Today’s IEP meeting was not really much of a change from what we had before.

The goal, to us, was to get the Monster an aide for next year.  He’s moving back to his zone school, and while that’s a Good Thing, we’re really sure there are enough supports in place.

After yesterday’s push and pull about getting information on what was going to be reported today, we received the informal report from the Early Learning representative in the evening.  The report was exactly what we figured they were going to “spring” on us at the meeting – that he seems to be behaving in class, is easily distractible, but with the general impression that he doesn’t need an aide.  Moreover, it did not cover anything about his going to the bathroom or how he behaves on the playground.

Now, the playground at Garrett Heights is fenced in – the kids only have a few egresses, and even if they go out through those openings, it’s a good distance from a quiet street, where an adult could catch him before he likely would get into trouble.  Mount Washington is by two very busy streets, and the playground (really, the parking lot) is easier to get off of.

Further, we’ve had an ongoing battle with him, lately, to ensure that he’s coming out of the bathroom fully dressed, and he’s been having minor accidents at home.  We don’t know, clearly, what he’s doing at school, but again, you’re talking a single adult with two dozen or more kids, as opposed to four adults with twelve children.

So basically, his teachers and the Early Learning rep feel his bathroom issues aren’t a major problem, because after all “first graders have accidents sometimes”.  We couldn’t win that battle, but we’ll see how they feel after it happens a few times.   (Seriously, I hear of -one- incident of him doing of what he does at home, and the school’s going to have me yelling about how we warned them – it’s in the minutes from the IEP meeting today.)

On the other hand, after we pointed out that there’s a history of his eloping – and that the Early Learning rep could not refute that we know of no fewer than three incidents of his doing so at school – they agreed that he needs to have “proximity controls” when he’s outside of the school building, which our advocate felt was sufficient wording for the situation.

The original idea they had in mind was that he’d have a peer-buddy for these situations… but bluntly, what kid’s going to want to spend all of recess with a child who doesn’t socially interact properly?  Or is going to want to (or actually do without mocking my son) go to the bathroom with him to ensure he has no problems?  He really needs an adult to monitor him.  And the school needs to understand that.

While it’s now in the IEP that he needs more monitoring, I really feel like the woman from Early Learning did not understand or appreciate my concerns.  This was the same woman who took away the Monster’s ESY, so you all already know what I think of her and her opinion – the fact that she seems to think that we’re overreacting did not help my opinion any.

So, apparently we’ve done all we can until we can get the Monster’s records transferred, which should be in a few weeks, and then we can ask for a meeting with the IEP team at Mount Washington.  Just what I need, right?