I dont know what to do about schooling

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my ds is nearly 8 and attends mainstream school. Last term he moved up a class and really knuckled down, doing his work and his behaviour improved greatly. I had a phone call from the head yesterday to say he is not settling at all, refusing to take part in anything or do any work since being back after xmas and doubs very much he will make mainstream secondary.

We have a meeting with a school (an new school) which has just opened and is specifically for asd kids but there is only one child at the moment. They have five different studios for different levels, eg. high level and challenging, asd with medical needs etcs. I would have to be referred by the LA as its owned by a company and you can pay fees a whopping £45,000 per year ( like most we cant pay that)! or the la will fund, i doubt i stand a chance but we are going anyway to the meeting.

Anyhow, im kind of going off topic, but should I leave him in mainstream in the hope he might prove us all wrong or send him to a special school whcih willl affect his future a lot more regarding work etc - im just so confused.

His main problems are hyperactivity, behaviour, attention, concentration, rigid in thought, obsessive only in things he is interested in, bad eating habits and eats very little - lashes out if cant get his own way.

I guess im just looking to see what other people would do, many thanks.

What has changed between last term and this? You know now he CAN be successful; what I would be looking at are the factors that made it happen. I know that can be like looking for a needle in a haystack, but if you can find it, the information would be invaluable. What does HE say?

I think the problems you listed are all very typical. I've noticed with my child that they become stronger the more stress he is under, and they mitigate when he is comfortable. What is stress to him is not necessarily stress to us, so getting at the cause isn't a simple exercise, but it works.

The question becomes, CAN the environment in a mainstream school (any - maybe not this one) be managed well enough for your child to succeed more often than not, or are the stress factors for him so inherent to the concept of mainstream schooling that it is impossible? The two children I know who pulled out of our very AS friendly elementary school and into a private special needs school both had sensory issues related to the volume of people around them. That isn't going to change in a public school. My son has sensory issues related to noise, and the activity of the kids around him, but in a well controlled classroom he is fine - as long as HE is allowed to move and fidget and stim as needed. So, in his case, the mainstream school can be controlled to meet his needs (whether or not the school wants to, or if the specific teacher has the necessary talent, is another matter).

There are no options here, we just have to suffer through public school. And here I am, an Aspie myself, having to deal with The School vs. 17-year-old Boy with High Functioning Autism and 11-year-old Girl with Asperger's. They are so stubbornly clueless about what to do with my kids. Also, it seems as though the school administration, as well as some of the teachers, have it in for them. I think this because of the many times that my kids are treated more harshly than other students in the same situation, and it makes no sense. My kids are, apparently, the "bad eggs" and I am the "detached, clueless" mother (I most certainly am NOT-- and neither are they!). I really want for my family to find a way out of this maddeningly hopeless cycle. I see no hope for things to change here, but we can't move. We're stuck, I think. Anyone encountering/ever encountered this sort of thing?

When the school insisted on taking my son from a special needs classroom in 5th grade to fully mainstreamed in middle school with no supports, we decided to pull him out completely and homeschool. During this process we not only discovered he is doing much better socially and behaviorally without the constant bullying of teachers and peers, but he's also quickly catching up and excelling academically as well. We were told for years that he was behind in math and reading, but, the special needs classroom wasn't teaching new math skills, every year it was addition, subtraction, multiplication, division; no fractions, no decimals, nothing new that he needed to be on grade level and for more advanced math in high school. Now (two years later) he's almost caught up, though he still has some trouble with fractions. The school also claimed he had little to no reading comprehension, however, now he's reading high school level/college level books (though I'm careful about adult content), and writing comparison papers on them (when they are also out in movie format) or continuing their plots in a graphic novel because he loves to draw. The problem wasn't his reading comprehension, it was the way they tested it. We also do living skills such as cooking, figuring out public transportation schedules and routes, budgeting, and cleaning.
Now, I'm much more confident that by the time he graduates he'll be ready for work or college, with the skills he needs to succeed as an adult. He'll still need support, I know that, but perhaps not as much as he would if he were in public school, which doesn't bother to teach life skills most of the time, especially ones they assume kids will just 'know'.

*WOW* I'm actually a bit jealous, that sounds so awesome! It's just what I'd like to do. Thing is, I don't think I have the capacity to organize all that, being the sort of Aspie that I am. Also, we're talking 2 kids here, not 1, and we need my income-- that sounds like a full-time job! But oooohh how I wish I could pull them from public school-- I know they could do better than they are and it would be great to take them out from under the bullying that happens on a daily basis, from peers and teachers.

Since your son isn't "mainstream," I don't see any reason why he would be better suited in a mainstream environment.

Just like others have posted, we were lucky in that I could quit work and homeschool my son. Within two months of pulling him out of the mainstream environment, his mood improved significantly - and it had to. He was borderline suicidal. It is not an exaggeration for me to say that removing him from the stresses at public school probably saved his life.

He excelled in home school, and I mean really excelled. Since I could teach at HIS pace, he was wayyyy ahead of his grade by the end of the year. We enrolled him into a private school, thinking the "normal" social environment would be best for him, but in hindsight, it was a mistake. He did not endure the bullying at the private school, but his intellectual talents were held back.

So, in our situation, our son is not a "mainstream" person. We should never have treated him as such.

Am in a similar situation. My son, 8yo, is in public school. He does fairly well BUT since he doesn't speak and has limited interaction w/other students they hassle with him (name calling, kicking, taking advantage since they know he won't 'tell', etc). I would like to pull him out and home school but I keep getting, 'then he'll miss the socialization aspect of school'. That's exactly the part I would like him to miss.

that is so ignorant!! Just because your son is around other kids every day does NOT automatically "socialize" him-- he learns nothing but to withdraw further into himself. Stupid school people-- they give the good ones a bad name!

We're also one of the lucky ones that home school our 11 yo aspergers son. He has never been to school and I really do think that it is school that results in the most negative behaviors. Our son is free to go and bounce on the trampoline he loves whenever he feels the need and that is something that no school can allow. We work around his needs rather than him being forced to work around the school's needs and we are very happy with his learning.

You are lucky. I will probably push more to HS...what made it clear to me was the Christmas program at school. My son wanted so bad to sing in it, so we taught him the songs (he can speak at home: selective mutism) but I had a really bad feeling about it. So the curtain opens and there he stands right in the center, staring, not moving a muscle for 15 minutes. I tried to push my way through to go get him but it was wall to wall people. I finally got him out of there. This is not the memories I want him to have of school.