ADHD

How to Get Your Kids The Help They Need At School

How to Get Your Kids The Help They Need At School

When my youngest son, who’s now in fifth grade, was in first grade, we already saw the signs of a child with ADHD. He didn’t have hyperactivity or behavior issues sometimes associated with ADHD, but he couldn’t focus for shit.

We had parent-teacher conferences, I sent many unanswered emails to the teacher, and time after time, we found that she was lumping him in with all the other students, and completely overlooking the specific educational needs of my son.

I wasn’t asking her for an effing kidney. I just wanted her to consider for just one flipping minute that my son wasn’t learning the way she was teaching.

I have a very strong opinion on this, by the way.

Back By Popular Demand

Oh heeeyyy!  I realize it’s been a little longer than a minute since you last heard from me.  

I’ve been on a nine-month, unplanned hiatus during which I pretty much gave up my entire life in service of others (I’m disgustingly selfless), got my oldest son graduated and moved off to college, moved our family to a new home in a new town, planned a once-in-a-lifetime family vacation in celebration of The Graduate, and find myself now pale with dark under-eye circles, greasy meth hair, dressed like I lost a bet, and almost completely unraveled.  

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Back to School: How the 504 May Be Keeping Your Kid From Adulting

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Back to School: How the 504 May Be Keeping Your Kid From Adulting

Let me start by first saying that the title of this post is not meant to discourage you from putting a 504 Plan into place for your child. In fact, we have one in place for our son.

The purpose of this post is to help parents understand “the system” and become aware that these services exist.

But also to make sure you & your child understand what the Plan’s purpose is: to give them equal access to an education, and what its purpose is not: to give them less work or to get them out of certain classes or assignments. Although the accommodations might cut their work load down or allow them out of certain classes or assignments.

It can be confusing.

Kristan Braziel LeBaron.jpg

Kristan (Braziel) LeBaron is an author, writer, marketing professional, and the voice of the blog, Bring Mommy A Martini. Mom to two hilarious boys: one in college and the other in middle school, she writes “real mom” stories on life with anxiety & depression, and choosing happiness as a daily practice. She lives outside of Austin with her two sons and two lavishly kept dogs.

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