More of a developmental delay than we thought? - Page 2

[Mama2Xander]

Originally Posted by Linda on the move

I totally get where you are coming from. For my DD, having a dx means that the school can make a different set of rules for her, rules that help her succeed. Without a dx, they couldn't do that, and she would both be a complete basket case and fail some of her classes.

I don't know how it works for preschool -- either here or in Canada. For school aged kids, private schools are not required to make any accommodations here. Public schools, on the other hand, must provide an appropriate education in the most unrestricted environment.

I'd check into what a dx could get him. Could you get the same things with just a note from a doctor?

We cross posted

I am not sure of the exact rules for preschool. They will bring in an aide in some cases, so they are definitely willing to make accommodations in some cases. I will need to research all of this more.

[Mama2Xander]

Originally Posted by CarrieMF

I was going to say talk to the school, they will do referrals with the school OT's if you have a child in the school already(especially for one who will be entering soon), however it sounds like the specific school system you're in sucks for special needs & it surprises me for BC. My kids are in the SK system & everything I mentioned above is done through the schools. They're more than willing to help any of the kids. The school system I work in is a rural school in AB and has limited funds(seriously, $250 for the entire year for our school's special needs kids which there were 5 SN needs kids 3 who were severe). We have had OT's, ST's & behaviour psychologists come in & give us suggestions. The ST was the least helpful & I really hope I don't have to see her again.

Stopping ST for 3-4 months allows for ALOT of regression.

Yeah, things are not great with the schools here esp. right now - the Vancouver School Board is having major financial trouble and is facing a huge shortfall for next year. They gave notice of potential layoffs to over 800 teachers earlier this year (official layoffs won't be done until next month, I think). So yeah, funding special therapies does not seem to be high on their priority list

About the break from ST - again, funding issues - demand far exceeds supply, and this is their way of trying to have more kids at least IN the system, rather than having super long wait lists. We only had to wait about 2 months from when I first called them until DS started receiving ST.

I agree that it certainly isn't ideal, but I can't really do much about it... of course we work with him at home as much as we can, and the speech therapist gives us activities to do at home as well.

[Mama2Xander]

Update

As if I haven't posted enough on this thread already

I talked to DS's speech therapist today, since I needed to call her to schedule his next assessment & therapy sessions anyway. We're going back for more ST starting May 13th. She is going to put in a referral to the nurse (in the same community health center) who does developmental assessments. She said we would be given a questionnaire to fill out, and then the nurse would either do a phone interview with us or come and do a home visit. I'm happy with this option - I didn't know they offered that particular service, and I think it will be a good starting place

[Linda on the move]

Originally Posted by Mama2Xander

My other thoughts on this are:
1. As I mentioned above, we are heading towards the possibility of him being excluded from some activities (potentially including preschool) due to the lack of potty-training. He will not be able to attend any of the summer activities like DS1 did/does, because the children are required to be diaper-free.

I'd start the ball rolling for the eval and see if a note from your doctor will do for now to get him into stuff.

I really think that when the issues are big enough to be impacting their lives, getting a label can be VERY helpful to a child.

[Mama2Xander]

Originally Posted by Linda on the move

I'd start the ball rolling for the eval and see if a note from your doctor will do for now to get him into stuff.

I really think that when the issues are big enough to be impacting their lives, getting a label can be VERY helpful to a child.

We don't have a doctor... the nurse that I posted about should be able to give us a referral to a ped if necessary. The community health center should be able to give us some kind of documentation though (when DS had his speech eval we got a copy of the report and they sent one to the preschool too).

Thanks for your replies, BTW. I'm not trying to argue with you, honest!