1. Will the schools accept the report I write up after the assessment?
You will learn in this course how to explain the report to the parents so that they can explain it to the teacher, thus leading to better outcomes for the student.
Most neuropsychs don’t even know how to explain dyslexia to a parent, and many parents don’t even know they should be giving that report to the school.
If you want a student to be supported by getting good intervention on an IEP, this report can definitely be used as a tool to help the evaluating team of educators who are making decisions about if a student is eligible to receive services on an IEP. But the school can not automatically put a student on an IEP just because there is a diagnosis of dyslexia, whether that comes from you as an educator or from a neuropsych.
2. After the course is done and I test a student, can I call it a DIAGNOSIS?
This is NOT psychological testing. You are not a psychologist and I will not be teaching you how to assess using cognitive psychological tests.
You are educators and I am an educator who was trained in using educational assessments and I will train you to use educational assessments.
As long as you have a background already in educating individuals with dyslexia, you go through extensive training in this course, and you follow all of the steps I will teach you to do a COMPREHENSIVE evaluation, and the analysis of the results shows dyslexia, you can most definitely confirm that this is an “EDUCATIONAL DIAGNOSIS” of dyslexia.
You will be learning how to rule out other conditions, look at family history, analyze school records, previous testing reports, etc. and NOT just giving a few tests. Just giving a few tests to a student would not be an accurate or ethical way of giving a confirmed diagnosis of dyslexia.
There are NO current LAWS around who or what constitutes a diagnosis of dyslexia. The International Dyslexia Association (IDA) says this:
“Educational testing can verify the presence of SLD or dyslexia and can provide the needed diagnostic documentation that is required for eligibility for specially designed instruction and accommodations throughout the educational career from elementary school through college and graduate school”...
and “Cognitive or intelligence testing is not required as part of the SLD identification process”…and
“Assessment of dyslexia involves individual testing, most often provided by a team of qualified professionals who have had extensive clinical training in assessment as part of a graduate degree program. Professional clinicians who assess Specific Learning Disabilities (SLD) and dyslexia may have M.A., M.S., M.ED., Ed.D., or Ph.D. degrees in Education, Reading, Speech Language Pathology, School Psychology, Psychology, or Neuropsychology” THIS is what I bring to the table and will guide and teach you how to do. I have the training from professionals in the field of dyslexia, along with extensive training as part of my graduate degree program in both education and in reading intervention.
Watch the video below or CLICK HERE for additional information about the term "diagnosis."
3. I’m a tutor who is always full with no openings. Is this still a good business move for me, even if I have to refer the students I test to other tutors?
Yes! You will get your name out to so many more people by doing assessments! The schools will know your name because of the reports going into the schools, and you will meet so many more families in the community, so that if you do have the occasional opening, you will fill that immediately with a new student.
4. I don’t have an official business yet. Could I start with this and then add tutoring later?
Sure! This would be a great way to kick off a new business. If you’re just starting out, this is an excellent opportunity to get your name out there to schools and then the teachers can send families your way who have a child who is struggling. Then you can decide later if you want to tutor those same students you assessed or refer them to another tutor in town.
5. I don’t have an education degree, but I have been tutoring dyslexic students for over 10 years. Am I qualified to assess?
That’s the whole point of this class! I have extensive experience and training from attending assessment courses from dyslexia experts as well as the training that was part of my graduate degree in education and reading intervention, and I will be training you!
We will NOT be allowing just anyone into this course. We want educators who already have good knowledge of dyslexia and are already aligned with the current research and best practices in this field. You will have to take a short questionnaire assessment before being accepted into this course.
6. Can I test students over Zoom?
You technically can, and we did in 2020 (during the COVID-19 pandemic), but it is recommended that you assess in person. It is really important that you be able to hear your student extremely well so that you can detect if they are making errors in language at the sound level (like saying /m/ instead of /n/ and that is difficult to do over the internet.
7. Why would parents choose doing this type of assessment instead of just doing a neuropsych assessment leading to a medical diagnosis?
There are many times when you WILL refer a family to a neuropsych and we will teach you when you SHOULD do this.
Families will often want to use a neuropsych, speech pathologist or other medical professional because they can use insurance benefits.
But there are some times when they don’t want to use a neuropsych: when they don’t want to wait 6-12 months on a waiting list, when their insurance doesn’t cover the costs and the fees are $3000-$4000, when they want someone (YOU!) who has extensive knowledge and training specifically in dyslexia, and many other reasons that we will explore inside the course
Below are links to several short videos that you can access on Facebook:
You can also click the video below for more detailed information about schools accepting the testing report.