Child with pdd-nos?

Question

Hello, my child has been diagnosed with pdd-nos. We knew something was wrong but did not know what. my sons name is Joshua and he is 6 years old.He has been in special ed since pre-school.he was evaluated at age 4 and they said he was speech delayed. When we sttended his iep meetings the special ed teachers would say he's on track and he is progressing .We felt like he needed more special ed support then what the school was recommending. We decided to have him tested outside of the school and with our own insurance and money.thats when he was diagnosed with pdd-nos.we did not tell the school until we had the diagnoses.now we are waiting for the full report to be mailed to us by the doctor.i guess my question is two parted. one how can the school allow a child to fall threw the cracks like this i am so up-set. And two does anyone know what pdd-nos is and where i can find some information about it.i am so lost as to how to raise and educate my child. i only want to do whats best.thanks

Answer 1

PDD is Pervasive Developmental Disorder. Schools do this all the time. They can eval academic performance levels. But the school psych is limited by his position of employment by the school as he is not allowed to diagnose any disorders. If he did the school would have to provide counselling, or whatever the child would require for tratment of the disorder. Once you get that report and do your research, call an IEP meeting. Take an advocate with you. Ask them to take notes on what is said so you have a record. Your state agencies should have services available to you. The links below should give some good info for you to get started.

Answer 2

One commonality with PDD-NOS children and other children on the the autism scale, except for Asperger's children, is a language delay. If your son has been labeled as "Speech Impaired," then he only qualifies for speech services and is not really in special education.

The first thing to do is to look at your IEP and see what label he has. It may also have a Language Impaired label to go along with the speech label. In this case, he really is in special education. LI is one of the labels used for placement in an autism class.

Please look at your private testing and see if there are low receptive and expressive language scores. With average scores being 80-110, look for scores that are lower than that. That is one way to qualify him for more services.

Special education services must have educational relevance in that they are only received if your child is doing poorly in school. That IS how kids who have language needs fall through the cracks, because they don't qualify for services.

My suggestion is that you ask to have academic testing be done to see how he is doing at the current time. Ask that these tests be done formally by the school psychologist. You may have to call an IEP to request this, but many times it can be done simple with a request for a more frequent re-evaluation form.

The reason to ask for formal testing is that it will yield standard scores that can be compared with his IQ scores from his psychological testing to see if there is a discrepancy between ability and achievement. Then you have a basis for asking for more services.

You may want to add a bit more information to your question such as the kind of services he is currently receiving and why you think he needs more services. Also, you could mention the kinds of services you think he needs. Then it will be easier to guide you down the correct path.

Answer 3

PDD-NOS is pervasive developmental delay-non specified and is considered to be part of the autistic spectrum, on the high functioning end.  Generally speaking children with PDD have similar issues to children with autism, often in the areas of communication and socialization, but not to the degree associated with children further up the spectrum.  Most of the time, they are on grade level and can do really well in traditional classrooms.

It is important for you to realize there is a huge difference from the testing you had done and what the schools do.  The schools are not testing to diagnosis, but to identify areas in which a child may need to recieve extra help or special services.  Many kids with formal diagnosis will still not qualify for extended services through special ed.  Services in the school are not given simply becuase of a diagnosis, but are based upon the child meeting certain criteria...generally delays of over 20% in one or more areas.  Even when those criteria are met, your child will only recieve services in the areas of the delays.  So, if your son is doing ok socially, is able to keep up with his work and has no discipline or behavior issues, he may not qualify for services in areas other than speech.  It is also imperative that you realize the school does not assign services based on a diagnosis from a private provider.  Having the testing done was a good idea, but the school does not and will not change your son's IEP or services based on this formalized diagnosis.  What will happen (and you will have to formally request it) is that the school will immediately re-evaluate your child to see if there are other areas that may need to be included in his IEP that were not there previously.  Again, there is no garuntee that your son may qualify for anything beyond what he currently has.  You don't mention what you feel is missing from his current IEP, so I can't really comment on if new testing and the addition of the formal diagnosis to his records will make these things happen.  All I can say is to get a copy of parent rights, reveiw the process and put it in motion.  Unfortunately, the whole thing does take time (the school will have 90 days from the day you sign permission for them to test to complete his new testing, and then so much time to write up any new IEP changes), but the sooner you get started, the sooner you'll have an idea of what you  may be facing.

As for information, there are dozens of sites dedicated to spectrum disorders and just as many specifically designed to educate about PDD.  My advice, as both a parent of a child with autism and as a parent advocate, is to start with sites affiliated with national awareness groups.  These sites will give you the basic facts on the disorder.  You can also check on these sites to see if there are any local or regional chapters of these groups in your area...an invaluable reference and great place to get support and information on the schools.

Answer 4

PDD-NOS is part of the autism spectrum. It is usually considered a milder form of autism because the child does not meet all the criteria for autism, but meets some of the criteria. However I often found many cases where the diagnostician just doesn't want to burden the family with an autism diagnosis and will use PDD-NOS instead. So without knowing your specific child it is hard to know what this really means for your situation.

Here is some generic information on the label

http://www.asaoakland.org/pdd_nos.htm

But remember a label is just that and doesn't speak to your individual child's needs. Regardless of your label the important part is to make sure your child's needs are addressed through the IEP. If you feel your child needs more service you need to be able to substantiate that by saying what specific needs or goals your child needs in order to make progress. The actual IEP is more important than the actual label. Remember also that the district's responsibility is only to help your child make progress. Where as your likely response is how to help your child catch up, be cured etc. This is not the school's legal responsibility and having exceptional outcomes for your child may involve having to take your child to private tutoring, speech, OT or social groups if you want optimum outcomes.

You are your child's best advocate. Educate yourself and come prepared to IEP meetings.

Here is a great website for advocacy and IEPs etc.

www.wrightslaw.com