Let’s Look At Scholarships.
Shane is sometimes ignored due to good behavior. Because Dylan’s issues are so RIGHT-IN-YOUR-FACE, it’s hard to know if Shane even has any issues.
But I’ve been paying attention, and Shane definitely has some issues.
Diagnosed with a vision processing disorder at age 6, and even after two years of treatment, Shane has developed a strong inability to spell. He not only can’t spell simple words, but he consistently misspells simple words – in different ways. Last year, he had trouble with vocabulary tests because in order to answer the questions, he had to copy the words from a list – and he still misspelled them.
His handwriting is also very difficult to read.
Last spring, we took him to the person who diagnosed his vision processing disorder and she said, He has dysgraphia. So I went into hyperdrive. With a diagnosis, we could finally meet with the school and get him some help!
It took months, but we finally had our meeting yesterday. The principal asked us to talk about Shane’s issues. The teacher brought in samples of his work, which were passed around the table. I talked and talked about Shane’s issues – how we were worried about his future, but that his current teacher seemed to be doing fine with his handwriting and spelling.
But once his work was passed around, we could tell that talking wasn’t going to do any good. The lady at the end of the table started reading his journal and couldn’t put it down. She even read parts of it aloud.
“His use of vocabulary is stunning,” she said. “Here’s the word extraordinary. And his sentence structure is amazing. He writes better than I do!”
Someone said, “You shouldn’t be looking at his spelling. You should be looking at college scholarships.”
That’s when I realized: Shane is too smart, too good of a writer, too good of a reader, and too good at math … to get any special treatment at all.
I did ask for the use of a word processor for longer assignments. I asked if he could use the hand-held spelling dictionaries. They said, “Sure! That would be fine.”
Then they tossed us out on our ears. We were there for a total of 20 minutes. There was no talk of a 504, an IEP, or even another meeting – unless something gets drastically worse.
Once again, Shane is on his own. Perhaps this is just how it was meant to be.