Please wait for the host to start this meeting.
I’d stared at this familiar screen command while sitting in my tiny home office, built-in white bookshelves on both sides of me, then looked out the window above my desk. It was early spring, and the grass had started to turn from brown to green, our pond was flowing, a couple of robins fluttered around a cluster of pine trees. Micah’s school IEP (Individual Education Program) meeting had always been during this time of year. Last April, during the early months of the pandemic, Todd and I Zoomed from his home office. This year Todd had to be at work, so I was attending alone.
The IEP meeting was introduced to us nine years ago, a few months before Micah began kindergarten. We sat at a rectangular table in the small, carpeted school library at his special education preschool. As part of Micah’s IEP team, along with his special education teacher, kindergarten teacher, three therapists, principal, and the school psychologist, we worked out a plan that would give Micah the best shot at success in the upcoming school year. We discussed what kind of accommodations he would need, how many hours of therapy he would get, how much time he would be in the mainstream classroom, what goals would be set for him. Micah had wandered aimlessly around the room, showing no interest in the many books on the shelves. I felt sad watching him. He’d only been talking for about a year, had been toilet trained less than six months. Would he make progress in school? Was he capable of learning?
As this year’s meeting began, I settled into my comfy desk chair and enjoyed hearing the heartwarming and humorous “Micah stories” shared by a few of the team members. I felt proud as a painting he’d worked on in art class was held up to the screen. His teacher read a couple paragraph’s he’d written. Then came time to discuss his progress over the last six months. I was expecting to hear what I’d heard every year since our special education journey had started–that Micah had shown improvement. Instead, what his teacher told me was that he’d regressed in both reading and math. He’d gone from a third-grade level down to a second-grade. My heart sunk. How could this be? Last fall, we’d chosen in-person learning for Micah over hybrid, an option all kids with special needs had in our district. He hadn’t missed school other than a few vacation days. Why had he fallen behind? His teacher gently explained that, “Sometimes kids just plateau.”
How were we going to fix this? Maybe get a tutor for Micah over the summer? There was a business in town that helped kids who struggled in math. Would they work with a child on the autism spectrum? I blamed myself. We hadn’t been reading like we had been in other years. The math pages I’d compiled just sat in a cupboard; I’d given up after too many unpleasant sessions trying to help Micah with a subject he clearly hated.
“You’re focusing on the wrong thing,” Todd said to me later that evening. “Look how far he’s come for a little boy who didn’t talk until age four?” He reminded me of Micah’s strong interest in theater. He’d been in every school play since he was in fourth grade. Last year, in “Elf JR The Musical,” he’d expressively and flawlessly delivered six lines and had (after much practice at home) danced alongside the other cast members. For three years he’d been mainstreamed into choir at our request because of his love for music and singing. And he’d thrived.
I’d lost sight of all of this while sitting in that IEP meeting; I’d taken for granted these wonderful gains I’d never dreamed possible nine years ago when I sadly watched Micah wander around that little library.