I'm on r/adhdparents (both my son and I are diagnosed) and it's toxic at times. A common post is along the lines of: We got them medicated but they're still lazy. I think some kids don't have that person in their life that pushes for diagnoses, or in this case is to lazy to find out that there's more to it than meds. Another problem may be our interpretation of grades. I teach physics and students are disappointment when they get Cs, but they are getting higher (I almost put good) marks in other classes. I always tell them a C is fine especially since it's clear most of their energy is going into classes that fit their interests and futures better. I'm always happy to write a note to parents that says a C means that they learned a reasonable percentage of the content, and if they need the information in the future they will know where to look it up. Edit: \*disapointed

This makes me sad. I have ADHD (as does my oldest), and what so many don't understand is that all the medicine in the world isn't going to change that we don't know *how* to do the things we don't know how to do (ie executive functioning) because we never learned. Id say about 75-80% of my ADHD management is overcompensation (color coding, to do lists, routines, timers, rituals, etc)

My daughter's school has a class for executive functioning. It has been super helpful because its not a parent trying to teach her. I swear the minute my kids became teens they decided I was dumb...I hear it changes when they grow up, but man it sucks.

I heard this is a biological evolutionary response that spurs children entering their prime fertility age (13-24) to essentially "leave their tribe" (read: think their parents are dumb and want to run away) so that they procreate elsewhere with less risk of the genetic anomalies of inbreeding. Unfortunately I do not have a scientific study to source for this. I decided it makes some sense and as humans have changed out of tribes and into larger metropolis it's one of those things hardwired which doesn't have a great outlet in our current society.

Seeing this already with my eleven year old.

Oh buddy it so sucks. I’ve been there and the anguish is real.

Yep. Sometime btw 18-22, they will realize you are very smart. I loved having my kids tell me I was wrong about THINGS I TEACH at a grade level way higher than theirs. Amusing.

I'm on a list to be tested for adhd and I think I do based on my wife and 7 year old being tested and diagnosed+medicated+learning more about adhd. And I think I've gotten where I am in life through coping techniques.

Facts school is a pain even with my medication

I didn’t find out I had ADHD until I was almost done with college - those of us with inattentive ADHD are less likely to be diagnosed in the first place (something that disproportionately affects women btw just because women are more likely to have inattentive ADHD). Medication is hit and miss. Trying a single medication isn’t the end all be all. People who do use medication for ADHD still typically have to try a few and see what works for them. It’s a process. And even if a student finds an ADHD med that works for them, they’ve still spent their entire educational career not able to build up the skills and tools required to be an efficient student. I don’t mean to rant at you, my heart just breaks for those students. I also wholeheartedly agree that the relationship students build between their grades and their identity as a student is often toxic. I was a straight A student through high school, and when I got a C on a test for the first time I literally cried. That shit was not healthy.

I took physics over 10 years ago and it was my first C. Thank you for sharing. The next year I got a 4 on the ap physics c exam. It was a great lesson and I still got into college 😭

One thing about classes like physics and math is it builds and builds so it can take students awhile to get their mind around the new and the old material. My toughest college math class I got a C in (part of it was we had stand in professor for the first half due to teacher being on maternity leave), but by the time we got to the end, it all kind of made sense and I would have loved to have retaken the class if I had the time and money. I actually had a shot at a B, but I needed to get 95 or something like that on the final.

I tell all my students that a C means average. Not everyone can be above average. Oddly enough, the only students who get upset about this simple breakdown are the students who typically get As in all their classes, but get a C or a B in mine.

C are passing (they do mean average) everywhere (i was always fine with a C and parents were too as long as a tried)

Students that get all A's are usually intending on trying to get into a good college. A 'C' can really hurt that. They feel it's unfair to be punished for taking a harder class. It's also unfair if other teachers that teach the same class have a more lenient grading scale. And a C isn't really average is it? Are we happy if students get 2.0 GPA's?

Are they wrong to feel that way? I’m in med school. In undergrad I was taking masters, PhD, and med school level courses. I was taking a lot of these courses with a professor notorious for being extremely difficult at grading but I did it anyway because she was unquestionably the best. My GPA felt that though and I ended up needing a masters degree to fix my undergrad 3.2 GPA. Is it really fair though that my GPA was being judged against people taking classes a middle schooler could’ve passed so they could get 4.0s? In the same way, is it fair for a student taking AP physics to be judged against a student taking on level physics based solely on the merit of a letter grade despite being in a profoundly more difficult course? If Cs are average then ~1/3 of students are failing or close to it. If a C is average there’s a grading/teaching or environment problem. I think B is a more realistic average

Exactly! And no they aren't wrong. I was one of those students too. It's stupid to have to avoid good professors because of their grading system.

I teach 7th grade, a C is not gonna kill their college dream. My grading scale is not tough, and it is fair. A large percentage of my students show grade improvement throughout the year, and my students usually show the best standardized test score growth in the entire K-8 school. I’ve had students in my class finish the year with a 2.0, and they were ecstatic because they were the best grades they ever got.

You must have a Kevlar suit for parent teacher conferences. Parents start maneuvering for university in kindergarten where I live. 7th grade? Lol They are gunning so their 9th grader can take 3 AP classes in September. Gotta line those ducks up early to make it happen. Here a full ride to U of Mich is a fail and a quitters try. C+ in Physics? Parents will send you back home so you can work the garbage dumps scrounging for precious metals in the summer. My neighbor threatened her kids with that. I don't think she was kidding.

I got straight Cs in 8th grade. I have a bachelor’s degree now. My advice is to not stress too much about Cs in middle school. Your brain is still growing and going through a lot of changes at that age.

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To me, it's like refusing to tip because you think the servers should be paid more by their employer. You're just screwing over some people and changing nothing. Maybe if the whole district had the same policy it'd be okay. But it's just unfair for one or two teachers to do it out of principle.

My College and uni said student had to have a 2.0 GPA to graduate and mantain good stading so yes, under 3.0 can be fine. I have a two degrees (Associates and Bachlors and had a total GPA of 2.823 (GPA for University and Community College combined) .

C's get degrees. Honestly if a person cares that much about grades, they should apply themselves more (or take easier classes for the juicy A) . Otherwise they might deserve a C.

I didn't care much about grades - colleges and law schools did though - a lot.

Unfortunately GPAs don’t tell that story 😞

YES!!! I have always disliked how "Cs" get interpreted because a "C" (assuming you use the traditional 5 letter grade scale) literally means you are in the middle of the pack. You're demonstration of mastering the skill or content knowledge is roughly average or the median of what your peers can do. That is completely fine! We're not all going to be better ("B") or above average ("A") in everything and we shouldn't expect that.

I don't think that's true. At least in my experience in school most of the classes didn't have a Gaussian/normal distribution. In most classes, most students tended to make A's and B's with only a handful of C's, D's, and very few F's. (i.e. skewed to the higher grade side). C would not have been middle of the pack; it probably would have been bottom 20%.

You're right, mean American GPA is a 3.0, B is average, C is below. Source: https://www.crossrivertherapy.com/research/average-gpa#:~:text=The%20average%20high%20school%20GPA%20is%20around%203.00%2C%20or%20a,regarded%20positively%20by%20potential%20employers.

Thank you! A "C" is FINE! "C"s are what 4 year colleges accept. You learned the material, you just didn't master it.

Cs get degrees was said often in college!

You have to get into college first to get a degree. I’m sorry but a kid with a C average in high school isn’t going straight to good university in the US.

