The transition begins!

[bdavis337]

Mark had a impromptu, mini developmental eval this morning. We start EI transition to preschool tomorrow, so his therapist wanted a clear picture of his current standing.

Oh my.

He's still soooooo delayed. I'm guessing he's probably still at the 30% delay, although he did answer a few questions. And his language issues really revealed themself - he can accurately perform a STATED task, like "give me the red triangle", but when ASKED "what color is this triangle?" or "where is the red triangle", he either answered "a choo choo train!" or "no no no that's not a color". Yeah. He knows 6 colors accurately, but he can't predictably name them when asked, only when TOLD to find the color itself. He has major wordfinding and processing problems. He also showed serious attention issues, he couldn't do any higher order skills like finding a toy hidden under a cup (2 cups, hide toy under 1 and then slide them around twice, where's the toy) he didn't even look under either cup, just ran excitedly around the table. Lots of toe walking and laughing, he had fun at least!

He also had absolutely no recognition of himself in the mirror. Wasn't it Ivy's mom who had asked about this a while ago? Anyway, he still doesn't realize he's seeing himself, in a mirror OR in a picture.

On a good note, I found out that he ages out of EI at the end of May, and would start preschool in August, with a service gap in the summer, which had me very worried. But, the local agency that provides his dev and language services is privately funded to serve children ages 3-5 who fall into a service gap like that, so he'll continue to get language, playgroup AND private dev therapy until school starts. What a discovery!

[AndVeeGeeMakes3]

What a roller coaster! Hopefully this transition will be a really good thing, and good to hear that there won't be a service gap - that is such a stressful thing to deal with.

Peace.

[bdavis337]

Yeah. I just got off the phone confirming the whole meeting tomorrow with everyone, and now I'm walking to the mailbox where I expect to find the formal copy of our dev pedi meeting last week, with his official autism dx. THEN I hope to do something totally unrelated to anything special needs oriented. yeah. whatever....

[AndVeeGeeMakes3]

Is there such a think as unrelated? Let me know, I'll go along.

[Marieke]

Originally Posted by bdavis337

On a good note, I found out that he ages out of EI at the end of May, and would start preschool in August, with a service gap in the summer, which had me very worried. But, the local agency that provides his dev and language services is privately funded to serve children ages 3-5 who fall into a service gap like that, so he'll continue to get language, playgroup AND private dev therapy until school starts. What a discovery!

I'm in NY, and I have no idea if the EI to preschool (CPSE program here) transition is different here to wherever you are. Is your son aging out of EI at the end of May because his birthday is the end of May? i.e. services end the day before he turns (I assume) 3.

Here EI will end the day before my son turns 3 (July in our case), especially if he is not considered eligible for the CPSE program (3-5 y/o post-EI), but if he is eligible for CPSE, then, if we want, he can continue with EI until the end of August, being that unlike EI CPSE is tied to the school calendar and runs from September through June and is not available in July/August, unless you get a special dispensation for which your son's therapists would need to prove that there would be significant regression if therapy wasn't continued, and then 6 weeks of therapy is provided in the July/August period.


Marieke

[bdavis337]

EI ends at age 3, on the day of his birthday. WI doesn't have, to my knowledge, provisional services for children after their 3rd birthday in my state.

He moves directly to the school district services the next day. But, school ends in early June, and he doesn't need or qualify for summer services. So he'd have a service gap, and would probably show fairly significant regression during the summer months. We might be able to argue that he needs school to prevent that, but I'd prefer him to continue on with his current services and start school in the fall.

And, we can use their services NEXT summer as well, since he won't yet be 5 years old, for summertime continuation of services when school is out. He simply will not qualify for summer school service, b/c he's not been found to have a cognitive delay or major physical needs.

[Marieke]

Originally Posted by bdavis337

EI ends at age 3, on the day of his birthday. WI doesn't have, to my knowledge, provisional services for children after their 3rd birthday in my state.

He moves directly to the school district services the next day. But, school ends in early June, and he doesn't need or qualify for summer services. So he'd have a service gap, and would probably show fairly significant regression during the summer months. We might be able to argue that he needs school to prevent that, but I'd prefer him to continue on with his current services and start school in the fall.

Interesting. Does your EI service coordinator have any ideas? It seems a little strange to me that here in NY EI would continue until the 3rd birthday *or* start of the school program in September, bridging the summer holidays until the school district services kick in. On the letter I was sent recently about my son's transition from EI to CPSE it listed both the potential ending dates (obviously dependent on whether he gets evaluated and approved for CPSE, which he will).

So in our case we can either stick with EI until the school program starts, or decide to end it the day he turns 3 and then try and get the 6 week interim program that CPSE does in the 2 month summer vacation period.

So much to figure out though, it's all a bit confusing at times.


Marieke

[bdavis337]

It's in the school's interest to provide summer program to children who can show potential for regression should they experience discontinuity of service during the summer months. In our case, we could probably argue it, but I'd rather have my summer to myself, AND give Marky a little more time to acquire some basic social interactions before he starts.

So I'm sticking with what we currently have for the summer months, because there is a local agency called Developmental Services Center (DSC) that recieves state and other funding, but they are separate from EI. We currently recieve slt, play therapy and dev playgroup with DSC staff, and EI reimburses DSC for those services. When he turns 3, we can continue with DSC until school starts. I'm a bit fuzzy on it, but I'd like to find out if he can continue with DSC after school starts even if I opt to hold him out fof the preschool environmnet for a year, or even a semester. DSC offers services free of charge to children ages 3-5 who do not receive school-based service. What I need to flesh out is if that means that they only offer them to children who do not qualify, or that they will offer them to any child not in school. I'm not sure.....And if I did go that route, would the transition to preschool a year from now be any less smooth without EI to back me up going into it?

Too many questions!!!