Care to discuss your schooling experience?

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Hi,
I am a high school teacher in training, taking a course on special populations. I would very much like it if
someone shared what it was like having aspergers specifically in the grade school environment. What was your interaction like with peers? Teachers? Were you given alternative assignments or individualized learning plans? I am also curious as to how you would describe your exceptionality.

Thanks for any posts!

High school was pure torture to me. I got along fine with the teachers but I did feel sorry for them because of the plethora of juvenile delinquents they were forced to deal with. These kids had zero respect. I kept my distance from them. I even walked home the 3 1/2 miles to my house every day instead of riding on that juvenile delinquents bus.

I skipped my senior prom and tried to get out of taking my school picture. I relented but went to the photography session without a suit like the others. I just wore a jeans and t-shirt. If my school had one day caught on fire and burned to the ground I wouldn't have shed a tear. It wouldn't have been missed by me.

Kudos to you for trying to become a teacher. I'm a nurse so I know what it's like to have a despicable profession. I don't even know which is worse. Both sound like torture to me.

Welcome to WPea

A higher level of Hell.
I went through elementary school in the '70s. Open-concept - group work - regimentation. And then their was the yelling. And I could write a novella about recess. Just plain Hell.
I guess it's different now that kids are identified.

I was in elementary school in the mid-late 60's. Ever since kindergarten teacher would give me bad marks regarding social abilities, as well as my organizational and handwriting skills. I was always being punished by my parents for these lack of skills.

Junior and senior high is when all hell broke loose. Not only was I ostracized by my classmates, most of my teachers ostracized me as well. What few friends I did have, we're not allowed to come home with me, as my parents would not allow any kind of visitation.

College wasn't much better. Sure, I went to a few parties, but never had that great of a time, as I can't stand drunks, nor do I like the taste or smell of alcoholic beverages, cigarette smoke or marijuana smoke.

I was 'miss identified' three times in school, twice in elementary, and again in jr high. Had the first attempt been done the same way just a few years later, I would probably have been identified, instead of being told that it was probable that both my 9 yo and myself were uncaught HFA. We are in the starting phases of having him tested, but looking back, I think we know the answer...

Elementary was a weird mess for me, I was bullied more than some, and it caused me to be transferred to another school after having a lasso around my neck. I was marked for TAG at the same time, and sent back to first school 1 day a week for their gifted program.

Jr high and highschool were about the same as each other, I could count my friends on one hand, and I am not in touch with any of them. (Aside from my cousin, who married my wife's ex BF, and their son who considers our son to be among his best friends) My current best friend is someone I havn't even seen in almost 10 years now. (Though I did meet his wife a few months ago.)

In HS, I ran into a problem that I think I blamed largly on the teachers. My sister got a full ride to Northwestern, and the teachers wanted to repeat that success on me. It caused me to lock up, and more than once, I would only do my work at the last minute. That contined to college.

In college, after 1 semester, I paid a lot extra and got the dorm room to myself, no roommate. (He was a jerk to begin with, but I really preferred the privacy.) I only have 1 friend from 5 years of college, and maybe 1 livining in this town. I found out the other friend I had here was moving across the country when I drove past his garage sale... Anyways, the only real time i remember interacting with others in my dorm was freshman year when I went with a few others to a strip club, but even then, I didn't really hang around them, and I can't remember a single name of any of the people that went. (Though I can remember the stage name of the stripper that I paid for a lap dance from, 15 years ago...) (I actually do have a few of the professors on my facebook friend list. I hung out in the science offices a bit more than I should have.)

I can say that I am watching my oldest son with what will probably turn out to be HFA (one teacher of his said she doubted it because he was too smart, another teacher said she expected it 6 years ago when he was in preschool, but wasn't allowed to tell us.) He gets a bit of dislike towards him as he tries to give ideas and control group settings where he has no business controlling the group. He doesn't really have the correct sense of personal boundries, though that has improved, and there hasn't been any noticable effects from his toe walking.

