My son's school vp asked me the stupidist question today.

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I had to drop my son off to school late this morning as he'd had another doc's appointment.
I ran into the vp (dragon lady) at the office. I asked her if she'd contacted the autism resource worker yet. Yes she'd left a message but no one had gotten back to her as yet. (this is a huge step)
Then I went on to mention that I had concerns that J my 9 year old son had told me that whilst he is happy because he apparently has a couple of kids to play with, my concern is they are only playing his way. He is even physically touching to manouver these kids where he wants them, he is instructing them in what they can and can't say. this can't be a good thing in the long term.
He is happy that kids are playing with him, he is happy that they are playing his way. He still melt downs after school if he is asked anything about school, we had a rather large meltdown on the weekend over writing (he hates writing and isn't very good at it)
I tell the vp all this and she says "the kids will tell him if it's a problem, he is fine, he is coping at school, stop worrying." I tell her yes he is happy the kids are playing with him, but they did this last year to, but by mid year they had had enough, he didn't get it and the kids were saying nasty things to him.
She then goes on to ask me "what do you want?, Do you not want him to cope at school?" How stupid is this woman!! !! Of course I want him to cope. Maybe I'm saying it all wrong. Is it coping when he says he is acting and would just like to be himself at school? Is it coping when we aren't allowed to talk about school at home?
I suggest that maybe what he needs is someone he feels safe with someone he could talk to about what ever is going on in his head before he gets home. I don't think she gets it, although admittedly at least she is now saying he has aspergers, and she has put a call into the resource worker. She said (as I know)that these kids love rules and routine which the school have a lot of, and they aren't getting the behaviours I'm talking about there but I'm getting them at home ( I believe she was hinting that maybe I'm doing something wrong) I'm probably rambling now. Maybe I should just give up, perhaps he will always have to "act" at school, perhaps this is just the way it's meant to be, perhaps I'm asking to much. I'm not even sure what I'm asking the school to provide to be honest, we are very new to asperger's.

I need help and advice. Could the school be doing something solid to help address this situation. What should I be asking for?

I would refrain from opening complicated topics in casual conversation and keep them to meetings. I don't know how job assignments are broken down there, but here in Arizona, the vice principal is the last person in the school you would go to about helping your child.
If you have a close relationship or a trusting relationship with the teacher, I'd start with them first. It sounds like an open-ended topic that would require brainstorming, identifying trouble spots and coming up with resolutions and a protocol. That happens in a meeting setting. If you have a practical suggestion, then you could bring it up with the teacher first and see if they can try things.

double post

Last edited by sinsboldly on 11 Mar 2008, 11:03 am, edited 1 time in total.

Lets hope dragon lady isn't reading this forum.

Your son sounds like a micro-manager. Maybe one day he will grow into an assistant movie director and be posing all the background actors in the scenes. It's a skill really; he's gifted.

Not joking, but what about the other kids that take his direction? They need to learn how to step out of a situation like that and not do things just to humor him.

Dragon lady can't do much; she probably has a few hundred kids to look over, at the very least. Teacher talk would probably work better. Also some positive reinforcement for desired behavior, as in "did you let the others move by themselves?" after school might have some effect.

I acted my way thru school and was not very successful at it, and was bullied horriably. However, now I am able to give the "Academy Award Performance" and it has served me well. Don't discourage the acting so much, it IS a coping mechanism.

Well part of what I was worried about happened today.
One of the kids J has been playing with tried to choke him today, J managed to hold him off. Did he tell the teacher? No! The kid told him not to. was he scared? Yes. Did he even tell me? No. Because he knows I will speak to the school about it. He told the swimming instructor, he knows that she in turn told me. But he wont give me the details he gave her, because this other kid will be angry and may not be his "friend" any more.

He needs in school social skills therapy.

I have found when dealing with people like the Vice Principal (ones who don't get it) to put concerns in e-mail and send copies of the e-mail to everyone in the team.

When I'm writing e-mails, I can take time to think about the message I'm trying to get across.

When I'm talking in person to some of the less helpful members of staff, I find I become so stunned by their ignorance that I can't think clearly.

