School problems (already) advice please

[Jimjams]

Have some fairly trivial school problems I've just been made aware of.

1. The teacher is inisiting ds1 sits on for the whole literacy and numeracy hour (please tell me there aren't two of these a day- is it one hour of the day?) which is all well and good, but he's not going to understand a word of it. The govt apparently says he has to "have access to the entire curriculum"- well yes but if his language skills are below that of his 21 month old baby brothers then sitting in a room of other children doing literacy and numeracy is not the same as having access to the curriculum.

2. there is a handdryer in the toilets which he is terrified of. He has now wet his pants twice becuase of this (and it also means he won't go in public toilets if he sees a handdryer). It was suggested (by his nursery manager) that as he is going to the toilet seperately the handdyrer is switched off at the wall when he is in there so it can't go off accidentally- but no go- the teacher won't have it.
3. I haven't got a home-school link book. I need something as I have no idea what goes on in there (obviously ds1 can't tell me).
4. Other minor stupid things like he'd just learned his LSA's christian name but has now been told he has to call her Mrs X. He can't say anything remotely like Mrs X. it doesn;t really matter because he only ever said it when he was saying goodbye anyway but I think its kind of sad he now can't say anything. I don't really mind about this but I think it just demostrates they don't really understand how far behind he is.

Now I think the literacy and numeracy hour would be a good time for him to do his one-to-one work with the LSA- surely there's a way that can include literacy anf numeracy.

None of this is major as he only attends 5 hours a week at the moment. Just wondering how best to go about addressing concerns. I don't want to go in like a bull in a china shop within a couple of weeks of him arriving. I think the very good autism outreach worker is in tomorrow and I'm hoping she'll sort out something about the hand dryer (whether its a phased introduction/desensitisation to it or turning it off) and also the literacy/numeracy hour.

I think overall I'm just worried as I think the school are expecting too much. They are expecting him to be able to behave like a normal kid, when he can't. Of course its all early days- did anyone else have these sorts of problems initially and how did you go about sorting them out?

oh Mooma- your bit about "well she may as not be here" makes me want to cry. I feel like he may as well not be there if they are unable to show felxibility, but we were not given any other choice of school. Mainstream or nothing.

you sound a wonderful LSA though. I feel very unsure at the moment.

I don't understand this whole sweets thing. I've just re-read the bit in the PECS manual about reinforcers and it seems that you have to let the child choose their own. They want him to use pECS, but they're not prepared to give him the tools to learn it. He's not even in the same room as the other children and it's not like he can go out of the room and tell them he had buttons. His nursery manager told me that if she has to use buttons when he is in the same room as other kids at nursery, or if they see the buttons she says "A has problems learning to talk, so to help him learm he has special chocolate buttons, but they;re his and you're not allowed them". She says she;s never had any problems with the others accepting that explanation.

Really beginnging to think I shoud have stuck with home ed. What on earth am I going to do when the nursery is no longer involved. She's my lifeline at the moment.

I suppose the problem is in order to integrate autistic children into mainstream then school have to make concessions otherwise it doesn't work. However meanwhile there is no other choice. No wonder autistic kids are the fastest growing sector of the home ed movement.

And when you live somewhere where the LEA won't fund ABA you don't always have a choice re home ed. The child I support had 2 yrs paid for by the parents (and extended family raising money) but they have run out of funds.
I just get a bit fed up because she is making progress and although we have some behavioural issues she is not much worse than at least half of the class. It's just that she is permanently under a microscope, because of her statement and one to one support.
The reason the staff get a bit sniffy is that there is a local specialist school for autism but the parents have rejected it. They feel their daughter benefits socially from being in mainstream.
The time will come when it is more difficult to support her placement but at the moment we are more than just coping. You should have seen her at the Harvest Festival yesterday, joining in with all the action songs, and sitting so beautifully!
Re the chocs, it might be difficult in our situation because we are mainly in the classroom and the other kids would definitely notice. However, they can see that the child is not as they are, and accept it very happily when I explain why we have to do things a bit differently. Since your child is not in the classroom, I cannot see any objection to his being given his primary reinforcer.
Time to get stroppy????

OMG the LEA wouldn't fund ABA!! No if I home ed we'll be alone (and we can't afford an ABA programme

There is a local autism unit (for ks1 only) but its crap- and he wouldn't get one to one.

Harvest festival sounds great! The one thing on his side is that for an autistic kid his behaviour is pretty good, and he's pretty compliant. Still lots of concessions are needed.

I'm leaving it up to the nursery manager atm. Having a chat with the class teacher tomorrow, but will be nice rather than stroppy at the moment. Keep reminding myself, that its really good that he's coming out happy. I'm kind of hoping that I can build a good relationship with the school and when it gets to the stage where they can't cope they will agree to flexi-school so he can have school as his place for social interaction iyswim.

