19
May
5 Things Parents Must Do Before School Closes For Summer
By: Meena Tadimeti
Contributor to specialneedsinmycity.org @SNinmycity
With busy work schedules and demanding family priorities, it’s easy for parents to forget to seek important feedback from their child’s teacher(s) before school is out.
Here are five important things that parents must do before school is out for the Summer.
- Thank your child’s teacher & IEP Team: Teachers often say that a simple ‘thank you’ from parents is tremendously satisfying, motivating and rewarding. Whether it’s been a bumpy ride or not managing your child’s educational needs, don’t forget to convey your appreciation to your child’s teacher(s) for their dedication, patience and hard work. As we all know, it’s not easy being a teacher particularly a special education teacher. Don’t forget also to thank the aides or para-professionals in the classroom and certainly your IEP team! All of these people directly or indirectly have helped your child throughout the year.
- Get Feedback– It’s important to take a few minutes to ask your child’s teacher and service providers what learning techniques or strategies have worked and not worked with your child this year. Gaining this insight is valuable to help you understand
what strategies to reinforce at home and which techniques to suggest in the upcoming academic year. Knowing this will be helpful especially if your child will have a new teacher in the Fall. Keep a running list of what’s working and what isn’t will be helpful at your next IEP meeting, parent-teacher conference meeting or at back-to-school night. - Retain and Reinforce Concepts: With Summer vacation around the corner, ask the teacher what you can do to help your child retain or reinforce concepts. Ask him/her to recommend good math and reading websites to reinforce the concepts taught during the school year. Websites such as starfall.com (free, reading & more) and ixl.com (K-12, math & language) and wegivebooks.com (free) are incredibly useful and help increase a child’s attention given their emphasis in presenting the concepts in a fun and visual way. If your child receives speech and language services, make sure to ask the speech therapist about quality apps on the tablet in the areas of social stories, verb tenses, fluency, articulation or with 5w’s.
- Create Positive Social Opportunities: Since our children often have communication challenges, it’s difficult for us to know who they converse with or play with at school, ask the teacher or a staff member who your child seems to enjoy interacting with or his curious to interact with; whether it be in the classroom, at lunch or recess. Help your child connect with friends by having your child write/type a note to his or her friends with your contact details; inviting for play time over summer at the park or to a birthday party. For older kids, supervised text messaging opportunities could help strengthen their friendships outside of school.
- Consider Extended School Year (ESY): Don’t forget to check your child’s ESY services (summer school), if eligible and planning to attend. Make sure all approved services are clearly mentioned in the ESY section of FAPE so that these services will continue into the Summer. Don’t assume that just because your child got it during the school year that it will continue in the Summer. If there are any services that won’t be offered such as OT, PT, AT or speech, find out why as soon as possible, before school closes. Also, find out which electives are available for your child to take part in the next academic year (junior high or high school students). Make sure that the elective is clearly stated in the IEP.
Have a wonderful Summer, enjoy your time with your family and friends! Hope these strategies help you to stay ahead and have stronger pulse on your child’s educational needs and progress.
Please share your thoughts or tips by clicking on ‘leave a comment’ at the bottom of this post.
“For every minute spent organizing, an hour is earned”. —Benjamin Franklin