I relied on e-mails last year. This year I relaxed for a couple of weeks, relying on casual conversations and everything fell apart. So I'm back to e-mails.

I print my e-mails and keep them in a folder. This way I have a clear record of what's been happening.

A friend at work taught me last year how to write e-mails to get results. I would draft my e-mail and she would tell me which bits to remove (the bits that sounded emotional or had negative judgement statements about staff members). I'm getting better because the last few e-mails she hasn't changed a word.

Your e-mails need to be clear about what the problem is and clear about what you want

For example.

I am concerned about J's social skills. He only engages in play with other children if he is directing the game, to the point of physically touching to manouver other children. I don't believe this will result in J maintaining friendships.

I am also concerned because today one of the children at school tried to choke J. However J will not tell me the details because he is scared of losing this friendship.

J urgently needs social skills training. I would appreciate the opportunity to meet with the team at school as soon as possible. I will contact J's classroom teacher tomorrow to set up a time

Or something like that. I just made it up on the spot. I send e-mails at least 1/week.

Hope this helps.
Helen

Helen

until dragon lady sees Js issues as being injurious to himself or others, it seems she is poised to do nothing.......... is there someone else there that you can talk to that might garner some results?

The VP and Principal at my son's school employ the casual corridor encounter as a type of formal meeting, so like Smelena, I email everything too now. I cc all my emails to various people and I have found this the best and quickest way for any concern to be addressed.

I get someone to read over my emails too .

Your VP's assessment of the social situation is exactly what the VP at my son's school would say - you're not alone aurea. My VP likes to frequently remind me that I have to 'let go' and trust the school more .

Temma

LOl, My husband is my proofreader and now that he has a Blackberry, he can read email at work. I forward stuff to him so that I don't bombard him at home.

I would definitely write down the incident J had with the boy who choked him. My son gets in trouble all the time because of kids that tattle on him and yet, he won't tell on kids that hurt him. It's really messed up.

I just wanted to say that your son is so much my like mine. My son plays with kids too as long as they do it his way.

I've had the same kind of experiences!
I've also found I have to be pretty picky about who I chose to talk to. After many bad experiences and disapointments.
Smelena's email advice was excellent. I think I'll try it out!

Thank you all so much, I feel like everything else is starting to fall into place it's just the school that aren't getting on board, or if they are it's extremely slow and painful.

J has his arts program with western Autistic school today, I will pass this on to them and ask them to pass it on to the resource worker. They all work from the same place, at least then she will have a heads up.

I don't know the schools email, I need to find out what it is. I think part of me is so scared to upset things at school any more than they are already, it's strange this is the only place where I get extremely intimidated when it comes to my kids, it was the same when my oldest (18yr old) son was there.

Everything goes threw the vp, I believe she is in charge of the teachers and any of the special needs kids. She has the office staff so well trained that I can't even get in to see the school district psycologist without running what ever I want to see the psycologist about past her first.

It really worries me that he isn't talking to me about it, I tried and he got very agitated. It makes me wonder if other things have happened in the past, and the possibilities of what could happen in the future are scary. Thank goodness his swimming teacher is fantastic and very observant, and she has earned his trust.

There is no "team" to go to at the school, just the vp or his teacher. The school won't schedule another meeting with me because I've already had an hour this term. (this is what the vp told me when I asked for extra time to explain how the dx effects J personally) My hour that I had was in Feb when J's autism team met with myself and the school and gave them the offical dx.

I know that the vp was asking me for specific things I wanted the school to do (personally I think so she could give me all the reasons why he can't have those things) but I couldn't really give her anything specific because I don't know whats available, what works etc. I just know what we are seeing and what J is saying, this is what I mean by I am new to the dx. I have been going backwards and forwards to the school now since he started there in prep, with concerns, observations and requests. I believe each incident has been seen only on an individual basis, no one there has actually (this is possibly partly my fault to) sat down and put all the puzzle pieces together.

I'm tired, frustrated and as you can all tell worried. I get frustrated in thinking (for those in Australia) if centrelink can recognise asperger's as a very real disorder why can't the education dept? Why do they make it so difficult?