Just out of interest- how do you feel progress compares with mainstream vs ABA? Really beginning to wonder whether we should have gone for ABA (but then keep reminding myself we can't afford it anyway).

Nothing to add but hugs. I work with S/N kids once a week but also see a little boy in my son's Reception class (Downs) and from reading all the posts, can begin to understand how frustrating it must be. Does your son have to have integration or could he go to a special school (I'm sorry if that's not the pc word?). He seems,from what you've said as if he's really bright and yet not getting all the help he needs. Could a team of people go in to help or is it just that he can only have one co-worker with him. The little boy in my son's class is just getting on to learning Makaton, and becuase I know some from working with "my kids", I've volunteered to go and do music with the class, which integrates makaton and songs. Hopefully, this will help the other kids to communicate with this little boy and maybe help him, in some way. Hope things work out, you sound such a caring mum and I have read all the other posts about what's not pc/what is and how you relate to auti families, but if ever I can help, even if it's for a rant, let me know. Better out than in!! LOL

Jimjams - the progress question is hard to answer. When the ABA programme was in full swing, well staffed with experienced tutors, the child's acquisition rate was very high. However, at times there were problems with staff turnover and consistency, and at those times you could see the negative effect this had on the child's learning.The biggest problem was generalisation; although it was a stated priority, it never seemed to be done in enough different ways to ensure knowledge was carried into new situations. The child has become very prompt dependent and also does not access instructions well from people other than her LSA's.
Progress at school is in a different sphere; she has learned to pick up on things by observing and imitating the other children, but now that we are in Yr1 opportunities for social interaction using spoken language are limited. Academically, we try to follow the NC targets, but always differentiate the task or the language used when necessary. If the task involves a concept the child does not know, I will usually teach it by applying ABA methods, ie fully prompting then gradually fading this out. Whether the child actually takes the concept on board or simply learns it rote is open to question. (Half the kids in the class have problems with the most basic concepts )
I think each setting offers the child something different but neither provides everything they ideally need. The blend of the two that we had previously worked quite well but there was sometimes a lot of tension for me, playing piggy in the middle and trying to liaise between parents, school and ABA.

maryz - good point about not making physically challenged kids climb ropes! When the child I support is assessed by the SALT, she won't use the language the child knows, because she says she 'should' know the other language as well...I think it's like asking a French speaker to take the test in English! And she tries to use Makaton, when she knows the child has never been taught it. I sometimes wonder who it is that needs help!

Ha ha Mooma I relate to your last post. And true Mary about the ropes. This is the problem iwth him looking "normal".

I am feeling more positive now. I think maybe I'm expecting too much at once. It is a big thing that he is coming out happy. Jollymum - we were told that he would definitely had been special school material 4 years ago, but becuase of the inclusion policy now will not be considerd for special school as he is "coping" in a mainstream nursery (actually he's doing well but the nursery is very very good). This means that he is a bit of a trailblazer for mainstream schools. funnily enough his little friend of very similar ability has just started mainstream school in a different county and they are experiencing the same sort of problems. Maybe the schools do need time to learn a bit?

I'm going to have a chat with the teacher tomorrow as she's going to ring. I'm going to start by saying all the positive things (becuase there are lots), ask for a home link book, mention that he's getting funny about toilets so that it is important that the handdryer is turned off, and maybe say that the nursery manager wants a meeting with the SALT to discuss about the reinforcer problem.

Thanks for the advice though everyone. He is happy and does seem to be enjoying it- and relaxing. He's sitting cross legged at home for the first time ever so he must have learned that at school! I do think perhaps I need to chill a bit and given them time to get to know him. I just find the whole school "format" quite hard to deal with (all the Mr and Mrs business etc etc).

Thanks for all the help though and advice.

Just thought about your ds jimjams and the handdryer. I have got to have my hair cut today and because dd is off school I have to take her with me. The trouble is she is scared of those over head hairdryer thingys Hope she doesnt create too much

