ive been gone for a while, massive upheavals with buying our first home and moving, and even more school drama. i see so many negative stories about public schools, and we have had plenty of our own, too. i wanted to give an update and share our school success as my last thread was about pulling K from mainstream kindergarten and putting him into a special needs school.
we never did put him into that school. as part of his SpEd services, he has an asd teacher consultant who works as part of his iep team. her job is to work with his teachers and give suggestions to make things work. after we pulled K from school, we werent getting any info on getting him into the new school, which was frustrating. but his consultant asked us to be patient and give her a chance to see what she could come up with. he ended up being out of school for 3 full weeks, which derailed our plans to get our house ready and move in, which means we moved in without a kitchen floor, working stove, or *gasp* internet and cable tv. thats all fixed now tho, and K is back in school.
the consultant was able to cobble together a placement for K that is excellent. he is in a self contained CI (cognitively impaired) classroom at another school, kind of odd since he is actually not CI at all and has a really high IQ. but the classroom was chosen because of the wonderful teacher who runs it. there is a total of 10 kids with 1 main teacher, 1 assistant teacher, and 1 student teacher. its actually a 2nd/3rd grade class, so the other kids are all older than K, which he is more comfortable with anyway, and everyone works to their own level, which means K has his own individualized curriculum based on his abilities. he is doing mostly first grade work right now, and is progressing really fast, especially in math. K likes his teacher, altho he pretty much ignores the existence of the second and student teachers (par for the course for him, if he doesnt particularly like you, you dont exist).
the icing on the cake is mrs m. she has made our family of atheists believe in angels, for she is one. she is K's one on one full time aide, with him every day from the time he steps into school until he gets into our car in the afternoon. K's teacher hand picked her specifically to be his aide, and its a perfect fit. and K ADORES mrs m.
6 weeks ago K was bolting for the door multiple times a day at the other school, they had an aide standing guard at the door all day just to keep him in, he was hitting and kicking the aide, crawling under and on top of tables, and learning nothing. now he goes into school willingly, and SMILES at mrs m when she is there to meet him in the morning, and he never tries to run. he has eaten in the cafeteria and played outside and in the gym with his class, not a lot but a few times, by HIS own choice. he is doing excellent academically, and even did homework last night without a problem.
the difference for our family was in finding the right teacher and the right placement. i wish every kid had someone tailoring their lessons to the child. i wish every kid had a mrs m. but there are possibilities out there, and even public school can be a great learning environment for an asd child, if you can find someone to make it happen.
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Neurotypically confused.
partner to: D - 40 yrs med dx classic autism
mother to 3 sons:
K - 6 yrs med/school dx classic autism
C - 8 yrs NT
N - 15 yrs school dx AS
10 Nov 2011, 2:58 pm