I think all of the torture that I went through in high school made me the person I am today. Having asperger's and being in high school sucked and I had to be put on an IEP for it. It was apparent how different I was as I had issues with anxiety and I had friends, yeah, a good number of them actually, but I preferred to be alone. I couldn't help it, being so different. Even when I tried to fit in it was not normal for me. Can you complete a jigsaw puzzle if you have a piece that isn't the same shape as the empty space? NO, you f***ing can't! I had a couple girlfriends in high school, but you can already guess what happened... go ahead, I'll wait... ok... if you guessed they broke up with me due to my cursed disability then you guessed it right!

On the bright side, my teachers were for the most part pretty awesome. They were accepting of the fact that I wasn't normal and I even became pretty good friends with my English teacher, which also happened to be the subject I excelled in. Know what? It wasn't good enough though because I was still bullied and shunned. It's years later, I don't even like people anymore and I make no effort in trying to get to know them because I know what they'll do! They will pick on me, cast me aside and shun me. They always do... but that's ok, because I should be accepting of this "gift" that God gave me. They can be normal while I sit over here being a F*** UP! I'm sorry, but I go to a very dark place when I think about my high school days...

[Moved from Getting to know each other to School and College Life]

I am 16 and currently in HS.
During elementary school I only officially had an ADD diagnosis, even though some counselors had already brought up the fact that I might possibly have had some form of high-functioning autism as well.
Elementary school was not that good but neither terrible. I used to suck at some subjects and be good at others, I had no friend through 1st and 2nd grade and only occasionally played with other children if they asked me to. The bullying was very scarce during the first two grades and disappeared almost completely in 3rd, 4th and 5th grades. I was a very shy kid in 1st, 2nd and 3rd grade, but then my shyness became less evident. I had my first friends in 3rd grade.
The teachers didn't like me and they always scolded me. I'm going to write only a few examples about this:
once in 3rd grade we had to paint a thing to bring home. I had an awful coordination back then and I wasn't able to paint properly. The teacher noticed it, got mad at me and called another kid to paint the drawing instead of helping me with it.
another time in 4th grade I was drawing and a kid came close to me to see my drawing. When we had to present the drawing to the teacher she got mad at me and said I had copied my drawing from the other kid that had came close to me to see what I was drawing. Telling them he had copied from me and not me from him would have been useless; they wouldn't have believed me anyway.
Middle school was awful. The teachers were a**holes and the kids as well. I got through a lot of teasing and ostracising but I was never physically bullied. I used to skip school a lot during 6th, 7th and 8th grade and there's not really anything to tell. In 8th grade the school counselor told me I had Asperger's and my mother brought me to two other psychiatrists: one agreed on the fact that I had Asperger's, the other said I didn't have Asperger's but OCD and another anxiety disorder.
Now I am in HS and it's mostly ok.

To me a school reunion has all the attractions of a descent into hell, I have had dealings with quite a few things which can mess you up big time in my adult life. The kids at school seemed to want to hunt me for their own perverse ammusement, which to me is far more horrible than a legion of amoral threats from the forces of nature.

While I can not be bothered to plot revenge (I have far better things to spend my time on) on them I would take my own pleasure out of being just like a vogon if they ever asked me for help, I would refuse to lift a finger to help them. My reasoning is that if they made a choice to make my life as bad as they could, why should I ever help them.

The other pupils either hated me or were so keen to fit in with the right crowd that they shunned me or worse. Some of the staff were OK but a lot of them were just older bullies on a ego trip or cowards who just wanted to maintain the status quo. The school was more interested in small things like someone not quite wearing the right shade of grey for their socks than they were in bullying and violence.

I have not maintained contact with any other pupils from school, I see no point. As far as I am concerned I am not interested in them or what they have done.

