This Thursday I walked in to Khaled’s preschool to the following scene.
The other little boy with autism standing at the crafts table. A strange woman standing behind him, holding his hands over a sheet of paper moving them around in circles. He was crying and screaming but not bolting or physically struggling. There was paint on his hands and they were “finger painting”. The teacher in the class passed me a very quick glance possibly reading my surprised/what-the-hell expression and then averting her gaze. Other kids in the room were ignoring this event.
I later discovered that was his EA. So he finally got one from community living, Mississauga.
A little while latter she asked me if Khaled was my son and if I stay here with him and I explained our situation. She told me her little career history of working as a resource teacher, following “program guidelines” laid out for her (by who?) and that she has also worked in schools one-to-one with kids in special-ed classes. She proudly highlighted her earlier achievement. “You see he doesn’t like the feeling of wet things, but I made him do it” (insert chuckle) “Because they have to get used to it you know, that’s how they will learn”.
Of course.
In such scenarios I play dumb and then slowly back away and try to fade and avoid.
We go to preschool half way through the program (deliberately missing circle time in the beginning and only making it for free play and then story and song).
They do weather and days of the week and printing their own names during circle, all things that are beyond Khaled’s grasp right now. I could technically force him to sit there through some clever use of reinforcers, but what is the point? He does not understand the complicated language, he does not yet possess the cognitive abilities to know what is going on, so why torture him, just to make him “conform” and “appear normal”? We will do all those things when he is ready and that time is not now.
I recently read a good little blog post by another mom about why she is homeschooling her young son with autism. I will quote her words “And it doesn't really matter to me how many good teachers are out there until something is done about the bad ones." You can read her blog on Teaching The Boy .
I am sure there are great EA’s out there, and awesome principles, and nice success stories of children really thriving in the school communities. But for every good story, there are so many horrid ones, and so many that you don’t even hear about or realize are bad ones because it is too late by the time the kid has graduated from highs chool and has completely bypassed all the essential remediation that could have been done earlier in his life, only to come out with academic skills at best.
What good are academic skills if you cannot function in the most basic real life situations? It’s real nice that you can read and multiply, but do you know what to do when the stop signs stop working at the road crossing? Do you stand there all day? Do you have a meltdown? What if you are working and someone interrupts you? Do you know what goals are? Can you understand basic body language, or read between the lines in a conversation? How good a judge are you of someone’s intentions? Can you multitask? Do you know how to plan your day and pass your free time, by yourself? And so on.
I guess you choose what battles you want to fight. I am not sure what to do when Khaled is “school going age”, which will be very soon. Do I want to fight the school system, EA’s, IEP, IPRC’s and so on because it is my son’s right to go to public school? These are important things and someone needs to make the change and fight for change, and improve and reform, but as a parent of Khaled I have to ask, how will current policies and realities benefit my son? He won’t get to relive his life. Time passed will not come back. What if I can do a better job of teaching him and preparing him for adult life? That is not easy either, it is possibly harder than fighting other people.
So which battle would I rather pick? I fight a few wars everyday. Sitting down with Khaled and getting through a few minutes of “passing a ball back and forth” or “cutting and making a house” really is the equivalent of a battle. I would rather fight these battles than take the risk of fighting with professionals and boards who may or may not give a damn about where my son is at the age of 20 and 30 years.
Here is a light little video from a few weeks ago. On the way to school one day, Khaled started to insist going to the back of the building where there is a slide and play area. I thought about telling him “No, we are going to school right now Khaled, later slide”, but something about the way he asked and the look on his face, I decided to say OK, just for a few minutes.
He is scripting from the Monsters Inc movie, but also talking about airplanes. He scripts sometimes when he is excited.
He must have spotted an airplane in the sky earlier, because he went up the slide structure and we watched plane after plane fly by for a long time. It was such a beautiful day and I must admit I really like watching planes too. I was glad I let Khaled show me something cool, and that I did not force him to get in the car. We did go to school, albeit a little late.
