Parents' Checklist
- Be optimistic and open-minded
- Don't feel shame or embarrassment
- Be encouraging and supportive
- Seek independent evaluation if necessary
- Become familiar with the disability. Ask questions and seek information.
- Be willing to work with the teachers.
- Share your reading material with the teacher.
- Don't do your child's homework for them, rather with them.
- Request yearly reevaluation to measure where growth is realized.
- Disclosure - follow good judgment (piano teacher, soccer/hockey coach, art instructor etc.)
- Be your child's advocate until they can take on the challenge themselves.
- Kid check - ask your child what is working for them and what's not.
- Be patient - remember children instinctively want to do well.
- Make sure your child has an activity they enjoy and are successful at. (Skateboarding, baking, music, biking, sports, dance, art etc.
Source: Randeah Moore
LDAS, Past President
Suggestions for Parents
Get to know the up coming teacher. Encourage educators to read your child's cum file. Schedule a conference with the Resource teacher/private tutor/future teacher.
Share strategies that were implemented and are currently working.
Ask for the list of the mandatory reading material and inquire about upcoming lessons and vocabulary.
Investigate if the books are available on tape or in large print.
Record books, texts, etc., on a tape recorder, marking each new Chapter.
Acquire a "talking book" library card.
Ask for talking book catalogues no longer in circulation for home use.
Buy pencil grips and stay away from coil bound notebooks.
Use colored hi-liter and recipe cards.
Purchase a good spell check.
Weekly check-in with the teacher
Seek out a private tutor
Transcribe exams - from written work to print, onto graph paper (math)
Use a salt box to practice confusing letters.
Penmanship can be practiced using large colorful makers for a change
Extra time for exams may be needed ( a test is a measurement of the child's knowledge of the material - period - not whether or not they can do it in the allotted time, which is usually for the teacher's benefit.
Oral examinations where necessary
Answering exam questions on a tape recorder instead of writing them out.
Source: Randeah Moore
LDAS, Past President