I went to public school from 1965-1977. I was bullied all the way through school. My school years were pure hell. Kids made fun of me, pushed me around, stole my books, and called me ret*d. At graduation, though, I evened the score by graduating in the top 5 of my class magna cum laude. I still have no desire to see my classmates because, unlike other kids, I did not form any lasting friendships. I was never part of a group--I never fit in anywhere and today I still don't belong.

My teachers told my parents during my elementary years that I had some serious issues, but nothing was done. Instead of trying to help me, my parents would scold me about them getting called to the school constantly, and they would ask me why couldn't I be like the other kids so they wouldn't pick on me. That was totally beside the point--I was different and I couldn't help it. When I was in the fifth grade, the school sent me to a psychologist who in turn sent me to a neurologist in Atlanta. Instead of this being a day off and a fun time, my parents ranted and raved about losing time from work and how it was all my fault. They kept bringing it up for a long time afterward saying there was nothing wrong with me and I had cost them unnecessary money. The truth was, something was wrong but they did not know what. They did not do an EEG, which, I later found out, was supposed to have been done. The neurologist told my parents that I was just "odd" (a primitive term for Asperger's, 1970) and they would just have to live with it. A few weeks later, I was expelled from my elementary school for disruptive behavior and had to finish the year at a different school. From there, things just went downhill. My grades plummeted because I wasn't trying, I would fly into rages at home and try to harm myself so I wouldn't have to go back to that school. I was hoping that I could be put in a hospital for a while. Not surprisingly, nothing was done.

I had no close friends, so I couldn't talk to anyone because no one understood. I believe the counselors, staff, and teachers knew that I was different, but did not know what to do since I was an honor student. Surely something could have been done, like social skills training, or putting me in a special school.

What do you know about education from the mid 60's to late 70's? What kinds of resources, if any, were available to aspie kids at that time?

Last edited by cooler8625 on 14 Jun 2014, 10:06 pm, edited 1 time in total.

I wasn't diagnosed.

School was tough for me, I always did poorly... until Jr High when one of my teachers started placing me at a desk by myself. Things started going up from there, assuming in retrospect I was overstimulated by the other kids.
I had a couple good friends who were oddballs, but, was mostly bullied and beaten up at that age.
Again, that tapered off as I got older. By the time high school ended, everyone was really nice to me.

I'm 16 (17 in 2 days!) and in HS. i was diagnosed when i was 4.
My parents didn't agree with the diagnosis, i read that my mom was urged to...exaggerate my symptoms to get treatment for me.
I had speech therapy since preschool and i still have it. mostly for stupid reasons, like "dentalization" of /s/ and /z/, stuff like that. (my native language is Spanish, maybe that's why.)

I went to elementary school in the 2000s, i went to one school for preschool and kindergarten, another for 1st to 6th. one of the only things i remember about that time was stealing a plastic helmet from one of my teachers, getting a glass bottle and breaking it against a lamppost (i was punished lightly for this). i really had only one "friend" i remember, a blonde kid named eric. i don't think it was mutual...his mom would give me tootsie rolls though. I wasnt bullied or anything, i was mostly left alone. my relationships were mostly one sided. i would tag along with groups of people when i felt like it...maybe i annoyed them.

our elementary school would have these singing events twice a year, i would just stand in the back and lip-sing...or not at all. what ones with costumes were the worst. i was pulled into the office once for not singing.

my teachers liked me though. they thought i was really smart...i was often picked on to read aloud, which i hated. i was able to pronounce long difficult words but i would freeze up when they called on me. they noticed i had "artistic ability". i read a lot, mostly during inappropriate times. sometimes i got strange looks, and i deserved it, i did things like pull out my hair in class, yell and stuff. i dressed rather badly, long sleeved shirts and gym pants every day. the last time i ever wore shorts to school was in 1st grade, and that was for a field trip, to the beach. even nowadays i still see my 6th grade teacher around downtown. we talk a bit.

