Individual Education Plans enable administrators and local educators to work through issues with parents of their special education students. In accordance with the nation's IDEA law, a so-called IEP generally includes goals, services available, set hours for interactions with general education students and other daily school issues. As a parent, you might not have planned to do anything before your own first IEP meeting; however, try these tasks.
Talking with Your Child
Your child can be invaluable to any preparation you do for the meeting. Because they're attending school, they can let you know how successful some teaching methods are and how ineffective other school activities are. For instance, if your child doesn't seem to be warming up to an aide or seems to be struggling with a particular subject, you'll know what to mention when the IEP event happens. Mention the yearly meeting throughout the school year; they might be willing to start looking for issues for you to discuss.
You can feel proud of how quickly your child is understanding various topics and concepts. You might already be working with speech therapists or healthcare providers who agree that your child can progress beyond their current educational situation. IEP meetings are the best time to mention any advancements and achievements happening outside of school. It's vital that you bring letters from professionals which will back up what you're saying, especially if you'd like particular changes to be made to the way your child's days will go.
Get Parental Support
If you've never interacted with other special education parents, start. Ask for support groups and look at your school's social media pages and special education online forums to hook up with other parents. Their ideas, suggestions, and supportive comments can make your own prep and meeting performance even more beneficial for your child.
Whether the meeting seems to be smoothly proceeding or not, notes are important. No one's memory is flawless; you need a way to record what's being discussed. If everyone agrees to a certain change but it never happens, your notes will be proof. If you meet resistance about certain methods or ideas, notes can be delivered to legal professionals for study and further action can be decided on. You could also just want to refer back to some pointers or tasks to keep your own actions on track regarding your child's day to day education.
Your work in the activities above enables a better meeting with favorable, satisfactory outcomes for all. For support, retaining a lawyer with solid special education experience is recommended.