1st Staffing Meeting & New Diagnoses

I was expecting two more evaluations - one with the occupational therapist (OT) and another with the physical therapist (PT) - prior to the staffing meeting at the preschool. The OT and PT said that they had enough information from the progress notes from the Early Intervention program and my notes in the Developmental Achievement Chart, which I had prepared and updated. So they didn't see a need to put Matthew through more evaluations. That was nice.

The staffing meeting was held on September 29 with the program coordinator, the school psychologist and speech-language diagnostician. The purpose of the staffing meeting was to go over the results of the evaluations that Matthew did have and from there, determine what services he qualified for and how he qualified. It took a little over an hour to go through everything.

He scored the highest in the Social-Emotional subtest of the DAYC (Developmental Assessment of Young Children). His second highest score was in the Cognitive subtest of the DAYC. Based on the scores in those two areas, he didn't qualify for services. Hearing that he didn't qualify for services actually made me happy. It was reassuring to me that he was doing well, according to a standardized test.

Diagnosis: Speech Impaired - Sound System Disorder
His lowest scores were in the areas of speech and language. Based on the results of the speech and language evaluation, he was given a secondary diagnosis of "Speech Impaired - Sound System Disorder." It means a communication disorder that includes articulation and/or phonology errors. He drops consonants in his speech, drops syllables, has age appropriate letter/speech substitutions as well as irregular substitutions.

Diagnosis: Young Child with a Developmental Delay
Matthew was determined to be a "Young Child with a Developmental Delay" based on the prior evaluations and interviews with me. He qualified for services because of delays in speech, language and Adaptive Behavior (self-help skills).

He also qualified for occupational therapy and physical therapy.

Related posts:
Speech and Language Evaluation for Preschool
1st Screening for Preschool
Initial IEP Experience and Goals