When it stays hard

At the front of each volume of the Guide, When arithmetic is hard for her says what to change when a sitting stalls, and when to ask for help. This page holds its part on asking for help, with the addresses a printed book cannot keep up to date.

From the Guide

When it stays hard. If you are worried, ask; you do not need to wait. Ask sooner rather than later if, after patient work at her own pace, she still:

• cannot say which of two small numbers is bigger without counting both;
• counts every small sum from one, months after the sittings that taught counting on;
• loses her place in a calculation she could do last week, or changes methods partway through;
• can do a step with the objects but, again and again, cannot use it in a story.

Each of these is ordinary for a while. What matters is that it lasts. Talk to her teacher, her doctor or your public school district, and let her doctor check her eyes and ears. In the United States, any parent can ask the public school district to evaluate a child, at no cost to the family. Ask in writing, and keep a copy. The district where you live is usually responsible even when you teach her at home, and each state has a parent center, listed at witheveryreason.org, that can tell you how to ask. Outside the United States, ask her school or her doctor how an evaluation is arranged. A specialist can look closely at how she works and suggest what will help. This book cannot do that, and it does not replace a trained tutor or a school’s extra help. Bring her notebook and the Heard map, because they show what was taught, what she has said and where she stalled. If a specialist works with her, show them this Guide and ask how its sittings can fit their plan. Where someone who has assessed her advises something this book does not do, such as timed practice or a reward chart, follow their advice for her. This book’s rules are for this book.

Each state’s parent center

Parent centers work with the families of children and young people with disabilities, from birth to 26. Yours can tell you how to ask your school district for an evaluation, and what happens after it. The Center for Parent Information and Resources lists nearly 100 of them, the Parent Training and Information Centers and the Community Parent Resource Centers, by state and territory.

Find your parent center (parentcenterhub.org)

If you teach your child at home

The school district where the child lives is generally the one that finds and evaluates a child taught at home. Whether the child then counts as a private-school child or a public-school child, for the help that follows, depends on your state’s law. The U.S. Department of Education answers these questions in Questions and Answers on Serving Children with Disabilities Placed by Their Parents in Private Schools (revised February 2022), questions I-1 to I-3. Ask the district in writing, and keep a copy.

Outside the United States

Ask your child’s school or doctor how an evaluation is arranged where you live.