[littleflower0624]

Hi everyone. My son is 11 and was just diagnosed with Aspergers.  I have suspected that he had it much longer but that is a story in itself.

Anyway, a full battery of tests were done in response to my request for an IEP for my son (He already has a 504 Plan).  One of the findings of the tests was that he has Aspergers.  The problem is that they told me he doesn't qualify for an IEP because he scored average and above average in all the intellectual tests.  These tests were done one on one in a distraction-free room.  His report card just came home and he got 2 Cs, 4 Ds and an E.  To me, this says he should qualify for special education.  There is a huge gap in what he can do and what his grades are showing.  I've e-mailed the 504 team but I wanted to see what others who may have been in this situation have to say.

[littleflower0624]

Hi everyone. My son is 11 and was just diagnosed with Aspergers.  I have suspected that he had it much longer but that is a story in itself.

Anyway, a full battery of tests were done in response to my request for an IEP for my son (He already has a 504 Plan).  One of the findings of the tests was that he has Aspergers.  The problem is that they told me he doesn't qualify for an IEP because he scored average and above average in all the intellectual tests.  These tests were done one on one in a distraction-free room.  His report card just came home and he got 2 Cs, 4 Ds and an E.  To me, this says he should qualify for special education.  There is a huge gap in what he can do and what his grades are showing.  I've e-mailed the 504 team but I wanted to see what others who may have been in this situation have to say.

[mothersadventure]

what are you trying to accomplish - do you want to get speech and language services (pragmatics)?  i think you need an IEP for that.  

did your DS take the TOPS (test of problem solving)?  our kids usually do really poorly on that one!

could you call a meeting and discuss the discrepancies between ability (testing in a distraction-free environment) and performance (poor grades on a report card, real behavior in a classroom and on the playground).  can you enlist the help of his teacher?  our teacher in the 4th grade was really good at keeping record of his behavior (we had a lot of meltdowns)  actually the behavior piece was really helpful in getting my DS onto an iEP.

what tests did they give him?  was it multi-disciplinary? 

[littleflower0624]

His teacher and the whole 504 plan team have all been great so far. I was just surprised when he didn't qualify for special education. The main reason I am fighting for it is because he goes to middle school next year and with an IEP, he will be put in co-taught classrooms. Here is a list of the testing and the results: ASDS- average of likely to very likely by both raters (myself and his teacher ) BASC-2- Clinically significant range on the developmental social disorders scale DAS-II and GCA- average to above average range GFTA-2 and CELF-4- average to above average range WJ-III- average to above average range In short, the first two are what went into the Aspergers diagnosis. The other tests show that his speech, intellectual abilities, etc are all average to above average. The discrepancy is his actual grades versus his intelligence.

[mothersadventure]

Getting an ASD diagnosis (school or doctor) does not automatically put a student into Spec Ed.  The school will need to find that his Aspegers negatively effects his educational experience and services follow need.  (In other words - they offer a service to support an area he is doing poorly in).  If you can work with your team to identify his areas of need more specifically (for example, he needs pragmatic language training from the speech pathologist to have access to the regular curriculum) then they may offer services.

These are general tests of intelligence,  and ASD identifying tests.  i don't see any "social cognitive" tests in his recent testing - like the Social Language Development Test or the Test of Problem Solving.  These kinds of tests look at critical thinking, problem solving within the context of the school and home environment, perspective taking, and inferencing, etc. 

The CASL (Comprehensive Assessment of Spoken Language) identifies problems in the area of non-literal language, inference and pragmatic judgment.  The Listening Test  measures strengths and weaknesses in specific listening skills related to natural context classroom situations.   These kinds of social-cognitive specific tests can show need in areas overlooked by general tests. 

I recommend you continue to work with your team to document and problem-solve his areas of need.  Are you keeping notes from the teacher, classroom comments, or records of how things are going at school?

[littleflower0624]

I think the problem in the classroom has pretty much been identified. He spaces out and misses directions. Then, as many times as I've told him to do so, he does not look around him at the other students for clues about what he should be doing.  He does not take notes and does math in his head, insisting that he doesn't need to write things down.  He is very distracted by the smallest little things and cannot focus on anything else when something has his attention.