IEP... TAKE 3...

Sometimes it takes more than one meeting to get it right!  We had the big IEP meeting at the end of April.  Everything was going swimmingly until it wasn't.  We had the second IEP less than 2 weeks later.  Everything was going swimmingly until it wasn't.  We now have the third IEP set up for next Wednesday because the system drowned!  I hope we can resuscitate it because the bones are really good.  
James was thriving and succeeding independently but the life vest was a one sized fits all and it defeated him.  James requires very special attention to allow him to be independent.  A lot of that attention is ignoring what he is doing because it is the quickest, cleanest way to get it to stop.  James is so smart that he knows how to sabotage the best rescue efforts, (he is so like his daddy in this way!)!  That is one of his many superpowers!

The strange thing that has become very apparent to me through this situation is that sometimes the IEP is more hurtful than helpful.   In the past, I have always looked at the IEP as a tool that gave James power.  The power to succeed.  The power to be independent.  Unfortunately, I now have a more jaundiced view of it.  The IEP can also magnify the child to the point where those following it can't see that James is still a child not just a behavior, deficit or label.  He is looked at so closely that the main focus is lost.  The brilliance of the whole child is altered.  The deficits, labels, and behaviors become the child and if he happens to stray from the perfection dictated for on the page he is called out.  Not to say that the IEP isn't a very valuable tool, it is... but it is a tool.  It isn't the finished product.  The IEP tends not to look at the whole picture.  However, it is through the whole picture that beautyof the child is seen.