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To home school or not???

Geewhizz1999

My son age 9 has ASD and is currently in year 4 of a main stream school.  He has great difficulty in retaining information and concentrating, but the biggest issue for him seems to be writing.  The school have been pressing him to write joined up in all his subjects, but this was causing numerous meltdowns as he found it so hard to do.  After having a chat with the school senco, we came to an agreement that he could write in single letters as long as he tries hard to complete the work.  After attending the EarlyBird Plus course a few months ago (which I hasten to add, the school would not send a teacher to attend with us) we have relayed what they need to do to get the most out of him, ie: asking him to write in smaller chunks, not copy this A4 page of writing, as that completely overwhelms him!!!  However they continue to do it their way and so he is now simply refusing to work full stop!  The teacher came out after school today, hot headed and clearly exasperated as my son and completely frozen her out!  This is happening all the time and I hate seeing him coming out of school crying and so stressed... I always said if he started to struggle too much that I would pull him out and home school him, but I just dont know if this is the right thing to do for HIM!  Academically I'm sure I could manage, but would it be the best thing for him?? Does anyone else home school their ASD 9 year old???  How do you find it? 

Parents

  • Thank you so much mum170 for your good advice!  Reading your comment, my son also struggles when addressed by someone he doesnt know well, particularly in authority.  Recently the boys in his class were pulled before the head teacher after school as some of them had been throwing wet tissue paper on the ceiling in the boys toilets... my son was absolutely distraugh when he came out that day.  He was insistant that he hadn't done it but took it like he was being personally blamed for what had happened.  He just didnt understand that the teacher was not blaming anyone in particular and had to speak to the boys as a group!

    We have also had teachers (in front of me I might add) talking to Calvin and demanding that he 'LOOK AT THEM' while they talk to him.  They dont understand that he can't!

    He has excused himself from PE on many occasions, but thankfully his class teacher has been so understanding.  Its just his other teachers such as the English and science ones that dont seem to make any allowance for his autism.  I had a real fight on my hands just to stop them pushing him to write joined up!!

    After seeing the SenCo, she interveined on our behalf which helped tremendously.  She has also put his name down for a tap typing course that should start beginning of year 5 (after the summer hols).

    Bob, I completely get what you are staying... My son is finding each year of school worse than the one before... and he too has had issues with children being down right nasty with him.  He just doesnt have the tools in his box to know how to deal with it.  Most days he begs me to home school him!  Its so hard to know what to do for the best.  When he breaks up for the weekend or school holidays, he is like a different child... the relief completely un-crumples his little face and you can see his entire body language change.

    Thank you also Blossom59... there is a very good 'special needs' school near us, but I don't know whether I would be able to get him in because he hasn't got a statement.  I don't know why he was never given one and now they are changing the statementing system I have been told not to apply yet as nothing will happen because of the transition between old and new statements.  I'm going to have to look into this better.

    Thank you for all your help everyone! Smile

  • in reply to Geewhizz1999

    Has the school encouraged any form of social skills development. Stress will prevent your son from being able to focus on his work. Sometimes having a peer to relieve some tension can help. Also ample opportunity for down time.

    Does he have an IEP?

    I work with a young man,aged 9, since the beginning of this year. The former worker said he needs growled at to get anything done, you have to be hard on him and he will never be toilet trained. I had him toilet trained fully within a term and completely changed how he approached learning. He was only doing dot to dots for maths, his focus was on learning numbers. When he relaxed and I had encouraged social skills and friendships to start forming, he cpletely changed. He showed he could count forwards and backwards extremely well and understood addition and subtraction. We introduced him to fractions, time, algebra and geometry and he began picking things up quickly. 

    For writing I applied for him to get a funded assistive technology Chromebook and also got him headphones to limit noise distraction. His writing went from 4 words in a session to 20 simple sentences. 

    I'm trying to put together a book with worksheets and ideas for teaching kids with autism. Can I ask what you think work be helpful for the school to understand?

Reply
  • in reply to Geewhizz1999

    Has the school encouraged any form of social skills development. Stress will prevent your son from being able to focus on his work. Sometimes having a peer to relieve some tension can help. Also ample opportunity for down time.

    Does he have an IEP?

    I work with a young man,aged 9, since the beginning of this year. The former worker said he needs growled at to get anything done, you have to be hard on him and he will never be toilet trained. I had him toilet trained fully within a term and completely changed how he approached learning. He was only doing dot to dots for maths, his focus was on learning numbers. When he relaxed and I had encouraged social skills and friendships to start forming, he cpletely changed. He showed he could count forwards and backwards extremely well and understood addition and subtraction. We introduced him to fractions, time, algebra and geometry and he began picking things up quickly. 

    For writing I applied for him to get a funded assistive technology Chromebook and also got him headphones to limit noise distraction. His writing went from 4 words in a session to 20 simple sentences. 

    I'm trying to put together a book with worksheets and ideas for teaching kids with autism. Can I ask what you think work be helpful for the school to understand?

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