kindergarten issues, needs advice!

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God bless you jat ! ! Thank you so much for the support, you gave me a wealth of valuable information. No, he has never had a FBA before. I will certainly look into that though. How does one ask for one? Through the school system? He has never disrespected or been oppositional to any authority figure besides two people. This teacher, when he told her he wouldn't do his work and got put on time out before Christmas and also his old OT, she used to put him in time out for sitting there when she asked him to put on his shoes by himself when he was 4. Everybody else he loved and had a lot of respect for. I didn't like the old OT myself, when he would come into therapy, he would take a little longer than usual and she would say.."what's a matter with you!??!" She was an impatient b****! ! I was so close to reporting her to her manager but my son's neuro stopped me. My son has also told me his teacher said "mean things" like "c'moonn!! !" when trying to get him to finish his work. Nothing major, but he is very sensitive and is actually really good at detecting people's tone of voice. He tells me all the time that I should not use my "mean voice" when I talk to him.

I'm so glad I have this week to organize everything for the IEP. Last meeting was not organized at all because I had such a good experience with his pre-k school, I was hoping the same would be true here. In fact, someone completely dropped the ball and lost all his school documents that were supposed to be forwarded to the new school. I had to give them a copy of the dx and they don't even have his OT or ST evals. I will surely bring that with me. I am also going to call my local autism support organization to find a good advocate that will come with me. Here are some of my ideas about what to incorporate in his IEP...
1. homework modification
2. he should be allowed to take class work home if he is unable to finish
3. he should be able to chew gum when needed (he has severe oral fixation)
4. he should have a 15 min sensory break after 2 hours of school (jumping on tramp, swinging, etc)

If you can think of anything else please let me know...

I totally understand not making sure everything is perfect on the paperwork when things were going fine before - of course you expect that to continue!

My son has also been very good at detecting people's unspoken attitudes. He may not always "get" social cues, but when it comes to how people feel about him, he's been sensitive to it since he was a very small child. Since the cues are always subtle (no one says to a three-year-old, "I can't stand you"), it was never something I could bring back to a teacher. Luckily, there were very few who didn't like him.

Whenever there are behavioral issues that are considered to be interfering with a child's education (or the education of other children in the child's class), the IEP team is supposed to discuss how that is going to be addressed, and an FBA is supposed to be done. I happened upon an article about FBA's on Wrightslaw that you might find useful: FAPE article. It refers to the 1997 IDEA, so it might be an older article, but it is still very informative. Authorizing an FBA is part of the IEP meeting, and the IEP team should have no problem doing so - it would be hard to justify a refusal, given the behavioral issues that the school is experiencing. I don't know what your forms look like, but our forms have a check box on one of the first few pages that ask whether there are behavioral issues that interfere with the child's or the class's education. If this is checked (and it should be, in your case), our forms say that a BIP must be developed based on an FBA.

Getting organized is so important (and so hard)! Bringing copies of evaluations with you is a good idea. Make an extra copy if you can, so you can have one to hand them. You might want to mark up "your" copy, to find the issues you are particularly concerned about. You might also want to bring copies of any articles or manuals that you have found helpful/authoritative. Bring a copy of the IDEA and regs, if you are familiar with them. Mark them up, so you can find what you're looking for.

I think your modification ideas are a good start, but I would caution you about #2: If your son is unable to finish his classwork at school, piling it on as homework, on top of the homework he will receive, will create huge problems for you at home. Don't make their problems at school into your problems at home. If they can't manage their job at school, that's their problem. You have your own issues to deal with at home. Some of them are school related, but it is not your job to clean up their inability to do their job. If you do, you are setting yourself and your son up for huge problems later, when they continue to fail to provide him with a FAPE (free appropriate public education), and, since you've been cleaning it up at home, there's no data to support your claim.

When you look at modifying homework, you need to try to figure out in what ways to modify it. That's not something you can do by yourself, but make sure that the modifications spelled out, and that it includes your right, as the parent, to conclude homework after "x" number of minutes, with no negative impact on your son.

In addition to the "big" break of 15 minutes after two hours, your son probably needs 5 minute breaks after 20-30 minutes.

There's a manual that was put out by the National Education Association about meeting the needs of autistic children in the classroom, and it's available for free download. You might find some useful suggestions there, and since it comes from an educational source, your school might consider it helpful (rather than "crazy parent stuff"). Check it out: Puzzle of Autism (I didn't name it ) I'm bringing it to an IEP meeting with me - there are some good, easy-to-implement ideas.

It's really hard to get the IEP to be written properly; the thing is, it should be written so that if people who had nothing to do with it walked in, they would know exactly what needed to be done, based entirely on reading the document - no knowledge about autism, no common sense, nothing!

You're doing a great job. Remember that you are your child's ultimate expert. "The" experts might know "autism" better, but you're the one who knows your child. Hang in there!

Jat should I be paying you for this??! You are extremely knowledgeable at this, you should set up your own service!

You are right about the homework thing, it may pile up at home. I work 30 hrs a week a night so I really don't have a great deal of time to sit down and do homework with him, 30 mins the most. I think the better choice for him is if he can't finish it at school in x amount of mins there are no negative consequences like you said.

I will also bring up the FBA like you said, I really DONT believe he should be on time out or lose his turn. He's having such a tough time with school right now. He's sad, anxious, and lost all his confidence. He'll say things like.."I always need help" or "I'm not that smart."

As far as the breaks, the reason I said 15 mins after 2 hours is to correlate to his sensory diet. His former OT believes he should have strenuous physical activity every two hours. We've enrolled him in swim before school. He only goes to school for barely 3 hours. I will see how it works or if not, I can always call another meeting to modify it to every 20-30 mins.

I will definitely check out the Puzzle of Autism, sounds like an awesome document! In the meantime I was also looking into some private school for autism, I can not believe those schools run up to 50,000 a year. WTF!! It's so unfortunate that we have to be rich to a good education for our children.