LD and Your Child: An Age-by-Age Guide

The Early Years

"Although my son walked at the appropriate age and reached other milestones at the right time, I felt that something was not quite right," says Yvette Moran, parent. "His social skills were lacking around other kids. We observed him carefully for a period of time and at age two and a half he was diagnosed with a learning disability." No one knows your child like you do. Trust your instincts and observations. If something "just seems wrong" and your child displays several of the following problems consistently, you might want to consider the existence of a learning disability.

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Learning to Listen, Auditory Processing Disorder in Children

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Temple Grandin, About Autism 

Friday, November 30, 2007

Truman State University

Baldwin Auditorium

Georgian Room

Kirksville, MO 63501

$95 Registration Fee (Lunch Included)

Contact Donna Brown for details and registration at 1-800-621-6082 or by email at donna.brown@dmh.mo.gov 

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Special Needs Planners / Academy of Special Needs Planners

Financial Planning Checklist for Parents of Children with Special Needs

For those raising a child with special needs, the daily needs of the child can overwhelm parents' ability to focus on their children's long-term financial security. To help manage this problem, Massachusetts Mutual and Easter Seals have released a 10-point set of guidelines to help parents of special needs children ensure their child's financial future. The question-and-answer checklist is intended to answer general long-term financial questions, as well as address issues parents may not be aware of, such as determining the financial needs of the child's guardians and notifying close friends and family of their estate plans.

The guidelines are intended to "lay the groundwork" for a secure financial future for children with special needs. For further information on planning the financial future of children with special needs, the checklist notes brochures and information resources that provide further information. These brochures may be ordered free of charge by contacting Massachusetts Mutual through their Web site.

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Funding Special Needs Trusts: How much is enough?

As a parent or guardian, you want to ensure that your child with special needs will remain financially secure even when you are no longer there to provide support. Given the significant, ongoing expenses involved in your child’s care and uncertainty about what needs may arise after you are gone or what public benefits may be available, determining how much a special needs trust (SNT) should hold is no small feat.

Fortunately, help in calculating your “special needs goal” is available from attorneys and financial planners with expertise in disability issues, as well as from special needs calculators, which are accessible free of charge on the Internet. Here are two such calculators:

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Special Needs Planning Guide

John W. Nadworny and Cynthia R. Haddad. The Special Needs Planning Guide: How to Prepare for Every Stage of Your Child’s Life. Baltimore, Maryland: Brookes Publishing, 2007. 336 pages. $29.95.

Parents and caregivers of special needs children face numerous challenges – financial, emotional and legal. How do you create a financially sound plan for your special needs child that takes into account future costs and supplemental needs? What are the key elements of any special needs trust? Can you create a special needs trust and maintain government benefits?

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18th annual KIDS COUNT Data Book

On July 25, 2007, the Annie E. Casey Foundation released the 18th annual KIDS COUNT Data Book, a national and state-by-state effort to track the status of children in the U.S. By providing policymakers and citizens with benchmarks of child well-being, KIDS COUNT seeks to enrich local, state, and national discussions concerning ways to secure better futures for all children. This year's essay examines the child welfare system and challenges the country to make lifelong connections for children and youth in foster care a national priority. The essay also focuses on the 726,000 children who spend time in foster care each year and what can be done to build and strengthen family relationships.

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Missouri's use of RTI to determine Learning Disabilities

July 26, 2007

Recently, there have been questions about whether a school district can use RtI for LD eligibility determinations when RTI is not used district-wide.

The U.S. Department of Education, Office of Special Education Programs

(OSEP) has confirmed for us, that despite language to the contrary in a technical assistance document, school districts can incrementally implement the use of the RtI process within the district. OSEP indicated that there would be updates/revisions to the document some time in the near future to reflect this. In the meantime, our state regulations already allow for use of incremental implementation as the regulations do not specify that there has to be district-wide implementation for RtI to be used in eligibility determinations of children with a specific learning disability

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TATRA

Secondary School Experiences of Students with Autism

The National Center for Special Education Research at the Institute of Education Sciences has released a new fact sheet on the National Longitudinal Transition Study-2 (NLTS2) entitled Facts From NLTS2: Secondary School Experiences of Students With Autism. This fact sheet provides a national picture of the secondary school experiences of students with autism using data from the NLTS2. This study has a nationally representative sample of more than 11,000 students with disabilities. Approximately 1,000 youth with autism are included in the sample. The fact sheet provides information on such topics as the courses taken, instructional settings, the nature of the curriculum and instruction, teacher perceptions, and the types of accommodations and supports provided for students with autism. To view, download, and print the full report as a PDF file, please visit http://ies.ed.gov/ncser/pubs/

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Mental Health Resources

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Community Living Resources From the Community Exchange Collaborative

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