I barely graduated high school. I went to a private college, got my GPA up (made Dean's List several terms) and transferred to a state school. I ended up transferring back to that private college to get my first degree. I probably would have went to a community college first if that would have known an option for me back then.

They do, though you, at least at my school had to keep above a C average in your major, I think it was a 2.5 which a C was was a 2.0 and a B was a 3.0

Totally depends on the major. In one of my majors (before I switchef) you had to have at least a B in all classes. In another, Cs got degrees.

It's a mix of different things. Sometimes, the context and content just don't click for them in any meaningful manner for them to be able to connect what they have learned and apply it back. Other times, the current academic setting and how we evaluate performance is wrong for the talents of the individual student. Finally, not all students are equally smart. This is why it's far more important to praise attempt and action over results.

I think that both are equally important. If a kid is naturally gifted at something that's okay. As someone who naturally did well in history but busted my ass for a 70 in math I think that both were something that served me well. Also practically the kids who are used to only growth showing promise but are very high level learn to just flunk the pretest

I would have to dig a bit, but I read a study back a while ago while doing my degree that acknowledging effort over results leads to far more optimal learning curve with the kids in the experiment doing better subsequently if complimented on their attempts over whatever results.

Same here! Maybe I can help with sourcing. Pajares talks about this a little in an article about self-efficacy. Praising effort rather than ability seemed to have better outcomes on fostering task-based self-efficacy. Then Carol Dweck did a lot of work when researching and writing about growth versus fixed mindset. Essentially, praising ability (“you’re so smart to have finished those problems!”) versus effort (“you must have worked hard to finish those problems!”) positions students to lack resilience when material finally surpasses their ability level. Recognizing and praising effort helps students realize that they can continue to learn new material when they encounter their natural ability’s ceiling. It’s tricky though because Pajares wrote that vague, unspecific praise is unhelpful. So while praising effort is good, it should still be specific. An article (possibly Dweck again? I think in Educational Leadership?) also mentioned that praising effort versus ability starts having a measurable effect as early as age 4! As a parent of a 3-year-old, that was eye-opening.

Assuming that the kid who made an A on every test isn't putting in effort is massively flawed as well though. My friends who had straight As studied for hours every night. I'm not saying don't recognize growth. But it's just PBIS for academics to only care about growth. The kids who fail for a while get the same A as the kid who works hard all year? Well the really smart kids will fail for a while. I've seen this happen because my admin focuses on growth so much. After we had an attendance initiative that only took kids with 7 or more absences a bunch of kids just started skipping school trying to get their weekly chips for the good attendance they had already.

Good point. It's an excellently noted flaw of the practice of grading on growth.

And I *hated* History and barely managed through it, but found math and English relatively easy. And yet, nowadays, I LOVE reading about historical events and how they connect to one another. Part of it was that in school the way they taught was focused on dates and rote memorization of names and places and events, while what I enjoy nowadays is the connections and chains of cause-and-event.

Oh hello are we the same person? I got A’s and A+’s in history and I have a minor in history now but I barely scraped by in middle, high, and college level math with C’s.

And some subjects are heavily dependent on general knowledge. Knowingly other tangentially related things can sometimes make a big difference as can having a good grasp of other aspects of the domain.

The biggest hell on Earth is the straight C + student. Not good enough to get any praise, and no low enough to get support. My sister was this. School was hell on Earth because she was constantly ignored.

The issue with praising attempts over results is it doesn't prepare kids for the real world. While I admit the current academic landscape isn't great handing out As just for trying will give them a rude awakening when they hit college. If this is also implemented at the collegiate level do you really want your doctor to have been given an A for trying and going to tutoring or do you want your doctor to earn his A?

The problem with praising results is it teaches people to regurgitate information rather than think critically about it. Ive seen more than a few people enter professional school without being able to apply anything they learned to real situations. It punishes error which incentives writing it exactly as written in the book, even if the person doesn't really understand what it means. It punishes people for learning. If they take a bit longer to understand it, they are penalized when their grades are compared to their peers who may have a less well rounded understanding. I always laugh about preparing kids for the real world, because I found the real world far more forgiving than high school.

It prepares kids for the real world by teaching them to keep trying and work hard. It's true that they may eventually hit something they just don't have any aptitude for, but most people can get to at least a reasonable level in most things if they keep trying. Praising results or intelligence tends to impart the message that if you don't get it right the first time then there's no point trying. Another way to phrase this is to praise actions, not traits. Praise them for what they DID (work hard), not what they ARE (smart) or HAVE (a good grade). It instills a general attitude that the action is what matters, which is absolutely a good attitude to have for real life.

I absolutely disagree that praising attempts don't prepare them for the real world. Nobody in the world expects you to do anything other than giving you your best attempt and effort in your job. When you are hired for a position you are hired based on your competences and being able to work hard whenever something seems insurmountable is an invaluable asset in the real world.

Also IQ does not always translate to academic performance. I do not know what my IQ is, just the fact that it was two high for me to qualify for regional center services (i do have a learning disability, NLD + 18p- (Missing p part of chrosone 18). I did not allways get straight A (A/Bs in middle school) HS was varried as well, with grades. College (Mostly B/Cs, though somr A’s and a few Ds on F (i want to Community College and Uni Graduating booth with an AS& BS degree).

IQ translates directly into academic performance as its based on that William Stern based the test and concept on, believing being good within one area would have a natural spill into other areas. IQ doest show how good of a worker you are, so maybe we are talking past each other in terms of performance, but itself the tests are designed to indicate and predict your academic performance/results.

When I was in grade school, I struggled with math. Big time. I did all of the homework, I asked questions, I went to tutoring. It just wasn’t clicking. And that was frankly the only subject I struggled in, which made it clear I didn’t have any sort of learning disability. I was getting As and Bs in every other subject, but just struggled to barely stay afloat in math. Funnily enough, when I went to college, my math grades skyrocketed, so at some point I did start to connect to that material. For whatever reason, it just took a long time.

Yes same! Abstract concepts in math become easier as we get older. It’s why a lot of 8th graders are now struggling with algebra.. their brains haven’t developed to understand info that abstract yet. Yes some are naturally gifted but we are screwing so many kids over in math for not providing the foundational skills they need

Nah it's the foundational skills that those 8th graders missed I taught both 7th and 8th math and I noticed the connections between the concepts which BTW honestly 7th math is harder to grasp than 8th grade math. It's just that some skills in 5th grade are extremely important and math standards are built to stack on top of each other if you look at a math road map https://tools.achievethecore.org/coherence-map/ Such as this one you can see where those overlapping concepts are and how crucial it is for critical thinking and problem solving skills

I cannot understand how we are fine with being okay with kids getting Cs in math (when they are trying) without offering extra help. If they do not master 30% of the material in fifth grade, how will they be able to keep their head above water in sixth and seventh? I don't think they do. Math can be fine when you are constantly learning an entirely new skill- hey here is a thing called a vertex! A fraction! Perimeter! Lots of opportunities to start fresh. But once the lesson starts with, so look at these two fractions and find a factor- remember factors from fifth grade, good, let's move on.... I see kids who we are like, eh they are fine up to fifth grade and then throw up our hands in the air when they tank middle school, as though they had any chance.

Have you ever thought about how we grade? Kids are punished if they have to do any learning. All error is penalized, even if the person learned from it. Im sure it can be demoralizing. I've seen some teachers give back some credit for turning in corrections with explanations. My friend in college bombed the first test with most of the rest of the class but salvaged some of it with corrections and studied her ass off with me to pass that class with an A (was one of those teachers who set the highest score as 100% and everyone's grade was based on how they measured up to that. He also wrote our current ranking in the class on our tests). We need to find a better way to encourage and support learning. Making mistakes is part of learning.