Thanks for listening guys. I know this reply was long, for that I'm sorry. I don't know where else to go for advice and you guys are all in the same or similar boat.

Cheers Aurea

I was fortunate that my son's IEP team had identified recess / friendship maintenance as areas of concern, so I didn't have to identify the issue. Since you are looking for some specific ideas, here are some that have been proposed for my son, some of which have been placed into action, and some that proved not to be feasible at our school:

1) Lunch bunch. This is a supervised lunch and recess session where a member of the special education team arranges board games, etc., and works with the children on taking turns, listening to each other's ideas, etc. My son gets this service weekly, and as the program has progressed, he has been allowed to invite his own friends, instead of only working with other special education students.

2) Recess observation. Having a member of the special education team monitor my son's recess activities, take notes, and discuss their observations with him or with us. This was done mostly during the assessment process. As time has progressed, the staff working the playground and the parents volunteering have been given a sense of what to watch out for with my son, in case any issues arise, but they generally haven't been proactive in preventing issues unless my son goes to them specifically for help.

3) As my son's friends grew more interested in organized sports that he felt unwelcome to participate in, we had hoped to create a recess room with board games and similar activities, that would be an alternative to outdoor play. My son would then be playing with children with more similar interests to start with. For some reason this was something they ultimately were not able to arrange.

Overall, we have never gotten specific accommodations put into place without arranging a meeting of the special education team. If I see a critical issue that needs to be addressed, a meeting will be called. I am not aware that we have any limits on the number of meetings, just the requirement that the IEP team meet a minimum of once a year. On average, we've had one extra meeting every other year to deal with arising concerns. Otherwise, the plans put in place in the fall have been very effective for us.

Be aware that changing things takes time. I would assume that your school system has a whole list of procedures to follow, as does ours. In many ways I've found staff powerless to affect certain changes without process. Some changes they can just make happen; others, not. It is a constant process.

I think you start with the teacher, and then move outwards. I suspect the VP may have been harsher than she meant to be, because she simply didn't know what sorts of answers you were looking for. It wouldn't be her area of expertise, and she has hundreds of children to worry about. If it isn't an issue today, time management is going to cause her to assume that it isn't likely to be an issue tomorrow. Of course, NOW it really is an issue, because J's controlling behavior caused conflict, and you may finally have something with which to prompt further action.

DW-a-mom, I think you have underlined the problem in so many Australian schools - if something is not a problem this instant, ignore it. This type of 'leadership' is very reactive and relies on a knee-jerk response. The idea of actually working on issues before they become problems is not considered! Some schools do it though as the Principals use an 'adaptive' style of leadership, and as such their integration students have a much better time.

Temma

I was scared too, but you have to do it. You are your child's best advocate. I have the separate e-mail addresses of the classroom teacher, Vice Principal etc etc. I would send your e-mails to the classroom teacher and cc them to the Vice Principal, Principal and Autism Team.

Ring up the school and ask for all the e-mail addresses.

.

The VP sounds like a cow! Now that I think about it, also cc copies of your e-mails to the School district psychologist.



Great. You and your son have one ally!



That sounds like the biggest load of crap I've ever heard. The VP is being extremely unreasonable, and I'm sure she's breaking a few laws in the meantime. I don't know the state system requirements.

Call the autism team. Ask them where you can get information to find out exactly what your son is entitled too.



We've dealt with the fact that the VP is useless and not doing her job.

Call another meeting. Before you meet you will need to do lots of planning. Write a list of concerns about your son and post them on WP. People will give you heaps of tips.

Go into the meeting with your list. Have 2 colums:
Problem Suggestions for Problem

You will get results if you go to the meeting with specific problems and suggestions for solutions. The team should definantly add solutions of their own.

I had a fabulous meeting this morning. I only got notice of it yesterday. I spent 3 hours last night preparing for the meeting. I pulled out my list and we worked from there.

Does your son have an Individual Education Plan (IEP) yet? It sounds like he urgently needs one.

You are doing so well Aurea under difficult circumstances. It's exhausting, but you have to keep advocatig for your son.

Helen