Forcing ASD children to fit in

Post Reply New Topic

Our 8 year old son attends a school with a specialized campus for children with ASDs as well as many other 'disorders.' The reason I quoted that is because to me just because people are outside society's norm that does not mean they aren't just fine being who they are. I have a personal issue with looking at people who are different as having disorders in spite of having several medically diagnosed disorders myself.

My whole reason for posting is that in spite of our son being in a decent(not great)program at school I find they(teachers, therapists)expect my son to fit in by forcing interactions with other classmates. His class is small, only 6 kids total, all have varying degrees of either autism or other disorders, and he does not cause issues in the classroom with other students. He's very social with adults, and he will even ask kids to play with him occasionally on the playground. I don't see the point in forcing socialization. I've spoken to the staff about this and they claim that in order to fit in he must interact with his peers. None of them are on the same academic program, so they don't generally have chances to interact beyond recess. Why is it so imperative that he fits in at all?

Logically I understand that society has certain expectations and that if he is to be independent one day that he must know how to fit in to some degree. However, whilst I have high hopes for our son I'm not so much stuck on the idea that he must live independently unless that is something he truly desires and is capable to do. He's 8, whether or not he's social at school doesn't even rank on my radar as a concern. He's happy, he talks about his friends at school(and his cartoon friends as well)constantly, he enjoys spending time with our family and whenever given the chance to play with other children shows no interest, never has.

Is fitting in really that important? I've never fit in in spite of being NT. I don't know why it seems to be important to force children of any type to fit some socially acceptable mold. I feel as though because I'm not in agreement with his school team that perhaps I'm doing him a disservice. Anyone out there that can perhaps shed some light on this?

I can't speak about what is good for your son or the other kids in his class, but I wish when we were in public school, that they would have helped my son socialize. Not forced --- but helped. I didn't worry so much when he wasn't interested, but I was once he started trying. He would initiate epics fails of interaction and the adults would just let it be, with no guidance whatsoever. So, naturally, since he was doing it oh, so very, wrong, he would be rejected time after time.

There were kids who would interact with him willingly to get brownie points from the teacher, but that was about it. This does not help build skills, it only helped him temporarily have someone to talk to.

Do, I think kids who do not want to socialize should be pushed? I think encouraged, maybe, but if the kid does not want to, I don't think the child should be pushed at that moment. I also don't think it is about fitting in. To me it is about having the skills to understand when someone does and does not want to play/associate with you, and about ways to build more reciprocity in, as a life skill.

My son can socialize with adults, but that is only because they tolerate more, and are not generally going to tell off a kid who is being non-reciprocal, if the adults mean well. I have have few outlets for him to practice with kids in a psychologically safe environment.

I wish I had more. It is not because I care about him fitting in. I want him to be happy and able to navigate the social interactions he wants and the ones he has to have like eventual employment interviews and workplace dynamics. To me it is about skill-building.

It may be that is what your kid's school is trying to do. It may even be for the benefit of whom they are trying to get your son to talk with and not your son per se. I don't know.

How does your son feel about how they handle social interactions there?

Our son will interact with children when he feels he wants to. He does not(refuses)talk to others unless he wants to. He started talking right before 7 years old so I don't know, nor can I tell if it's solely based upon frustration on his part or if it is his way of basically saying "I don't like you and/or no I don't want to talk to you." He doesn't exactly know how to voice himself negatively beyond the typical child saying "no" to various things ie: pick up your shoes. He cannot tell me, as much as we've tried how he feels about the kids at school and forced social interactions beyond the fact he will not talk and will of course walk/run away from and avoid the situation.

I will try to give class the benefit of the doubt that somehow this will benefit him one day. I will always encourage him to engage with kids but will respect his desire not to for as long as it persists. I forgot to mention he will engage with older children willingly and often whether NT or otherwise. I'm under the impression that there must be something about children his own age that for some reason he feels he can't engage regularly with them. I wish he could tell me why.

I actually think it is common to have issues with peers. My son loves younger kids. Older kids sometimes will be more tolerant of younger ones just like adults are. Peers tend to have the most intricate rules for one another as well as the hierarchies and all of that confusing stuff. My son likes younger ones so he can teach them things and because they will let him take the reins.

Social communication is so much harder than regular communication, even with the young ones. It is harder to advocate for oneself in a group of peers. it is much easier to go with it and trust the mob, which is not a good thing. So maybe your son doesn't know when it is is OK to say no. Even my son, who is very strong-willed will go along with stupid things, so I think it must be some kind of mob behavior thing.

I don't force my son, either. I think that the ability to refuse is also important.

Fitting in is important. Though having to fit in isn't good.

For me, I might suggest that since clearly he doesn't know how, for this to happen someone would need to explore what he likes to do and facilitate social games with him and other children. If it's appealing enough, he'd likely be interested. If that seems difficult for an aide to accomplish, I'd ask that it be added as a speech therapy service if this is an important goal. It might be very helpful.

Though I think once you ask them to get creative and try to solve the problem themselves (and spend money) the importance they place on his interacting with peers will disappear. Which is a shame, because a good provider might help him see playing can be fun with anyone.

My son is older and was diagnosed last. My daughter got a lot of intervention at an early age regarding socialization. She is able to "fake it" very well in most circumstances. She has found friends who she doesn't need to fake it with, but she knows how to, and does when it makes her life easier (she is not always able to, of course, but under "normal" circumstances she does pretty good).