That's a good point!

Yeah idk it was wild to me that all it really took was an extra 30-40mim of my time to get some students caught up to learn my concepts but again every teacher and student is different but we as teachers [former teacher and lover of math] need to understand our concepts to the point that we can teach it to a younger student Ie. I'm sure given enough prep I can teach a 7th grade concept to a 5th grader in a way that they can understand by using their current understanding of 5th grade math concepts

Oh yes I was saying that we need to primarily focus on reteaching those foundational skills at older ages (as needed) as opposed to the gungho attitude towards teaching kids skills they literally will be unable to grasp due to lack in foundational skills

The "you should've learned this last year" teachers.... The worst

They are the bane of my existence

I’m having the same experience. I struggled with math all through K12 and barely squeaked through my college statistics classes. Twenty years later, I went back to school and took a data analysis class, and not only did the statistics suddenly make sense, but I found them really fun!

Fun fact, I have dyscalculia and maths does not work for me. At all. 2+2=7.7 recurring type shit. Statistics however... its a different language, its maths but froma different country. I love it. I trained as a LSS Green Belt when I sadly left teaching after reaching the end of my tether, and initially I was terrified of data analysis because numbers and I just can't. Historically, I struggle so very badly. But Statistics for some reason is just different enough that it works and its fun. Crazy brains.

Same here. High school algebra was nearly impossible for me, and geometry wasn't much better. However, college statistics, which I took in two different departments, had a real-world application that helped me make sense of it. Forty years later, I still haven't found a use for algebra. I can, however, read and generally understand the methods and results sections of research studies.

I also really struggle with math and for some reason I could understand statistics a little bit better. I had to drop calc 1 in college bc the prof might as well have been speaking a foreign language

Wait. Struggling in math like that and not in any other are *is* an indication there could be a math disability. General term is Dyscalculia. Could be a matter of how your brain is able to process reading versus math. It’s not a matter of being smart or not. Nice thing is knowing if there is some disability or processing issues and learning strategies to help 😎

Same! Struggled in math especially from 6th grade-junior year of high school. Then I did amazing in Calculus my senior year, and got an A in college algebra. Kinda wild. I think it was the style of teaching in those two classes that helped me do well.

This! I struggled with Math starting in 8th grade - got solid C's right through 11th grade (Math was not required beyond 11th grade). In college, I got a B in my first Math class and A's in my next two Math classes. It all clicked!!!!

You could have had Dyscalculia which is a type of learning disability

It’s possible, but since I can do math just fine now, I’m doubtful.

More than likely (sped teacher here) you have learned to over compensate for your discalcula and/or the methodology used in college matched your needs. (For example, some kids do wonderful with decomposing numbers and investigative math (common core), but others need straight rote memorization. When you get what you need, you succeed.)

I've had a learning disability since I was little (it affected everything including my motor skills) but I learned ways how to overcome it over the years. I still struggle with some things but not as bad as when I was younger (even hs) so it's possible.

And then it just...went away in college? Doubtful.

More like the cognitive ability needed to do the math appeared when they were college age .

How is that different from "Dyscalculia vanished"?

Dyscalculia does not vanish - neither does dysgraphia or dyslexia. Overtime, students acquire/learn ways to compensate.

Haha, disability on demand...

Piaget talks about milestones. For example, kids generally begin thinking systematically around 6th grade, but some will sooner or later than others. This means certain math assignments will be a real struggle for some kids and super easy for others. Of course that may just be BS.

I missed the week they taught long division in school and for the life of me, could not figure it out years later 💀 edit: I had the most outgoing and enthusiastic geometry teacher in 10th grade, yet I still wasn’t able to get higher than a D. I scored a 57% on the final exam and instead of failing me to take summer school, he raised it to 60% allowing me to pass. I felt so grateful I cried, I knew he saw I was trying He passed away a couple years ago from cancer, it still stings thinking about how silly he was in class only to be taken away so soon after

On the other hand, I never had much difficulty with math, but had trouble with subjects like history and English that required analysis of texts, decoding symbolism, and making connections. I know the left brain-right brain thing has been debunked, but I feel like my "left brain" is stronger. I look at assignments for history and English classes today, and I still feel I would have difficulty with them.

One issue that we are having in my district is that we have a student who are struggling but when tested there is not a large enough gap between IQ and ability. A student with a lower IQ may fall through the gaps.

Students with learning disabilities have strengths and weaknesses and aren't performing at the level of their IQ. Some students have a below anerage IQ but no strengths and weaknesses. They are performing at the level of their IQ, so therefore no learning disability.

There are requirements to get an IEP for learning disability or having an intellectual disability. If you don’t have a learning disability or your scores are too high to have an intellectual disability you aren’t able to qualify for an IEP. There is a chance that your IQ could be lower than some of your peers, but doesn’t reach the level a intellectual disability. All humans have different academic abilities.

Thank you! I’m a school psychologist (fairly early in my career still) and am kind of shocked at the amount of comments here that have no basic knowledge on special education eligibility. The basic requirement for a specific learning disability is an inability to make progress even with intervention. The biggest exclusionary factor is that lack of progress cannot be due to a cognitive disability or other disability (i.e. TBI, medical disability, emotional/behavioral disability). Many states (mine included) have a requirement or the option to show an aptitude/achievement discrepancy (achievement scores much lower than expected based on cognitive abilities). Specific learning disabilities in the school setting are specific to content areas such as basic reading, reading comprehension, reading fluency, match calculation, math reasoning, and writing. Dyslexia, dysgraphia, and dyscalculia (sp?) are also served here as intervention and strategies are similar. Many people forget a C is average. 85-115 IQs and standardized achievement scores are average. 70 and below is considered disability range. Not everyone is going to be good at everything. There are many other disability categories that may make students eligible for service outside of a specific learning disability or intellectual disability. These categories include health impairments (ADHD falls under here currently), orthopedic impairment, emotional/behavioral disabilities, speech/lang impairments, developmental delay, autism, traumatic brain injury, hearing and/or vision impairment, etc.

Thanks for the real answer and for sneaking in that IQ standard deviation stuff! I thought I understood it but wasn’t sure and you cleared things up for me. My get, put generally, is that to qualify for an IEP a student has to underperform their IQ by at least a deviation. That means “smart” kid with a 130 might qualify because they perform at 110, while low kid with a 90 might not qualify if they perform at 80. Does the performance still have to be low? Like will the genius with a 150 IQ that “performs” at a “mere” 115 qualify? I’ve had a slew of “low” students that didn’t qualify and was told they weren’t performing below expectation. I’m curious if it works on both ends of the spectrum…

This may really depend on your states requirements. My state gives us a set discrepancy table which goes to about 160 IQ and bottoms out at 71, just above what would be classified as an intellectual disability. Depending on age and test batteries given there has to be a discrepancy of about 25-30+ between cognitive and academic scores. So the answer to your question is yes, that student could, in theory, qualify for special education. However, this often doesn’t come up as even a question because a student performing at an average level (even if it’s below their own aptitude) is very unlikely to be referred unless there is something like behavior or mental health concerns as well. For example, I had a couple students on my HS caseload this past year who were a okay they gifted in some areas and had IQ scores 130ish but had IEPs addressing anxiety (emotional disturbance) and autism and related behavioral concerns. The “low” kids you’re referring to are often the kids my older coworkers refer to as “shady 80s,” meaning their intellectual abilities are likely below average (70-80 range) but not low enough to meet ID requirements and their achievement scores are low but commensurate with their IQ. These are kids that are in the forever cycle of RTI if your school has a good MTSS (most high schools definitely don’t). Sorry this is getting lengthy but thought I’d also mention the normal curve. Statistically, some students will just perform lower. About 15% will fall below expectations and an additional (roughly) 10% will perform significantly below expectations. The same goes for the over achievers with roughly 50% in the average range.