when it comes to teachers, jr high wasn't as good, but i got a bit better with making friends. in 7th grade, most of my acquaintances were 8th graders, it was a fun year. i wasn't too close with them but i was happy nonetheless. i got a lot of signatures in my yearbook.
8th grade was meh, my 8th grade peeps graduated, and i struggled a lot in class. i had 2 honors classes, history and english. english especially was bad. my teacher was confusing, and his assignments...i didn't see any real point in them. also he was HUGE beatles fan.
But high school...freshman year was the best thing ever. my classes were at a good challange level, they were interesting...and i met katie...yah. it was just great...sophomore year not as much.
junior year was awful. bad grades, all the people i talked to and actually cared about were gone
hah and i was really...bleh. i was the most lonely i've been in a long time, but i didn't tell anyone of course i didn't sem to fit in anywhere and i was tired of trying...so for lunch, i just spent it at home with myself.

on the plus side i got started with a social skills...coach (i don't know her actual title). she helped me a bit.

oh well.
just one more year of HS. wish me luck.

I'm actually surprised at how many of us have bad experiences at school. Mine went by pretty well. I was quiet, so no one really bothered me. I was bullied a little bit in middle school, but it wasn't too bad. The biggest troubles I had were the sensory things, but I figured out how to lessen the noises, textures, and lights.

I was an excellent student. I graduated in the top 10% and received many scholarships. The few friends I had were pretty good.
The reason I think I got on fine though was because my school was HUGE (over 3,000 people). It was easy to find people like me or to blend in to a crowd. I also don't notice that I'm that different sometimes. I'm usually in my own little world, so if people did find me strange, I don't care. I stopped caring about fitting in in high school, so school became pretty easy after that.

In elementary school, I couldn't speak English. I do remember talking a LOT in classes. No one understood me, I didn't understand them, but I just enjoyed talking about my special interests. I believed everyone was my friend till middle school. The kids probably though I was weirdo.

Middle school was pretty rough. I tried so hard to fit in. Friendships became less "tag and hide/seek" and more emotional. I knew was different then. My characteristics became more noticeable. I became selectively mute, had more panic attacks/meltdowns/shutdowns, lost a lot of "friends" (turns out they hung out with me only to talk bad about me later). I still had fun though and remember many good times. I'm sorry that many autistics have such bad experiences in school.

I was diagnosed after high school, so I didn't have any accommodations made for me.

School was horrible for me for 13 years that I went. It traumatized me, I had little to no friends, and the teachers rarely ever understood my learning. And that was private school.

All 14 years so far, I have felt something strange about myself with the other students.
Even in preschool, I had a rough time with unscheduled social interaction. I'd have thoughts of despair and loneliness when I was like 4 years old. The first day of kindergarten, my greatest embarrassment showed its face for the first time when I had great difficulty finding a partner for...whatever we did, escapes my memory. I was promoted to grade one a couple weeks later, and even though my classmates were a year older me, until 2009 when we quit for a year,I look back and note increasing disparity between my age mates and myself as the years went on, especially preadolescence onward. Middle school (though for my maturity level it might be called upper elementary) was the worst of it, if I remember correctly.I had an aide and even I was normally matured, most middle school kids are overwhelmed by how stupid it feels. Grade 9 and first half of grade 10, I was somewhat stronger, but far less equipped in comparison to the post-pubescent(heck even the scrawny freshmen) adult students, and definitely not capable to be an independent high schooler. Just a terrible time to be me in 2011. I didn't even physically hit puberty on time...I had body and facial hair and a cracked/deep voice, but weak and un-developed musculature and bone structure, facial expressions, and not normal testosterone levels.
2012-present finally brought a person who looked like a grade 9-10 student...still had an aide, but I finally hit puberty, and I was regularly lifting weights...Still no job, looked like an underclassman, and couldn't independently do things, but I was LEARNING and experiencing...Good times,bad times, all up to me...
hopefully college will get better