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Ask The Advocates: By The K 12 AdvocatesAction Plans To Meet Your Child's Learning Needs - A Parents GuideThey are the K 12 Advocates - a team of experienced special education professionals. Their names: Yael Cohen, Beverly Jones and Ailsa Wonnacott - and they have over sixty-five years of combined experience. Over this time they have developed a deep understanding of the educational system - the checks and balances that are required to make the system work in the best interest of your child.
The book begins with some testimonials from the parents who have used the services of the advocates in the past. It then goes on to provide you with a checklist of issues that you need to consider when choosing an advocate for your child. Following this, the book shows how to operate the educational system step by step - this includes time frames, deadlines, expectations and rights. The authors provide you with excellent guidelines of how to effectively spend your time when dealing with the authorities, in essence they help you pick your battles and be successful at the ones you do choose.
My favorite aspect of the book takes the form of a very informative question and answer session which deals with all the frequently asked questions that a concerned parent would want to know the answer to. The language is simplified to include definitions to acronyms and terms that are often uses in the special education setting. It also plays out possible scenarios parents may encounter in IEP (Individual Education Plan) meetings while giving solid advice on how to relate to teachers so that your child benefits the most.
There are also chapters dedicated to some very important topics such as the implementation of the IEP, autism, behavior, evaluation and much more. Probably the most pleasant surprise you’ll get when reading this book is that it is infact an easy read. Unlike many of the ‘special education’ based literature that I have come across, it is written with an average reader in mind and I applaud the authors for their simple approach. The K 12 Advocates, through this book make the language of “special ed” much easier to understand.
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