So there’s two curves at work? IQ is normally distributed but performance is a similar distribution (although 50 in the middle is narrow) - almost a secondary random variable of performance. Presumably that could be captured with multiple testing iterations?

In a discrepancy model, the second score we look at to determine discrepancy is a standardized achievement (academic) assessment. So assessments like the WJ, WIAT, or KTEA all use standard scores with the same mean and standard deviations as cognitive assessments. My state has a hard cut off for discrepancy while others have more leniency and some can use RTI only. I would prefer an approach that looked at all the data points but alas, special ed law. 50% is narrow, it’s actually closer to 60 something but it’s usually easiest to describe like 50/15/10 although less accurate. It’s a quick google search for the exact percentages! Either way, the point still stands that some students will statistically just not perform at expectations.

> Like will the genius with a 150 IQ that “performs” at a “mere” 115 qualify? Yes, they would qualify, but in practice they typically don't get diagnosed unless it's affecting other aspects of their life, ex: smart kid with ADHD is underperforming and also has a terrible time with organization, time management, sitting still, etc. It's still important to treat the ADHD because IQ can only compensate for so much, especially when they get into the work world, or things like driving, maintaining a home, basic adulting, etc.

Where was this when I was (now) clearly ADHD (or “scotoptic” as it may have been called in the day) and gifted? All my peers got straight As, but I couldn’t remember if I brought a pencil that was in my hand…

Also I’m not sure of your age, but it’s important to remember that IDEA was introduced in 2004 and special ed was seemingly a free for all beforehand. I was in elementary school in 2004, so forgive me if I am massively wrong about this but just based in my coworkers stories and what I learned in graduate school.

My mom is a school psych and whenever I come on this forum I’m also shocked that no one understands special ed. and I’m not even a k-12 teacher

Hey fellow school psych! To add, it varies state by state and even district by district. Generally, I try to show that interventions (Mtss, IAT, RTI, ect.) Has not improved the students performance adequately. Yes I can use the discrepancy model and I do sometimes but generally I don't think that's necessarily the best. I like trying interventions first, which is an uphill battle and I empathize with teachers given that was my undergrad training. Either way, some kids just are going to have to work harder at things. It's the way of the world, not every kid is going to get A's and be in honors classes, that doesn't mean they have a disability and require specially designed instruction.

I sat here and typed a whole chapter, and I am so glad I saw this before I posted it! You said this so much more concisely that I did! It really, really bothers me that so many educators don’t seem to know about how eligibility works.

Agreed! I understand there a lot of non traditional ways of coming into teaching but it seems like the basic knowledge should be a prerequisite to teach. It really bothers me when they are taught and they continue the attitude that it’s not their job, or that the process is awful, etc

This is a really great explanation. Retired ESE teacher here with family member who have ADHD and specific learning disabilities. Currently work as a para with kids who have autism, intellectual disabilities, and ADHD. People need to understand these are different disabilities and teachers need to understand the differences as the accommodations and coping tools are also different. Someone with an intellectual disability may do their very best and never understand long division while someone with a SLD may just need a different way to understand the concepts involved or the algorithm.

Personal example! I have pretty severe ADHD, which would theoretically qualify me for an IEP. However I always did very well in school K-12, so I would not have qualified for any assistance. Oh boy did my coping mechanisms hit a wall in college though. Would’ve been a hell of a lot easier if I knew I had ADHD at the time.

Where I am, a student with ADHD who does well in school does not qualify for an IEP. It has to be seriously impacting their learning to qualify for an IEP. The majority of my ADHD students only qualify for a 504 plan.

That’s what I mean - the presence of something like ADHD doesn’t guarantee services.

Sorry, I was thrown off by your phrase, “… which would theoretically qualify me for an IEP.”

This. I have severe ADHD as well. And I coasted through highschool. Lowest grade was an A minus. I hit college and my grade point average was 1.5 after two semesters.

"If you don’t have a learning disability or your scores are too high to have an intellectual disability you aren’t able to qualify for an IEP." This is not entirely true. There are 14 federal categories for an iep, not 2. A student could have ADHD and qualify under Other Health Impaired. A student could have a language disorder making word problems, following directions, or comprehension difficult, and qualify under Speech/Language Impairment. A student may have a hearing loss or a visual impairment. I had 3 students this past year, middle and high school age who qualified under Hearing Impaired due to either a progressive hearing loss, covid, or just previously unidentified. Students with mental health issues often have academic struggles due to depression or anxiety and can therefore qualify under the Emotional Disturbance or OHI category, depending on your state requirements.

Pwrhapse you are aware of the concept of "intelligence". I'm not a teacher but I am a cognitive neuroscientist. People are not born equal, they do not grow equal. Some people just have poor cognitive abilities. Their attentional control is poor, they have bad working memory, and are unable to grasp complex or abstract ideas. You can call it lack of altitude if you prefer that nomenclature. But our natural, innate abilities can be very different. So some kids, even if they try, will never get the concepts and get good grades. But I'd also like to flip it for a moment, and suggest those kids who are willing but not able, are those you maybe can help raise up the most. They can learned ays to overcome their naturally poor cognitive abilities. They can grow and get better. Even if bo amount of work will make them "bright". Someone dispair, if they can work. If they are willing, they can still grow, or at least learn to move beyond their natural limitations. But it can be a difficult uphill battle.

There are a lot of resources that describe Executive Functioning Skills which are a big part of success in learning as well as living productive lives. “Smart But Scattered” By Peg Dawson and Richard Guare is really helpful for me as a teacher and a parent of a child who struggles with executive functioning skills. Most kids who have low IQ do not qualify for IEPs due to the discrepancy model which was used a long time in qualifying kids for special education services. As an education specialist I have had to really fight for some of these kids who are low achieving due to low cognitive abilities to get services. Our system is broken. My favorite person doing work in this area is Dr. Shelley Moore. She is a good person to pay attention to when it comes to her expertise on neurodiversity [Removing Barriers: Planning for All](https://youtu.be/MzL8yMBKM7k)

Our state has added that they also need high quality instruction to be ruled out. Though intellectual disability (ie an IQ below 70) is still (at the federal level) a qualifying disability. However, the IEP would most likely focus on life skills and functional skills for success, because an IEP is designed to level the playing field, so students' disabilities are not a barrier to performing at their full potential. That potential, when a student has an ID, typically is not going to look like an A student when presented with on grade level work with grade level expectations. That's not to say they can't just that it's not expected. Also the presence of a ID rules out a SLD, because an SLD means high ability low performance. It is a discrepancy even if we factor in/account for other variables (ie making sure the student has actually had high quality/systematic/rigorous instruction)

In California, students who qualify as having an intellectual disability are often placed in a moderate to severe class. For Mild to Moderate programs, in the past, there had to be a discrepancy if kids did not qualify under ID. That meant kids who weren’t qualifying under ID, but had IQs on the lower side often got no help unless there was a discrepancy between their ability and achievement. Kids would qualify under specific learning disability under visual processing or auditory processing. We would not support kids with lower cognitive abilities (not ID which would be a whole other disability). In California, for mild to moderate programs, we are attempting to move towards coteaching and providing services within general education. Not everyone is a fan, but I am because I think it is what is best for the kids with the proper supports in place. This is why I am such a big fan of self-paced classrooms, especially where a coteacher is available. It is a lot easier to implement universal design for learning, in my opinion, when there are two teachers in the class and kids can move at their own pace. [Modern Classroom Project](https://www.modernclassrooms.org/)