My son never got help at an early age. Partly because we didn't understand what was going on. Partly because his sister was more "severe" and so more attention was focused on her. Partly because his quirkiness seemed more "cute" than "disabling." Now that he is a teen, I feel bad for him, because he wants to fit in, but he isn't as successful with "faking it," and the older you get the harder I think it is to "re-write" your inner scripts for behavior. The one thing that I will give him is that he was able to learn to identify the things that make him "stand out" in a negative way, and he is able to decide when he does and does not want to just let his quirkiness fly. The problem is that although he understands that X is atypical behavior for his age and will draw negative attention, and although he can choose to avoid doing X, he really has a hard time figuring out what to do instead. It has lead to increasing social anxiety. I feel like if he would have gotten support from a younger age like his sister, maybe he would have learned more "basic" skills.

The truth is, we all have to know how to fit in when it counts. There are very few stations in life in which this is not necessary. I think it is also important that kids learn that sometimes you have to do things that you don't like or that do not come naturally. If he is capable of learning the skills, then my personal opinion is that he should. THat doesn't mean he needs to choose to use them all the time. There are times when it is perfectly OK not to fit in. But at least he will know how when he finds himself in a situation that requires it.

I was once of the mindset that people should accept my kids the way they are, the their quirks displayed in full glory, because I do find many of them glorious.

The problem with that mindset is that we live on planet Earth. ANd that's not how it works here. It doesn't matter what I think people should do, it matters what people do do. My initial idealism has been beaten out by realism, and my desire for my kids to not have to face avoidable hardship.

This is true.

In a nit-picking mode, I might say "we all have to know how to blend in when it counts" or "we all have to know when to camouflage our differences when standard behaviors are expected" rather than "fit it" because we never do really fit.

But I think this is one of those ideas like "being polite" that has to be understood as a skill and a necessary convention that helps people to get through community activity so that they can be their individual selves in other contexts.

Aspie kids usually don’t fit in—they have a problem. Force them to fit in and they’ll have two problems.

It depends what you mean by forced? I would be disappointed if my sons school wasn't encouraging my son to interact to be honest. I encourage it myself. He will interact when he wants to but if he's in a take it or leave it mood without encouragement he would likely leave it. The more he interacts with support the more skills he develops and the more he then feels confident to choose to interact so I think it's important to encourage it. My son would happily spend all day on his Ipad otherwise which I don't think would be great for his development. My NT daughter probably would as well to be honest. But if you mean he is being physically forced or punished for not wanting to interact then that is obviously wrong.

He wouldn’t if you hadn’t given him one in the first place.



And how else would you “encourage” him?

I have no problem with him having a short amount of time each day on his Ipad. I'm not anti technology. But I do have an issue with either of my kids spending an extended time on it. Same goes for TV. That is part of encouraging interaction for me but I do it in lots of ways. for eg I'll take the kids to the park at quiet times so there's only a few kids there and it's not too noisy. I'll point out if a child is doing something my son enjoys and remind him he could ask to join in which he is usually keen to and has fun but if I didn't suggest it it probably wouldn't occur to him. If he didn't want to then of course I wouldn't force him. Not sure how you could force a child to interact. Nothing wrong with being content with your own company. But I would feel like I was letting my son down if he wanted to play with other kids but didn't know how.

The only thing any kind of “encouragement” to socialize ever achieved with me was to turn everything that didn’t involve social contact into a guilty pleasure, including any intellectual pursuit outside the bare minimum required by school, and even this only grudgingly. Sooner rather than later, I gave them all up. And I stayed socially isolated.



Of course you can force a child to interact. You’ll probably need to trample any social rules the group of kids you want them to interact with may have, but it’s very easy for an adult to regard them as too petty and immature to deserve any serious consideration—probably even more so for a proud adult aspie. As a consequence, the socialization attempts will fail miserably, and the aspie kid will be resented as nosy and rude—since they’re clueless about how to interact with the other kids, and probably frightened—and bullied, but, hey, you forced them to interact.

I remember feeling like I was forced to fit in, when attending nursery school and kindergarten. If I had had my way, I would probably still be living at home. As that is most comfortable. At some point, some level of socialization is needed, in order to become a functioning adult. The question is how much.

I think you're
generalising. My son isn't clueless
socially. People who meet him don't realise he's any different from other kids other than maybe seeming a little shy. He has a group of friends at school who actively go out of their way to socialise with him.
I may well be wrong but I'm parenting him in the way I feel is best. He's happy and that's good enough for me.
I still didn't quite understand what you meant by forcing a child to interact.

I don't think he should be forced to fit in....the idea of forcing kids who are different to 'fit in' just perpetuates the idea its 'wrong' to be different. The goal should be to get the students in general to have basic respect for each other, including those who are a little different or don't 'fit in'..instead its seems those who are different are pressured to do things just to fit in and its not seen as a bad thing when people pick on them.

I’m glad for you both then. I have a hard time imagining how that could work, because my experience as an (undiagnosed) aspie child was very different. As a teenager, I began to think of socializing as a serious problem it was in my own best interest to solve, and to perceive, very faintly, how clueless I still was—to no avail. Only much later did I start learning some essential facts about what I had always been doing wrong, and how far behind my contemporaries had left me in every aspect of life.



Well, it’s really simple: you dump them wherever the other kids are and let them sink or swim.