Does anyone on here home ed their autistic child? Also any other home ed advice please.

[Springfleurs]

My ds (6) has a diagnosis of High Functioning Autism.

He absolutely hates school. It is a rare day that I am not called in to help settle him or deal with a situation of some kind. I live nearby so this is not a problem for me.

The school and staff are incredibly supportive and sympathetic to his needs, they bend over backwards in fact to see that he receieves many services, including speech therapy for help with social communication as well as a one to one TA in the mornings every day.

He told me that he wished he could stay at home with me all the time and he knows he has to go to school because I don't want him to be at home . Nothing could be further from the truth. The only reason I send him is because I have noticed significant improvements in his socialisation and how he relates to his peers since he has been there. Other wise, I am not sure what else he gets out of being there. Every single day I pick him up and see his tense, white little face. More often than not there will be tears and a tantrum as soon as we leave the school, obviously pent up tension and unhappiness.

I am seriously considering home ed as I cannot work anyway as I constantly have to be on call for him at school. How hard is it to home ed? How disciplined does it really have to be? I have no idea where to even begin, what resources are out there etc.

It seems to me that he probably educationally speaking gets about half an hour of one on one teaching a day if that, so much time is spent of other issues. I CAN do that and more.

Any ideas or advice would be gratefully recieved.

get yourself here and join the HE special needs mailing list. The most supportive bunch of parents you could ever hope to encounter

Thanks have joined that list.

Riven, I know it might sound simplistic but my ds picks up stuff at an amazing rate. I could literally park him on the computer with a language cd for an hour and he would pick it up no problem. I am thinking that it doesn't have to be right sit there and learn maths for an hour, right now english, now science and so on.

I live in London so I was thinking we could visit museums and galleries and incorporate it into what he is interested in, do projects on it and things like that.

Is there anywhere you can send off for ideas of what they should be learning and what levels they need to attain etc? My Mum told me you can get packs from your LEA that tell you all this stuff. Where did you start?

just had to say had exactly the same with my dd (5). 7months in reception and we took her out 4 weeks ago to hed. Best thing we ever did - her behaviour has improved fantastically. She became so stressed out at school she would get aggressive and destructive there and wasn't learning even though she had a fulltime TA.

DD is very bright (prob aspergers) and like your dc she only has to be told something once and she remembers it. i've approached it very informally and based around her interests with the odd formal worksheet thrown in as i want her to deal with a control issue she has and she actually doesnt mind doing them. Her compliance is brilliant usually she's very defiant and i can only sing its praises. Look at various he sites and join education otherwise who can provide you with contactsin your local area who are also hedders.

socially dd can only just cope with one on ones and thats only for a short time i am hoping this will improve - but at least shes learning social skills in her own time rather than being forced into a social enviornment she just cannot deal with.