When to Talk to My Child's Teacher about Speech and Language Concerns.

*The purpose of this post is to clarify the process and timelines for requesting a speech evaluation to your child beginning speech therapy in the school setting.

If you have a school-aged child and you have questions about their speech or other aspects of their language, you should absolutely bring it up to your child's teacher.

School has just kicked off or is about to kick off for many of you and you may be thinking that you want to let things get into the groove and don't want to be "that parent" already bringing up concerns to your child's teacher about their speech. I have an alternative to consider. If this process is new to you, you may not anticipate the timelines you are about to encounter.

Let me walk you through how this process generally works:

A Parent (or educator) can request that an evaluation be completed. That evaluation must be completed within "a reasonable amount of time" which can vary depending on your state. Here in Chicago, the evaluation team has 60-days to complete their respective evaluations and have a meeting to discuss results and make a plan.

That is 2-months already gone just to complete the testing process and write up the evaluation results. Sometimes, an IEP (Individualized Education Plan) will also be drafted (if it looks like things are going that direction). Depending on your district, discussing evaluation results might be a separate meeting from your child's new IEP. (Translate to: more time going by without your child getting services).

If your concerns are only speech related, the results of the evaluation would determine:

1. If your child has a speech and language disability that 2. Impacts their ability to access the general education curriculum and therefore requires speech services.

I'm speaking specifically to speech/language but here in the US, for a child to receive special education services (commonly referred to as SPED) they have to qualify under one of 13 disabilities. Understood.org provides a nice briefing on what each of those areas are if you are curious.

The purpose of the evaluations are to determine if a child qualifies for special education and/or related services. Speech Therapy (ST) is considered a related service (as are Occupational Therapy (OT) and Physical Therapy (PT)).

Basically, even if you mention your concerns to the teacher on the first day of school (unlikely), a meeting is called, an evaluation takes place, and services are determined... the first quarter of school is already nearly over before any therapy has taken place.

If you decide to wait to mention your concerns until after the winter break (presumably to see how your child is doing), your child might not have regular services til March or April. In the district I live in, kids are out of school prior to Memorial day, so that is basically a whole year of missed speech therapy opportunities!

Armed with that knowledge, if you have concerns regarding your school-aged child's speech and/or language, make a goal to talk to your child's teacher either via email or in person sooner rather than later.

This information is meant to be informative and in no way intended to provide legal advice. Check your local school district for specific laws and timelines.

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