Once the IEP team decides that there is concern your child may have a disability, the team will come up with a plan to assess your child’s strengths and needs. The assessments that the team chooses will be specific to the concerns about your child, but there are many parts of the evaluation that are similar for most children.
Usually your school psychologist and special educator will observe your child in their classroom. This helps identify potential problems and strategies to help them or can help to confirm a child is working hard within the classroom. They will also get information about your child from you and your child’s teachers, as well as review their school history. The knowledge you have to share about your child’s history is a great help in the evaluation process.
Your child will meet with your building’s special educator to take an assessment that tests his or her reading, writing, and/or math skills. This assessment uses statistics to compare your child’s performance to the scores children from across the country have gotten. All children learn at a slightly different rate and these tests have been designed to find the level of skills a child the same age as yours typically has. A comparison would be if a whole classroom of children ran a mile in gym class, the students would finish at different times, but most of the students would finish within a couple of minutes of each other, and some children would finish with a much faster or slower time. We know that most likely the kids in the “main pack” of runners are performing at the level we should expect. These tests help us to figure out if your child is in the “main pack” of learners or if we should have more significant concerns about their learning.
Your child will also meet with your school psychologist. In most cases your school psychologist will use a cognitive assessment to gain information about your child’s learning strengths and needs. This is the same kind of assessment that compares your child’s performance to lots of other children of the same age. These assessments help us to figure out if your child is likely to be doing well in school or if you child may need more significant supports. They help us to identify suggestions for your children’s teachers to better support your child. Depending on the concerns that the IEP team had about your child, other assessments may also be given. Examples would be tests that look at your child’s memory skills, ability to process sounds needed for reading, or screening for visual motor concerns.
If there were concerns about your child’s behavior, mental health, or attention difficulties, your school psychologist will most likely hand out rating scales to get information from you, your child’s teachers, and if they are old enough, your child about how your child’s behaviors are perceived. These rating scales are helpful for identifying concerns related to Attention Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder, mood difficulties, anxiety, Autism, or other behavior concerns.
Sometimes, other professionals, such as a Speech and Language Pathologist, Physical Therapist, or Occupational Therapist may also assess your child using tests related to language and motor development.
These assessments take place within your child’s regular school day. When the staff have finished their evaluations, you will receive copies of the reports and a meeting will be scheduled to talk about the results and decide if you child will be eligible for Special Education services. This process can take no longer than 60 days if your child does not have Special Education services or 90 days if your child is already receiving services and your team is evaluating to find further information to help your child.