I remember one young girl who came to me in tears one day because she did not know how to create her family tree, as her father was not in her life at all. Her mother had remarried but she also did not consider her new father’s family as her own yet.

I told her to talk with her mother about it that night and to do the best she could with the project, that she would come up with something. Basically, I told her to deal with it.

I didn’t do anything to help her or console her. What I did was tell her to figure it out on her own.

Major FAIL

A few years later while we were in the process of adopting I realized exactly what needed to be done…the entire project needed to be revamped because we obviously were not helping kids who had non-traditional families. Why it took my life situation to realize this I don’t know….but it did.

So, I approached a few of the teachers still using this writing project and asked them to incorporate some alternative family trees. They had the same approach I used to have…the kids will figure it out if they need to.

As teachers it is not our job to  make the kids figure it out on their own but to be a guide and give them options.

Here are some that you, as parents, can give to your child’s teacher at the beginning of the school year. Alternative families are now the norm and assignments need to be reflective of that.

There is also a great listing of how to search for your adoption family history (family tree) at Cyndi’s List-Adoption and About.com-Adoption Resources

• Adoption Clubhouse offers 4 options in kid-friendly language.
• Adoption Competent School Assignments talks about the bias and the correct way to do particular assignments.
• Teachers Guide to Adoption-I love this one because it provides information for teachers on the many alternate ways that families come together…foster, adoption, same sex, etc.
• The Russia Adoption Blog on Adoptionblogs.com has a 4-part series on Family Trees titled: Family tree assignments: what’s the big deal? part 1. This one is certainly worth a read.
• Creating Family Trees for Adoptive Families- Creating hearts, leaves, and caring trees as alternatives
• Circle of Caring- Who Cares about You?
• Adoption and the Schools, by Nancy Ng and Lansing Wood, a guide to help parents and teachers anticipate problematic assignments, communicate effectively, and support learning. Read our review at www.adoptivefamilies.com/books.php.
• Adoptive Families Together, site of a Massachusetts-based support organization that offers family tree­style templates in down-loadable PDF format (go to AFT’s site and scroll down to “Alternatives to the Traditional Family Tree Assignments”).
• Are Those Kids Yours? by Cheri Register (Free Press, 1990), covers a range of international-adoption family issues, and includes the Family Peony Bush.
• Lucy’s Family Tree, by Karen Halvorsen Schreck (Harpswell Press, 2003). Read our review and/or purchase at www.adoptivefamilies.com/books.php.

Unfortunately, not one of those teachers used my examples or the resources I gave them and I would be remiss if I didn’t say how disappointed I was in them.

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Individual Education Plans can be VERY confusing for parents AND teachers and most parents are anxious, confused, and feel inadequate when they go into an IEP. I am a former teacher and am now in the role of a parent. I never thought that I would be the parent of a special needs child nor would I be having to fight for what he needs but that is exactly what I do every year for him.

I don’t like the word, “fight,” but last year as we were going into our IEP I felt like that is exactly what I was doing. I did not feel like AJ’s needs were adequately met during his preschool year so I wanted to ensure that his IEP stated exactly what needed to be done the next yeat.

I am actually in a unique situation in that I AM a former teacher and I do understand the educational jargon. I understand how to evaluate student’s progress, I understand diagnoses, I understand testing, and I understand the process it takes to get to where the staff sits. What they don’t know is that I have the utmost respect for them because of the hard work they put into their jobs and into just one IEP.

What should an IEP do?
An IEP should be adequate, sufficient, subjective, and measurable.

What needs to be included:
Present Levels of Performance
Measurable Annual Goals, including Benchmarks or Short Term Objectives
Educational Progress
A statement of –

(i) How the child’s progress toward the annual goals will be measured; and
(ii) How the child’s parents will be regularly informed (by such means as periodic report cards), at least as often as parents are informed of their nondisabled children’s progress of –
(A) their child’s progress toward the annual goals; and
(B) The extent to which that progress is sufficient to enable the child to achieve the goals by the end of the year.”

Wrightslaw specifically states in the article, Smart IEPs that good IEPs are specific, are measurable, use action words, realistic and relevant goals, and are time-limited. SMART.

Specific goals target areas of academic achievement, performance, and behavior. Measurable goals mean that you can observe behavior or count/test the skill. Action words can be categorized into the following:

(a) direction of behavior (increase, decrease, maintain, etc.)
(b) area of need (i.e., reading, writing, social skills, transition, communication, etc.)
(c) level of attainment (i.e., to age level, without assistance, etc.)

SMART IEPs use action words like: “The child will be able to . . .”

Realistic IEPs set goals that the child can obtain and time-limited means that the child can obtain the goal within a specific amount of time.

I highly suggest that anyone heading into an IEP head to this site (I briefly summarized it here) and print the entire page to review before heading into your IEP.

Take the print-out with you and verify that everything is covered. Additionally, print out the checklists at the bottom of the page so that everything is covered, as many times teachers and staff will rush through IEP’s because they have several to get through in a day. Often times they also assume that you know what is going on (because they do) and will skip over things or will assume that you will agree.

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Borya and the Burps: An Eastern European Adoption Story, in my opinion, is one of the first children’s books to (almost) accurately portray an Eastern European adoption.

There are adoption advocates out there who will say that children may be frightened by Borya’s perspective of the orphanage and what is going on around him but those things are very real to a child.

For example, Borya wonders where the other baby went and if he will be all right (Borya’s tummy hurt all night.During times of high stress AJ has tummy issues still. ), Boyra is frightened his new Daddy will give him a shot like the other male who does in the orphanage (AJ loved males because he never saw them. He loved his male doctor and he loved Eric. He hated women and was scared of them because he was constantly disciplined and medicated by them, thus he was afraid of me.), and when the caretaker tells Borya that his new mommy and daddy are here to get him he responds with confusion and fear (what child would not be fearful of strangers and of leaving the only place they have ever known? Every child who has ever gone through this situation would certainly understand that.).

The book basically tells the story of how a couple go to an Eastern European country, go to an orphanage, find their child, go to court, and then return to their home. As simplistic as it is it does explain what the orphanage is like for a child, how court can be daunting, and how the process is emotional for everyone involved.

See other reviews at Perspective Press.

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“Sometimes its not the child we carry that belongs to us but the child we have in our hearts.”

One of the most difficult things to deal with regarding infertility is the fact that we can not bear/have our own children. I still deal with this on a regular basis and I will be the first to admit it. I wrote a post not long ago about this and it garnered a lot of attention from both adoptive mothers and women dealing with infertility.

It took me a long time to get over the initial grief of not being able to have a child of my “own” and then even more time to come to terms with not being able to look a child in the eyes and know he came from me.

But, as I parent my first son every day I learn that more often than not he is looking back at me with the same eyes with which I look at him. It is not the color of his eyes that is important but the love that shines in them. It is not the shape of his eyes but the humor his father has taught him. It is  the knowledge that he gleans from us, his parents, each day.

And what is most important is that this child, no matter who he is blood related to, has “come” from me. Yes, he will always be tied to his birth family because they gave him life and they gave him his start.

But what is so wonderful is that I am allowed to parent him everyday. I am allowed to carry him in my heart every single moment. And I wonder, sometimes, if she carries him in her heart too.

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