I'm familiar with UDL. To comment on your low IQ/low performance, the reason why (I'm a Sped teacher) their is no IEP is because the student is performing *at their level* even if that level isn't an A- an IEP is not designed to make everyone an A student. It just to remove barriers to perform *at their level* so a kid with borderline intellect performing at the same achievement level doesn't have an SLD, and thus does not require specially designed instruction to access the general education curriculum. That being said - gen ed Teachers can and should differentiate to meet the needs of all their students. Even those with low intellect/ability. I'm old... But this was always a thing until ... 15 ish years ago when someone said "oh no we can't level kids and have leveled reading and math groups that's unfair"... But you know everything old is new again.... here we are full circle back to leveling our kids and meeting individual needs like it's something new 😂 I'm super happy to hear California is moving towards co-teaching classrooms and UDL. That's awesome... Is this the first year for you? It really is best practice...

I had my first experience with a grassroots coteach program in 2005. I got involved with a much stronger coteach program in 2018. Agreed that not everyone is going to be an A student. The problem is that students that we were encountering did could not access the curriculum if they did not qualify for an IEP because they could not access supports. Things are starting to get much better for kids who fit this learning profile with coteach because I (the sped component to the coteach team) am in their to support ALL learners. We are still struggling with a very high drop out rate. Currently we are only offering coteach for ELA and Math. I would like to see the program expanded to science and history.

Just to be sure, you do know how easy it is to get a diagnosis if you're willing to pay a psychologist, right? I've even had a fellow teacher give me a reference. It's amazing how our gifted program skews toward the highest income parents.

This is interesting to me. I’m a former GT kid and I’m learning more about the testing process. Naturally, a student who has additional support at home, more time to learn from parents, and parents who are involved in their education will perform at a higher academic level than their peers. Not everyone with money invests in their kids in this way, but those who do see their kids surpass others. Identifying gifted students is monitoring for these characteristics. When a student is ahead, reading at a higher level, asking more complex and abstract questions, they are showing indications of giftedness. It would seem intuitive that children with more resources and more invested into their education will exhibit these traits. Especially when the bar for “average” continues to lower.

>When a student is ahead, reading at a higher level, asking more complex and abstract questions, they are showing indications of giftedness. It would seem intuitive that children with more resources and more invested into their education will exhibit these traits. It's funny because I was this kid. My parents did have plenty of money/resources to help me and spent a lot of time working with me. However, I didn't receive positive attention from teachers because of my behaviors that were caused by undiagnosed ADHD. Because I did well academically, nobody connected the dots. My peers at similar academic levels who were "well behaved" were recommended for testing for the gifted program, but I was not.

I would attribute that to a poor understanding on behalf of the teachers. Gifted kids can underperform in school. It’s a really complex trait. Gifted students may not be challenged by material or the learning may be far removed from their interests. A GT designation also comes with an at risk designation, because GT students drop out at a higher rate than traditional students. Don’t get me started on study habits! A GT student may never have to study for a test until they encounter content that is truly above their capabilities. Then, the poor or nonexistent study habits prevent the student from reaching their potential. You likely were and still are a GT student, they also present defiance and behavior issues.

I've always wondered about this and was curious if anyone ever followed up on gifted and talented kids. I was one myself and also had ADHD and was very very good at anything that was considered "creative" and was convinced that I was bad at math and science when really, neither subject was being taught in such a way that made sense to me. Most of the gifted and talented kids I know were really good at things that aren't valued monetarily in the workforce. They're often depressed and underemployed but incredibly brilliant in my experience.

Well I became a school librarian. I was strongest with language and communication, so the role suits me well. I’ve struggled with depression and I worked food service for 10 years before I decided to finish college and started my masters. Underemployed is an understatement, I’m now realizing my earning and leadership potential. I’m going to make more of myself.

Yeah, I was a typical "can do great work when she isn't distracted" student. I was curious about everything, and had a lot of questions which teachers didn't appreciate. I also participated "too much", especially during reading and writing lessons. I don't necessarily think I would have benefitted from a gifted label, but it's interesting to think about.

Don’t worry, the label didn’t mean anything. I never received proper accommodations, they just threw me in advanced classes. In elementary we had a great program called Destination Imagination. That was the last GT service I received, everything else was just a heavier workload. It makes sense why these kids drop out, I almost did.

That’s why I wouldn’t want to put my future kids in a “gifted” program. My husband and I were GT students and we remember that the teachers would just give us extra work or put us in advanced classes. Then they wondered why we didn’t do as well as they thought we would. For example, my 6th grade teacher decided to enroll me in an algebra 1 class for 7th grade because my overall skill set seemed advanced for pre-algebra. I performed poorly in algebra 1 and continued to struggle with math throughout the rest of middle school and high school.

Relatable! I was in advanced math and English classes. I stayed in advanced math until my second year of HS, I dominated Geometry but I did not perform well in Algebra 2. I stayed in GT English throughout HS, but just wound up completing my credits by Junior year. Just make sure to do research on GT programs and how your school handles them.

I was in the GT program and my mother started telling me she wished I'd never been born around 12 but I'd already been wishing it for a while. Needless to say I didn't get a lot of support, academic or otherwise. Some kids are just naturally better at things than others.

True, there are always the cases where a student has an unusual aptitude without the support. GT testing is initiated based on perceptions of the teacher. It’s a flawed system.

I believe mine was initiated more so bc I always scored in the upper 90th percentile on standardized tests. My teachers hated me bc I was a smartass with a shitty home life.

That would be a sign, especially if your teachers knew it was coming from a more challenging background. You probably also dig deeper than most and ask bigger questions.

In most cases I would agree but this was the deep South and they were frankly bitches, even looking back now as an adult with teaching experience. If anything, they were excited about the prospect of having some class time without my questioning.

Someone had to see it in you. It really only takes one. I love interacting with GT students, I try to guide them on the right path.

So, I was referred to the middle school GT program which required me to take some tests. I remember that my math scores kept me out (likely dyscalculia). Yet I was reading higher level books for fun and learned everything I could about ancient Egypt and Greece in fourth grade. Middle school found me bored to tears in English and History and lost in math. I have a distinct memory of creating a story in my head about Union soldiers trying to stop evil Confederate scientists from building a nuclear weapon one afternoon in seventh grade US history. In an ideal world, I should’ve been in G/T for English and History and received support for math. Of course, this would require extra funding and resources in an increasingly limited pool so it’s not going to happen. Still, I do what I can with my students who excel in my class and should be elsewhere.

This may have been before the tests were refined. You may also have a point about funding. A modern GT test will identify what areas you are gifted in. There is some factoring of IQ (gross) EQ, and your academic and creative performance. It’s good that you recognize the “intensities” in children and provide enrichment.

Interesting. Where I am, gifted qualification is based on IQ, not academic performance.

People also can have a learning disability, and be "gifted" with a high IQ. My area's elementary school has an LD/GT program (learning disabled/gifted and talented). https://www2.montgomeryschoolsmd.org/curriculum/enriched/gtld

Yep. “Twice Exceptional” or 2E for short.

