School Concerns
Is this school required to provide my child with an assistant?
How can I get my child around typical kids more often during school?
How can I get the school to work on social skills with my child?
Is this school required to provide my child with an assistant?
No, the school is only required to provide services for your child as they relate to your child's Individualized Education Program (IEP). If the child's IEP does not specify that one individual will be assigned to work with the child, the school is not responsible for providing the child with 1:1 assistance. Some things to think about before requesting for an aid or paraprofessional:
There is no federal legal definition for an "aide". When you use the term "paraprofessional" in the IEP, you refer to a federal legal definition and a quality standard. This is not the case when you use the term "aide" (www.wrightslaw.com).
You first need to think about how your child will or will not benefit from a 1:1 assistant. Your ultimate goal should be that your child functions as independently as possible. If you do feel as though a 1:1 assistant would help your child to be more successful in learning at school, what activities and what environment does your child need the 1: 1 assistance? For more information on how to request for a paraprofessional for your child, visit: http://www.wriohtslaw.com/info/relsvc.aide.steedman.htm
How can I have better communication with the school? I feel, as a parent, I have no idea what my child is doing at school everyday.
This is a question we frequently hear from parents, especially from parents whose child is non-verbal. Parents really want to know what is happening at school and what they can work on at home to help with progress at school.
First thing first, any time you want something done on a consistent basis, make sure you put it in the child's Individual Educational Plan (IEP). When it is written in the IEP, the school is, by law, required to carry it out. So, when you meet with the IEP team, discuss with the team your concern and decide as a team the best way to communicate back and forth from home to school in order for everybody to be better educated about the student. Here are a few ideas other teams have used:
- Spiral bound notebook that goes back and forth from home to school. The school will write things that happened in it with the date and send it home. The parents will then add anything eventful to it and send it back to the school. This is simple and easy, however, the information tends to be very "subjective" meaning it's usually things like how the child felt overall, the child's behavior, etc. If you really want to know more about how your child did on certain tasks, you might want to consider something more specific.
- Worksheet that the teacher completes everyday. With a worksheet, you can customize what you want the teacher to document everyday. Make it as simple as possible, because teachers are very busy at the end of day! Make it possibly a simple check off sheet where they don't have to add a lot of additional information. You might want to include in the worksheet things such as: activities they performed, centers they participated in, socialization with other students, what they ate, goals that were addressed, etc. With the worksheet, the teacher can make copies of it and fill it out everyday or weekly, whatever the team decides!
Keeping good communication between the school and home is a vital component of a good program. Think creatively in coming up with ways to get the information you need about your child while also keeping in mind the needs of the teacher.
How can I get my child around typical kids more often during school?
As the research says, a big component of effective programming for young children with autism is that they be with typical children (http://www.nap.edu/, National Research Council). So, you are right on track for wanting your child to be with other children his/her age without autism!
First, you should request a meeting with the Individualized Educational Team (IEP) team. In order for the child to be in more regular education classes, it needs to be put on the child's IEP.
Prior to going to the IEP team, it might be helpful if you print off a few articles on the importance of including children with autism with typical children. Here's a good link that discusses what the research says about inclusion: http://www.wrightslaw.com/info/lre.incls.rsrch.whitbread.htm .
You also might want to bring the child's school schedule with you, so you can as a team looks at different opportunities the child might have during the day to be around typical children.
When you are talking with the team instead of asking "Can we get Johnny around typical kids more?" ask the team, "What will it take to get Johnny around typical kids more?" The first question is a yes/no question, whereas the second question encourages the team to problem solve through the issue versus just saying "yes" or "no."
Also, remember to start with small steps in order to help the child feel success. We might start by just five minutes around peers and gradually build to more time in the typical classroom, try to make the experience as positive as you can by providing the child with the appropriate supports and by educating others involved in the process as much as possible.
Encourage the team to not give up if it is not successful the first time. Reinforce to the team how important it is to you and your child that he/she gets time to be around typical kids!
How can I get the school to work on social skills with my child?
Anybody who has been around children with autism knows that "social skills" is a big challenge for them. It is actually one of the core deficits professionals assess for when diagnosing autism spectrum disorders.
Because it is a core deficit in children with autism, it needs to be addressed across all environments.
First thing first, if you want social skills to be a part of your child's educational plan, you need to have it included in the IEP.
The first step would be to request a meeting with the IEP team. Prior to the meeting, sit down and write out all the social skills you would like your child to learn or write down the social skills that are difficult for your child. Bring that list to the meeting!
When you are at the meeting, present your information to the team and ask the team, "When during the day can we focus on these skills for my child?" As a team then, you can write goals based on these social skills and also plan on how the team can work on these goals throughout the day with the child. In some cases, the child might need to work on the skills in a 1:1 setting and then quickly work on the skills in the setting where the child will most often use the skills. For some skills, the team might be able to immediately start working on them in a group setting.
You also need to discuss with the team how you are going to measure if the child is learning the new skills or not. How is the team going to document if the child is making progress? And, what are we going to change if the child does not learn the skills?
For more pointers for building social skills in your child's educational plan, visit: http://www.socialthinkinq.com/.