Thoughts on home schooling your child with Aspergers?

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hello,
i have a 7 year old son with Aspergers, Generalized Anxiety disorder, specific fears and phobias, and a socal anxiety. one of his greatest challenges since the age of 3 has been school. we have tried so many things to make him comfortable attending, but he is nervous all day long, doesn't engage much with his peers, although they like him very much , i am told. i have been considering homeschool for a while now, just haven't followed thru yet. everytime we're at our witts end with school, he has a good streak and goes without problem. then out of nowhere, that i am aware, he is suddenly petrified of school again and has horrific meltdowns and it takes days to get him back. this school year alone he has missed 25 days already. how many of you older kids with aspergers wish you were homeschooled? am i helping him by doing this or hurting him? thanks.

I'm a teenager, and i would say that would do damage. But school does the most damage thats for sure... Although not going to let him go to school will make him more incapable of fitting in to society, its not because whe're asperger that whe can't learn anything about sociality. But eventually both choices are bad, if i would get the choice i would probably pick a school specialy made for people lwith needs. Or homeschool, its really hard to say whats best...

Oh welcome to WP btw ^^

Greetings, and welcome to Wrong Planet, mamadeedee.You might want to check out Wrong Planet's Parent's Discussion Forum: http://www.wrongplanet.net/forum19.html
All the WP best to you.

I truly believe you have to go with your gut instinct. What is right for your AS child may not be right for another AS child. My little guy was in school until grade 5 and now we're homeschooling. We had an awesome school, 2:1 support, the kind of stuff most parents would give up a limb for, but it just wasn't the right fit for HIM. Since we pulled him, he's learning so much more. He's finally able to just be a kid and enjoy his day to day life and soak everything in instead of spending his whole day burning himself out by 10am because he doesn't have the capacity to function in such an overstimulating environment. He hated himself and his life because everything felt like a failure. Now he feels successful and independent and when we do put him in overstimulating circumstances, he's awesome. So for US, it works well and I wouldn't change a thing.

I look at it as an open ended journey. If he wants/needs to go back at some point then we'll do that. But I'm also perfectly content to help him become the best version of himself at home.

Good luck in your decision. I've been blogging about our adventures so feel free to check it out if you're interested.

www.mylittlecanadiancorner.blogspot.com

thank you for your post. you are right, it is a very personal decision, and i think my gut will tell me when the time is right for him. right now, my son still has alot of good days at school, it's when he has the bad ones that i immediately want to grab him and rescue him from the situation. but i go back and forth. i have been researching it alot, and talking to alot of experts, trying to see what i could get in place for him, when and if it comes down to it. i am the type of person that needs to have everything set, before i make a change like that. i think inevitably, he will be home, perhaps in a year, or maybe definately by jr high. i worry about him all the time. but today for example, he went to a classmates party, who is also on the spectrum, but many kids there were not... and he had the time of his life. he fit right in, ran with the boys, left my side, had a great time. it is these times when i think him being in school is a plus. but then there are the darker days. right now he is trying some anti anxiety medicine, which i am also very mixed about... he needs extra protection. he goes because he knows it is what everyone wants him to do, and he is trying to please us. but i know how hard it is. i just want him to be happy. that is why i want to hear from other kids with aspergers... how they feel in school, do they wish there was an alternative for them? is being home schooled something they would have embraced. i cannot afford a private school for him. i am home, i run a daycare, so we could do the homeschool thing if we need to . i will check out your blog. thanks again.

I can relate to everything that you wrote. Every single little bit of it. When we got to the point of making the decision of homeschooling, it was because we hit a crisis. There were no more good days over bad days. I got my answer because it was as clear as day. It sounds like you guys are still seeing a lot of positives and that is awesome. Just follow your gut. Good luck to your little guy.

I've had my struggles with functioning in school and socially but I get better everyday. As for anxiety, I've gotten over mine because I had to.
And are you going to home college him? Home employ him? Home get him to learn to make friends and get girls LOL.
Please don't. Unless you've actually given up on him ever having a somewhat normal life.
And trust me, teenage aspies need friends beyond their mom. He'll never have a fulfilling personal life homeschooled.

I completely disagree. My sister was homeschooled from age 11 until she went to university and she's now doing Grad school at Emory University and she's quite happy, has friends, lives on her own now. There is so much support for homeschooling families. Some kids are at their best when they learn from home. It varies from child to child. One environment does not fit all children. My son's social life is even busier now that he's home because he has more skills to be socially successful. Does that mean what works for him would have worked for you? Of course not. But I don't think it's fair to say that just because a child learns from home they'll never have a fulfilling personal life.

I homeschooled my AS son. He is now 18 (almost 19). He got a job at 16, enrolled in college at 18, got his first apartment two weeks ago. I could not be more proud of him.

Homeschooling him wasn't easy. We had to figure out what his schedule was, work above normal level for his age in most subjects, and below in some. But that's the good thing about homeschooling, there is no one to compare him to, so he was above no one and below no one. I know I made a lot of mistakes, probably didn't do as good of job as I could have, but I tried my best.

We didn't just work on academics, we worked on social skills and life skills. I helped where I could, explained when appropriate, reenacted when necessary.

He has friends, people that respect him, people that count on him, and people that love him.

Homeschooling isn't about keeping them sheltered from life, it is about letting them experience life.