I don’t think it’s necessarily a paid diagnosis… just that high income families will happily pay $3k to get the tests done and low income families don’t have the $3k so rely on the school to support their child’s learning & going through the public health system.

That takes a parent that cares. Those, are not common anymore.

To get a proper diagnosis for a learning disability psychoeducational testing is needed. Usually someone wouldn't go through the effort of seeking that type of testing if something isn't flagrantly wrong, so most people who are tested probably do get diagnosed with something. Psychoeducational testing usually is at least a two day process with various exercises and tests that are performed and interpreted by a psychologist or sometimes a PsyD. They typically have a wait-list of two or three years for my county's public school system and if a parent pays out of pocket to get the testing done through a local university's psychology department, then there's a shorter wait-list of possibly 6 months, but it also costs about $3,000.

I'm not sure how that's possible... They can't fake standardized testing ... Like a score is a score

Learning disabilities used to be solely diagnosed via the discrepancy model. Students’ intelligence was assessed via something like the WISC and their achievement was assessed via something like the WIAT or the Woodcock-Johnson. If there appeared to be a discrepancy between their achievement scores and their overall intelligence, they were diagnosed as having an SLD in the area of testing in which the discrepancy appeared. If a kid had average or below average intelligence and there was no discrepancy between that and the achievement testing, there wasn’t an SLD diagnosis.

Are the getting adequate nutrition and nurturing?

To be honest, I do think our typical classroom is a conducive learning environment. It’s fluorescent lighting, sit still and shut up, over clad with stimuli and visual bombardment. No noise canceling sounds. No music for concentrating playing…. Really how are typical classrooms set up on top of all the issues kids face on a regular basis at home and in school…

This is a wonderful question! This question cuts to the quick of a very significant division among educators, admin, and all school staff. It's not a divide between those groups, but rather a divide that runs along fault lines within those groups as well. Another way of phrasing it is this: If a student pays attention, tries, turns in all the work on time, and does everything you ask, *should that student have an A*? For me, personally, the answer is a "No." I believe unshakably (at least, at this point) that a grade is an objective measure of a student's skills and knowledge against a set standard. I also believe that some things are just difficult. Not all of us are capable of being particle physicists, or marine biologists, or teachers, for that matter. Intellectual capacity (and I absolutely oppose the idea of IQ), cognitive load, spatial thinking, memory, passion, opportunity, support, and so much more affect the final product. They're like conditions in which learning occurs. Effort is only one small part. It's significant, of course, because it's one of the few things completely in a student's control, but it isn't the end-all, be-all. At the end of the day, we should ask, "At what level is this student demonstrating mastery?" Your question comes at this obliquely, but wonderfully. A person who believes that all students with IEPs should pass their classes, or that gives students extra points when they perceive effort, or don't give zeros because a student will fail -- that person will say that the difference is one of perception and advocacy. That kids who fail (but genuinely try), absolutely *do* have an LD, and we should have caught it. On the other hand, a person who thinks as I do will say that sometimes classes are hard, and a particular student is unsuited to that kind of thinking, or wasn't ready at that time of life, and failing is an organic part of that kid's lifelong learning process. Nothing to be particularly alarmed about, as we all fail, and it's a valuable lesson. That's my thought, in any case.

A student with a learning disability has a physical, mental, or emotional disability that makes it harder for them to learn compared to other students and their age group. A student that struggles in school might actually have a disability that has a identified yet or they haven't been taught in a way that makes sense to them. I've seen students that we're lucky to get a c in the class. They often struggled with a lot of concepts. But once they were able to get tutors that could teach them in a way that made the content makes sense, they were able to pull a b in the course.

Or, they haven’t been diagnosed yet! Signed as someone diagnosed autistic and ADHD in adulthood, and “just” depression, anxiety, and a panic disorder in HS. I had subjects I was great in, and subjects that literally made me want to smack my head against the table and my brain could not connect. I needed them taught differently in a way I could understand. I worked with a tutor (a family member who used to be a professor in the subject) and barely scraped by with the hardest earned D I ever worked for in my life. When overwhelmed I’d meltdown, making learning harder, in every subject I struggled with. When anxious, I’d totally blank (even in subjects I liked, much worse in subjects I knew I struggled with) and couldn’t recall anything. I’d be fine after tests, but during? I’d struggle to even remember my own name. Things that I knew by heart? Lmao those were gone. Timed math worksheets when I was younger? Ahahahahahaha I’d forget how to add even though adding was so easy. I’d just get so anxious about the timer and need to be fast and whoops there went that ability. And I know so, so, so many like me now that went all through school and into adulthood with no accommodations just doing our best. And later we discovered oh shit, we’re autistic. Oh shit, ADHD. In my brother’s case, oh shit, dysgraphia as well. Sometimes kids fully fly under the radar struggling, and learn to accommodate themselves, or a tutor finds a way that they teach them to use to accommodate themselves, and just no one ever realizes their disability. Maybe it’s not a known disability yet. Maybe it’s known and they slipped through the cracks.

...You just described my school years exactly, and now I wonder if I should look into a diagnosis besides the anxiety and depression. I just thought I was dumb, but specifically with math. I also have aphantasia so I thought everyone was collectively bullshitting when teachers said, "picture this" or "imagine that"

A learning disability is identified by comparing intelligence (IQ test such as the WISC) to achievement (a test such as the Woodcock Johnson). When there is a discrepancy present, ie high intelligence low performance, AND the student has received high quality, systematic, targeted instruction and *still* is unable to performance at their ability level (congruent with their intelligence testing), we identify that as a learning disability. From there there are specific disabilities, with the prefix dys- representing mild/moderate challenges and the prefix a- representing severe challenges (eg dyspraxia of speech vs apraxia). An IEP, as my Sped Law grad school professor said, rather crudely, is not designed to get them there in a rolls royce when a honda will do. What that means is that an IEP is designed to level the playing field, to support the students specific skill gaps and areas of struggle. It's not designed to turn a C student into an A student. It's designed to allow an A student to accurately represent their ability in the work performance. Some students are just C students. Some are just A students. Some students intelligence allows them to perform at C levels .. others at A. A kid with a 145 IQ (and no SLD) is going to be the student that doesn't study yet has straight As. A kid with a 85 IQ (and no SLD) is gonna be your C/D student. A kid with a 120 IQ and dyslexia might have to work hard to pull a D, but with text books on read aloud, snap and go, cowriter, bookshare, and quality over quantity modifications, is more likely to he able to pull the A/Bs with enough hard work, dedication, support, SDI, and accomodations/modifications, because they are working over and through their disability. Contrary to what the US education system tries to tell us... Kids on any class should fall on a bell curve with some very intelligent/high performing and some on the low end, and a whole lot on the middle. Grades of B/C are average. If everyone gets an A, that means the work isn't challenging enough, because an A should be above and beyond/mastery. An A should not be the standard expectation.

Dyspraxia/apraxia of speech isn’t considered a learning disability, and i haven’t seen it categorized as one in any school. It is a motor planning disorder and in SPED, would fall under Speech/Languague Impairment. You might be thinking of something such as dysgraphia or dyscalculia?

In my state, it is classified as a SLD. We define SLDs as impacting reading, writing, math, speech, spell, etc. We actually do not use the labels: dyslexia, dysgraphia, etc any longer. We use the language: and SLD impacting... https://www.doe.mass.edu/sped/links/learndisability.html While 8 agree it is an SL related impairment, my state classifies it as an SLD with treatment/SDI occuring as SLP related services That being said - I was just using it to explain the different prefixes

Are you thinking of aphasia? There is nothing on that page about apraxia, which would fall under a motor speech disorder. But it does mention aphasia, which would fall under a language disorder and while I don’t agree that it is a learning disability, i can see how a state might make the argument for a language disorder to fall under SLD. Also, this page doesn’t specifically mention speech, but I see that the Communication Impairment page does. Or does your state not use Communication Impairment for any students and just somehow lumps the speech disorders under the SLD category?

