Can Someone Tell Me Why This Chicken Soup for the Educator’s Soul Keeps Burning My Tongue?
My last week of school was this week. I had lofty goals of meeting with each of my caseload of counselees and processing the end of our work together. I have about 10 students I work with weekly at my school site, and each one has made strides in their therapeutic goals. They have reflected […]
Auditory Processing (Psychoeductional, Part V)
This next post in the series on Psychoeducational Assessments (Background History, Testing Observations, Intelligence/Cognition, and Visual-Motor Integration,) has been extraordinarily daunting for a number of reasons: 1) I have a hojillion actual psychoeducational assessments to complete before my darlings all leave school for the summer.* 2) Every single area of “processing” is so much more […]
Under the Microscope
While waiting at the airport the other day, I overheard a mother saying solemnly to her friend, “Dillon is such a picky eater. AND he doesn’t like the tags in his clothing. I hope he’s not autistic.” Friend said, “You should have him evaluated.” I looked over at young Dillon, probably age 3, and he […]
Visual-Motor Integration (Psychoeducational Part IV)
So far, this series has addressed the following components of a Psychoeducational assessment: 1) Background History2) Testing Observations3) Intelligence/Cognition In this post, the psychological process of “Visual-Motor Integration” will be addressed. Loosely defined, visual-motor integration is eye-hand coordination, and is required for tasks such as writing and copying material, handwriting/cursive, pencil-paper tasks, copying from the […]
Psychoeducational, not Psycho-Educational—Part III
This post could be an entire blog, book, or career. I will try to do it justice. The cognitive/intelligence portion of the pychoeducational assessment is the keystone to determining whether or not a student has a learning disability, understanding the potential for learning, and/or knowing how the student learns best.* First, lets start with some […]
Psychoeducational, Not Psycho-educational—Part II
I started a series on psychoeducational assessment to help clarify the information in school psychologists’ highly specialized reports that are presented when students are tested for special education. In Part I, the importance of the background information section was detailed. Enjoy. It is so tempting to jump ahead to the good stuff, like the cognitive […]
Games Pirates Play
One time, I went on a blind date with a pirate. Ha! Bet you didn’t see that coming from a blog about education. It’s true. He had just returned from a month long trip on the “Black Pearl” down the coast of California, all in the name of 5th grade science instruction. He had dressed […]
Psychoeducational, Not Psycho-Educational
Okay, it’s really the same thing, but when you hand a report to a parent, it’s unsettling to see the word “Psycho” in isolation like that. If I had a nickel for every time I have typed the word “Psychoeducational,” I would have not that much money because a nickel isn’t really that much. But, […]
Free the Kids!
I wrote a while ago about the overprotection of children. Turns out, this is a hot topic. You simply must read this article called Why I Let My 9-year old Ride the Subway Alone. My reaction is mixed. I try not to subscribe to the culture of fear, but it is all around and so […]
Color Me Badd
Don’t fret. This isn’t a post about the 1990s R&B group that infused mild rapping into their vocal styling that was so “bad” it had to add an extra “d.” It’s about graffiti. As some readers who have been with me a while may recall, my introduction to one of my middle schools involved some […]