Jimjams, going back to basics with PECs is quite common, we did it too and I think its a good idea. I don't think we did it well enough the first time and got a bit complacent about it. As for the reinforcer issue, I think you should ask the teacher/LSA etc for ideas for reinforcers (ha ha) and make up a list of possibles inlcuding choc buttons. As we all know, reinforcers are what the child likes NOT what other people think he should or shouldn't have. Other things, non edible, we found good were bubbles, playdoh, party poppers (OK in separate room ), those little McDonalds toys that whirr etc. I also used to haunt Woollies, Toys R Us and the Pound stores. As for stickers, purleese! It is a rare ASD child who likes stickers although some do. The only way I can see you using those is as part of token economy and I don't think you should be doing that now (Mooma would know more). I think you need to establish your baselines of how he behaves there, how the places affects him, what he finds difficult and then sometime in the future you may use token economy for something specific (if you do, you can get the other kids to give him his stickers, they like that, and also the other kids get stickers for helping him or working with him, they also like that).
I can totally relate to the anxiety though. When my son first went off to special school fulltime, having been on his home prog for 4 years with 3 x m/s pw, I found it very hard to let go and to trust them. I have relaxed a lot about it as you just can't know everything that goes on BUT you do have to be careful not to let go too much or things fall apart and you don't know what is happening. Of course, getting things started in the best way possible is very important. Its wonderful that he's happy there and significant that he's already transferred something to home (sitting cross legged) that he has probably learnt from observation (maybe some prompting )

Just had a chat with his LSA who agrees that a meeting with everyone is the best way forward to iron out difficulties. I said that I felt thinkgs like not letting him use choc buttons were just a sign that they didn't really understand how PECS works (especially with him) and that if we had a meeting we could explain why that is actually a real problem, rather than just us being difficult. There are times when we could use other things (even non-edible ones like percy or thomas or something) but when we're starting something and he's not sure we often do need to use that strongest reinforcer. So I think that's the way to go.

Feeling more positive about it all today especially after talking to his LSA. She is very good, and very keen (she rang me becuase she had sat down (one her day off) to watch a video I'd provided for the school and all she could get was a view out of a window- they'd given her the wrong video, so she said she'd pop back into school to get the right one- I thought that was really good- and she's really enthusiastic about learning PECS etc) And ds1 likes her.

Hope your dd does ok fio- I don't "do" hairdressers anymore with ds1- luckily my hairdresser visits us here to cut the boys hair, and I go to her to have mine cut in the evening.

yippee!!!! No big dryers on at the hairdreesers She was as good as gold, had lots of old ladies fussing over her - I think they were doing her speech therapy with her

will get off your thread now jimjams

Davros - you are spot on about it not being easy to hand over control of the child's activities. The parents of the child I work with found this very hard at first.
Re token economy, this was not taught well in the home programme, mainly because we were not shown how to move on to the point where tokens were removed for undesirable behaviour. We seemed to become stuck at the early point where we were filling the token board every time, by making sure the child was always successful. From what I understand, token economy does not work unless the child gets to the point where s/he understands that the tokens will not appear unless the task is fulfilled, and that thay can be removed for 'transgression' (sorry can't think of a better word!) This has led to a lot of frustration for me as LSA because the child is compliant largely due to the strength of our relationship. If she is having a bad day or does not feel like working, I have very little to offer in the way of reinforcement, and I feel this is a major problem. I have invented all sorts of little treats involving toys and favourite activities, but the child might be happy with them one day but bored the next.
She had a great morning today though and used a fair amount of spontaneous language so that has put me in a really good mood for the weekend

Jimjams - also wanted to say I'm glad you like the LSA and she's so keen.

We've used token economies several times over the years but don't always get to the removal of tokens stage and I think this is not always necessary or desirable. I think you'd be more likely to fade the tokens by expanding the time or no of tasks between tokens. Can't remember so will have a look for some info.

Well that was easy!! Just spoken to class teacher. Mentioned to her about buttons and she said that was fine. She said they were feeling much more confident following the visit from the outreach teacher and that she had explained to them that as soon as he shows signs of being bored/inattentive during numeracy/literacy/whatever then he should go off and do one to one with his LSA even if that means he only spends 2 mins in numeracy/literacy.

She said it was a learning curve for them, but that they felt more confident having had the outreach teacher in. We talked about school trip and she was happy for me to accompany it if I can.

She said home-link book was a great idea and she wil have one ready for me on Tuesday.

So all in all very positive.

think I do need to let go a bit, but hard when I've been the one doing a lot of the teaching/therapy up until now!

So the teacher is OK then! Oh good. Communication is a wonderful thing! (And flexibility )

Oh, that's such good news jimjams. She sounds quite nice and positive then, really. Fingers crossed for it to continue.

So endearing about sitting with his legs crossed!

That's very good news Jimjams. A good day for you and ds.

JimJams, it really sounds like this school is willing to try very hard to accomodate your DS1. They've agreed to so many things and it's still only his first few weeks!! You must be delighted.

glad to read about the progress being made. I feel that the teacher was probably trying to find her feet and work out for herslef what is going on iyswim - no doubt she will come to you for advice...after all you are the expert.

Glad to hear things are looking a bit better for you and your DS.