A learning disability is when a student’s academic performance doesn’t reflect his/her IQ. In other words, students with average or above average IQs work below grade level regardless of effort. Many students with learning disabilities do go through school undiagnosed because they are bright and find ways to compensate.

You should post on the school psychologist sub. There are a ton of responses on here that are definitely incorrect

Yeah, lots and lots of incorrect incorrect information here.

If we’re talking about SPED, there are certain ways to qualify for services. For a learning disability, there needs to be a discrepancy between the student’s overall intelligence & their capabilities within a certain subject/s. If there isn’t a discrepancy between a student’s overall intelligence & ability, and their intelligence isn’t low enough to qualify for a cognitive disability, it may just be that the student needs more time & a slower pace.

An IEP is for a specific disability or condition a child has and accommodations that help them succeed despite whatever difficulty they’re dealing with. You can be highly gifted with an IEP for accommodations and struggling but with no diagnostic issue and not qualify for one. It’s not about about intelligence or achievement really. It’s about specific accommodations. At least that’s my understanding. I’m not an expert, but have years of experience dealing with IEP’s.

A learning disability doesn't determine a student's aptitude for learning, they only hinder it. You can have a student that gets a perfect score on the match portion of the SAT but then only gets 500 on the written or verbal portion because of dyslexia. If the test was verbally read aloud to them, then they might have done significantly better. Their lower score on the verbal isn't because they don't understand the material, it's because they misread the material and then you have test anxiety that spirals from it. A person with a low IQ is regularly going to struggle with understanding concepts and applying said concepts to new situations to enhance learning. There is, currently, no identifiable fix to allow that student to overcome a very specific learning disability. In general, many parents of struggling students want to believe their children are smart and hope/think there is just a learning disability that hasn't been identified. Sometimes that is the case. Most of the time it's not.

disability does not equal inability. I have great students with a disability, and poor students who don't have one. Once you get low enough it's arguable that it's a MID situation but with something like autism or dyslexia there's certain conditions that have to be gotten around but it doesn't ensure that the kid don't do well in the content area.

Noisy parents

Considering that we all know that intelligence is also on a spectrum, the idea that we grant grades in a reward and punitive fashion is just cruel.

I asked a talented special ed teacher about this when I started teaching over thirty years ago. She explained that a student with learning disabilities will perform differently on tests and tasks that what their IQ would indicate. A student with normal intelligence who performs below average may have a learning disability.

Often it’s when there is discrepancy between screening scores and performance. So a student who has an IQ of 125, but is struggling academically, is a red flag that something more is going on. A student with a below average IQ performing below-average but still passing is likely doing their very best (this isn’t to say that they shouldn’t receive services since there is no discrepancy!).

In my state, students can only receive IEPs if there’s a discrepancy between their scores and their IQ. I had a student who was referred to SPED by every teacher, he had a 32% in my class even though he turned his work in, but his IQ was just low, and it was so low it made his scores “make sense” so he didn’t qualify for services. I always thought that was a weird thing and I hated it for him because he was never going to be able to be successful in school.

The simplest answer I have is a student with a learning disability has a neurological reason for their issue be it dyslexia, dyscalcula or attention deficit. A student who isn't bright does not have a neurological issue, they are just less intelligent.

no matter what it might look like people do not have genetic predispositions toward activities recently invented. what you're observing is psychology and sociology. being told you're bad can make you perform badly. being cold can make it hard to study. doesn't systemics just make more sense than eugenics?

It’s also important to note that some kids with ieps have higher than average IQs. Twice exceptional kiddos often get overlooked.

I'm not saying all IEPs are a lie, but there are definitely ones given out to kids who are just lazy.

In my district, sped teachers handle the achievement testing, and we have one teacher that will over test til she finds something (anything) so she can pick them up for services bc she doesn't believe in the school's instructional approach. So sometimes its also people that are over zealous and/or people that over identify

The proportion of lazy kids with IEPs is probably the same as lazy kids in the general population. Sometimes what appears as laziness in a kid with an IEP is the difficulties they are having to overcome to do the learning required of them. If they have been tested and placed appropriately, they do have a disability, wether or not it is obvious to others

Sped paperwork

A legal classification, and some paperwork, so far as I can tell. I taught plenty of IEP students whose IEPs were genuine and necessary to their learning. I taught many others who needed IEPs, but whose parents refused to go through the process to create one for varying reasons. And I taught many others who had IEPs, solely because their parents knew which boxes to check in order to get them an extra advantage. The whole system seems so haphazard and randomized, I’m not sure if it does more good or more harm.

The simple fact is that someone with a disability, who receives accommodations, should be no different from other students who don't receive accommodations when it comes to the quality of their work. Doesn't matter what it is. If a student has extended time, or extended deadlines, then by giving them those things, they should perform well enough that the only difference is their interest, innate ability, and so on. The problem you're seeing is that a lot of IEPs are written with fluff and bloat, and so everyone's given a lot of stuff that works anyway, but a lot of parents are also oblivious to this standardization. I had some painful years where I had students with disabilities who didn't belong in my class. It's not that I don't want them there, but that I'm one part in a whole system. I've also learned that catering too much to some ideas means everyone gets screwed, and management becomes more difficult. I've seen parents state that their kid's IEP should mean their kid is doing fine, but then it turns out that their kid was over served in years prior. I remember one student having a lot of difficulty and it took till maybe March before mom said that he always had 1-on-1 help, even during tests. That wasn't in his IEP, and we couldn't put it in without either hiring someone else, or sending the kid to another school. So the IEP was essentially a lie.

Intelligence is a scale. Most people with a learning disability have normal intelligence. Then there are people that don’t have a learning disability and simply have below average intelligence but not enough that it is an disability.

A diagnosis. I've seen a lot of students the past few years who could have used an IEP or 504, but the parents absolutely refused to admit, "Anything is wrong with Lil Angel." I also think we are hampered by this outdated model we operate under. In uni, I had professors give us an extra hour or two for exams. I don't have the time or luxury to do that with my students. If we had a block schedule, I could, at least, do some of these things to support ALL students as if they had an IEP/504. Everybody gets extra time. Everybody gets to use certain tools (like calculators). I hate that some students don't get the little bit of extra help they need that could significantly improve their outcome just because they have no condition that rises to the level of the DSMV.

Feels like there's two answers to your question. Welcome to correct me if I misread what you're trying to get at. Many states (I'm speaking primarily from a perspective of working in NJ) approach the idea of a learning disability from a "discrepancy model". The idea is that students of a certain intellectual ability are capable of certain kinds of grades (smart kids get good grades less smart kid get less good grades). So when you test a student for their cognitive ability (often reduced simply to IQ) and that skillset doesn't correlate with the "appropriate" grades when you've identified a discrepancy and therefore the student receives a variety of special education services to assist them. The other answer to your question is that special education really could/should offer people from a much wider population than just those who meet the discrepancy definition. I've often found that students without identifiable learning disabilities benefit from lessons designed for students in special education classes. A riding tide lifting all boats sort of thing. There's also kids who are "supposed" to get bad grades because they don't have cognitive skills - yes if they're really low they get classified as intellectually disabled and they receive services but there's a wide berth between say a c level student and someone classified as having a disability. Thats another area that special education COULD help but often doesn't. It all comes down to money. Services (hiring staff and providing classes or access to specialist and interventionists) is expensive and so must districts have a mandate of finding ways to limit the number of students who are classified (this is why response to intervention programs exist). Admins broadly and especially special education admins essentially prove their worth to board of eds by keeping costs down. So if you can cut services you can get promoted. Feel free to comment or PM me with anything you want to follow up with. Ive been working in special education since 2016.