The other little boy with autism standing at the crafts table. A strange woman standing behind him, holding his hands over a sheet of paper moving them around in circles. He was crying and screaming but not bolting or physically struggling. There was paint on his hands and they were “finger painting”. The teacher in the class passed me a very quick glance possibly reading my surprised/what-the-hell expression and then averting her gaze. Other kids in the room were ignoring this event.
I later discovered that was his EA. So he finally got one from community living, Mississauga.
A little while latter she asked me if Khaled was my son and if I stay here with him and I explained our situation. She told me her little career history of working as a resource teacher, following “program guidelines” laid out for her (by who?) and that she has also worked in schools one-to-one with kids in special-ed classes. She proudly highlighted her earlier achievement. “You see he doesn’t like the feeling of wet things, but I made him do it” (insert chuckle) “Because they have to get used to it you know, that’s how they will learn”.
Of course.
In such scenarios I play dumb and then slowly back away and try to fade and avoid.
We go to preschool half way through the program (deliberately missing circle time in the beginning and only making it for free play and then story and song).
They do weather and days of the week and printing their own names during circle, all things that are beyond Khaled’s grasp right now. I could technically force him to sit there through some clever use of reinforcers, but what is the point? He does not understand the complicated language, he does not yet possess the cognitive abilities to know what is going on, so why torture him, just to make him “conform” and “appear normal”? We will do all those things when he is ready and that time is not now.
I recently read a good little blog post by another mom about why she is homeschooling her young son with autism. I will quote her words “And it doesn't really matter to me how many good teachers are out there until something is done about the bad ones." You can read her blog on Teaching The Boy .
I am sure there are great EA’s out there, and awesome principles, and nice success stories of children really thriving in the school communities. But for every good story, there are so many horrid ones, and so many that you don’t even hear about or realize are bad ones because it is too late by the time the kid has graduated from highs chool and has completely bypassed all the essential remediation that could have been done earlier in his life, only to come out with academic skills at best.
What good are academic skills if you cannot function in the most basic real life situations? It’s real nice that you can read and multiply, but do you know what to do when the stop signs stop working at the road crossing? Do you stand there all day? Do you have a meltdown? What if you are working and someone interrupts you? Do you know what goals are? Can you understand basic body language, or read between the lines in a conversation? How good a judge are you of someone’s intentions? Can you multitask? Do you know how to plan your day and pass your free time, by yourself? And so on.
I guess you choose what battles you want to fight. I am not sure what to do when Khaled is “school going age”, which will be very soon. Do I want to fight the school system, EA’s, IEP, IPRC’s and so on because it is my son’s right to go to public school? These are important things and someone needs to make the change and fight for change, and improve and reform, but as a parent of Khaled I have to ask, how will current policies and realities benefit my son? He won’t get to relive his life. Time passed will not come back. What if I can do a better job of teaching him and preparing him for adult life? That is not easy either, it is possibly harder than fighting other people.
So which battle would I rather pick? I fight a few wars everyday. Sitting down with Khaled and getting through a few minutes of “passing a ball back and forth” or “cutting and making a house” really is the equivalent of a battle. I would rather fight these battles than take the risk of fighting with professionals and boards who may or may not give a damn about where my son is at the age of 20 and 30 years.
Here is a light little video from a few weeks ago. On the way to school one day, Khaled started to insist going to the back of the building where there is a slide and play area. I thought about telling him “No, we are going to school right now Khaled, later slide”, but something about the way he asked and the look on his face, I decided to say OK, just for a few minutes.
He is scripting from the Monsters Inc movie, but also talking about airplanes. He scripts sometimes when he is excited.
He must have spotted an airplane in the sky earlier, because he went up the slide structure and we watched plane after plane fly by for a long time. It was such a beautiful day and I must admit I really like watching planes too. I was glad I let Khaled show me something cool, and that I did not force him to get in the car. We did go to school, albeit a little late.