therapy.  Even though he's come so far, I know there are still times that others don't understand him.  Rylan is much less intelligible though so I barely notice Carter's issues anymore.  Luckily Carter doesn't seem to mind being pulled from class and seems to look forward to it.