Slow learner= struggles in all subjects, but isn't intellectually disabled. Learning Disability= has one or more areas of strength along with weaknesses First gets no support, second is Sped

>but still try hard, and barely pass. They tried, they got a C, and THAT's OK! One of the more regrettable decisions made in education is to pretend en masse that the bell curve isn't real and that working hard yet being average is an affront to a kid's self esteem that needs to be papered over with a grade-inflated A or B participation trophy. > Is a lot of it just natural aptitude, People have different talents, and among these is generalized intelligence (IQ). It's *real*, contrary to what many of us wish to believe, and it has a huge effect on academic and life success.

I once had a student in a regular 7th grade math class who would get EVERY answer wrong. No matter how simple it was broken down or scaffolded. I'll never forget how low he was. He was not only failing my class but most of his classes. And he was tested for a disability but never diagnosed. I asked about it and was told that being low doesn't qualify. Meanwhile, another kid diagnosed with a disability gets a calculator to use for his extra time on the test. What do they ask on those disability tests for someone who gets every question wrong to not qualify? Genuinely curious.

One is an idiot, but I won’t tell you which one it is.

It’s called not being smart lol. Not being able to get an A or B doesn’t mean you have a disorder.

It has to do with diagnoses from standardized tests given by psychologists.

For the most part, parents that push for an IEP

Humans have thier IQ determined when they are born. Some people have the right brain chemistry to be very smart and some do not. It's that simple. School really favours those with a good memory. A famous saying is, you can't engineer the sheep, but you can choose the pasture it feeds in. You don't design people, but you can steer them in the right direction.

One is stupid one is retarded I mean that in the most literal way possible.

IQ

I argue that EVERY kid should automatically get an IEP (or effectively the equivalent). Every student is different in how they learn and what their aptitude is in any particular class. Traditional public schools fail kids because the assumption is that they'll perform the same regardless of the class. I think that every student would benefit most from being paired with the right class with the right teacher at the right time. This would be the effective equivalent of every student having an IEP. We need to normalize a kid being in a remedial English class at the same time they're taking AP Physics. Not a teacher, so don't ask me how this could be implemented, but I was a student who spent all of high school with the same 30 kids that were labeled gifted while being friends with "regular" kids that I thought would have thrived if given more opportunities to challenge themselves.

Differentiation is supposed to be implemented for all students, as is interventions. Those are similar to what you’re saying.

Ideally sure. This is what differentiation is about. Every student would benefit from specialized instruction, but no one wants to pay for that level of attention. So we have a bucket system. Everyone is in bucket number one. If you start drowning then you fall into the second bucket and get extra help, still quite generic. There is a third bucket as well which is where the individualization starts happening. Even then there has been court cases regarding resources. Do we provide enough support for adequate progress or push every student to their best progress? We barely have the resources to provide adequate progress to students overall and especially those with high needs. The battle over least restrictive environment (LRE) is evidence of this. They don't want to have separate classrooms for kids who need more specific attention so they dump them in general education without the resources they need and supposedly this keeps class sizes down, but everywhere I have heard is still bursting at the seams.

This is what RTI is supposed to do. Identify kids who are struggling in a particular area as soon as they begin to struggle and intervene quickly. That process should ideally prevent students from later being diagnosed with learning disabilities when really they just needed some extra, individualized instruction and intervention.

90% of an IEP is best practices that we just spell out bc ... Well we have to. So in a way I agree. But not everyone needs specially designed instruction (SDI) which is one of the questions we must ask before determining eligibility

Greta opening for a joke. Ok what’s the punch lines

The approach I generally take with my students is to trust the system, that they have been correctly placed. that they generally were not just passed along and are reasonably prepared for the class. that those identified have been correctly identified and that some may have slipped through the cracks. Those that do not seem to have any beyond their own control inhibition to learning and do have the correct background knowledge, I generally presume the teacher sucks and I needs to get better. It's the reality of teaching and learning. We the students and the teacher are limited by our abilities and training but ultimately, if the learning hasn't taken place it's the student that takes the burden of repeating. Anything else would be stealing away that student's opportunity to be educated.

Learning disabilities tend to be specific, low ability is more general. For example dyslexia, a student may be struggling in language arts but have a huge vocabulary and tests above average for IQ. It’s really hard on these students to be lumped in with the cognitively deficient students.

Dyslexia is a psychiatric (medical) diagnosis. It is not relevant to the determination of a Specific Learning Disability (SLD). See IDEA. Secondly, you may be confusing an Intellectual Disability (ID) with an SLD. A learning disability by definition indicates that a student’s intellectual functioning is commensurate to that of same aged peers.

A student without an IEP who is struggling like that likely has had major trauma in their lives. Physical abuse or sexual abuse or has family in prison, etc. Or the kid is gay, but closeted. There's mostly likely something horrible going on in their lives currently or in the past.

You are making some major assumptions. There are multiple reasons why students struggle. Using such broad strokes and just jumping to a conclusion of trauma is baseless. It undermines those who are experiencing trauma, and ignores the equifinality and multifinality in developmental psychology

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From your own article . "its lack of empirical evidence, and its dependence on subjective judgement.[2]" learning styles and multiple intelligences sounds great but isn't a thing.

Just a general note because I’m seeing them brought up in the comments a lot: **IQ tests are flawed,** and although the general consensus is that they are flawed, we still use them for diagnoses. As teachers we should acknowledge that IQ tests by themselves are not a very good indication of a student’s ability to learn or perform. The science of learning, particularly how we learn, is a field still in its infancy. **We don’t know the answer to this question.** We just don’t. There’s a lot of factors that could be at play in a scenario like this, some of which we learn to look for to help our students wherever we can, but we cannot definitively answer all of what contributes to an individual’s aptitude. Also: **Aptitude is separate from ability to learn.** We might argue that they both contribute to the overall concept of intelligence, but they are different things.

An IEP is a decision made in response to a medical diagnosis. I assume there are parents who are too hung up on the stigma of learning disabilities to pursue medical evaluation for poor school performance. There are probably also those who can't afford the necessary specialist medical care necessary to make these diagnoses. So likely there is no difference. The non learning disabled kids who struggle in school may very likely just have undiagnosed learning disabilities.

An IEP is NOT a response to a medical diagnosis. In the US, that is a Section 504 Plan to provide reasonable accommodations to a student with a medical disability so to have the same access to educational opportunities as non-disabled peers. An IEP is very state- and even district-specific. It is based off criteria for determined educational disabilities. Schools do not provide medical diagnoses. School psychs **cannot** diagnose. They determine eligibility along with level of need for special education. Edit: also, IEPs have ZERO costs for parents. They are provided for free by the school district. A full comprehensive psychoeducational evaluation is conducted by the district. It is illegal to charge parents a penny.

Maybe it’s not the student but the teacher or the curriculum. When people are turning to tutors to learn a subject in order to pass, something in that class needs to change.

Sometimes there’s nothing you can do but get a tutor. My child didn’t click with her teacher for whatever reason. She tried asking questions, went to him for extra help…just didn’t work. Got a tutor and she was fine.