Saturday, October 18, 2008

It's almost time to mainstream

In September of 07 Evan transitioned from our public school into St. Joseph Institute for the Deaf (an oral school in Indianapolis) b/c he was almost 2 years delays across the board. He has made tremendous gains and was ready for mainstream when school started this year but our public school wasn't ready for him (no training)... In their defense, no one, not even St. Joe's, expected Evan to make such great gains in such a short amount of time. He started St. Joe's this year full time but knowing that mainstream was quickly approaching. Our school has started training w/St. Joe's staff and yesterday we met w/the school personnel that would be teaching Evan when he came back.
You never really know how good you have it at a private school until your visit the public school. I have never noticed the blowers, light fixtures, noise levels and room size until yesterday. While I know that this is the norm for public schools, it just gets me nervous for my little guy to go back there. The staff seems to be super excited to have him back and to learn how to teach an oral deaf kiddo but I just can't seem to shake this nervous gut wrenching feeling of going back. I know Evan will adjust and most likely will excel w/leaps and bounds when he gets with his typical peers. I am imagining most of it is coming from going straight to mainstream after early intervention and really thinking the school was prepared to teach Evan and then only after a year of being there he came out with this HUGE regression. I am having trouble trusting any of them b/c none of them have a background in oral deaf ed and even the SLP had to admit yesterday that before Evan she has never worked with and oral d/hh kiddo. I knew this but to hear her admit it just made me want to say "No way your not getting my kid, I will just home school him". (Believe me I could not do this, not enough patience for one reason..)
We decided yesterday that he would go part time to our school then part time to St. Joe's and to keep training our school in the process, this will start in January after Christmas Break. All in all the meeting was a success and I really believe the school will service him well since they are getting good training and Evan will do well I just can't seem to get rid of me worrying about everything.

1 comment:

Kimberly said...

Hugs Leslie. I know exactly how you are feeling. He will probably adjust and adapt quickly but it's us, the mothers, that will have a hard time.

Good Luck with the transition and I'll keep you all in my prayers.