Does the TEACCH approach "feed" autism?

[mamadadawahwah]

I think i am going to send my boy to a "special" school (yeah, right real special). They use the TEACCH approach, a convenient and cheap cookbook style to "dealing" with autism, in my opinion.

Does anyone believe like i do that TEACCH (totally unscientifically unproven) feeds autism?? What i noticed from the classroom set up is that the school is accommodating the "autism" in kids as they see it. My son is not particularly visual yet they want to use schedules etc, and pecs. My boy doesnt need a schedule and in fact i believe this will hamper him from making real choices on his own.

I just think this cheap and cheerful approach really enables the autism as opposed to enabling the child.

What do you think? I would prefer that the school uses real ABA preferably verbal behaviour, but there isnt a chance in hell of us getting that.

All i can be is the original pain in the ass parent and make sure that i am on top of all they do.

HI, yes they agreed to fund it, but it has sort of gone belly up. I am wise to ABA I think, at least the way it is being presented to us. My son is making all kinds of gains and has had maybe 5 or 6 hours of ABA a week for months. My consultant costs are outrageous, we have no plan, and some of my therapists are leaving and to be honest i am so tired of it all. My son needs to be with kids, needs interaction. I was going to home school him. Tried that for 2 weeks and realised i wanted to be his mom, not his teacher.

However, i learned something incredibly useful because the ABA program wasnt working out. I can DO IT MYSELF, all day every day, with no need for consultants or therapists. I bought the books, i know enough now how to get progress from my son.

No scientific evidence for TEACCH and though they use it at the school i might send him to, they WONT be using it on him. All you have to do is ask for the "science". They can't produce any.

We will continue with a limited ABA program at least in terms of therapists, but really we use it all the time.

I am beginning to think, at least for my son, that ABA is just a big con. Sorry if i offend here, but its not the be all end all.

Don't write it off completely without checking out the school/ DS1's school would list TEACCH as being one of the methods they use, but actually they use behavioural techniques a lot as well. They only really use TEACCH for short periods of the day to do "academic" type work, and he has benefited from being expected to be able to work reasonably independetly.

They also take an individual approach with each child, so his timetable and teaching will be different from the other members of his class. Lots of sensory work and lots of going out and about in the community which he has really benefited from. All done at the child's pace. So they start swimming lessons in the schoolhydro pool then when they're ready move to a public pool for example.

For behavioural problems they very much use a behavioural approach.

Despite having 6 people for 6 kids (some are part time but still a good ratio!) they can't really do many discrete trials a day. However we're starting a Growing Minds program to do just that- lots of fast trials at the end of the day at home. And the school aren't threatened by that.

Good special schools are very good at building working relationships with parents.