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Hi everyone! I've been hiding out here for a little bit, but decided to come out of the shadows and make my presence known. I'm the mom of two boys - my 5 year old NT and my 9 1/2 year old, recently diagnosed with AS. It has been a rough couple of years for Mr. E, and we are relieved to be gaining some insight into how his brain works. He is a fantastic kid - crazy smart, adores everything related to science and computers, and has the most beautiful eyes I've ever seen. He has a great, offbeat sense of humour.

Right now we're feeling pretty overwhelmed, as we only got the results from Mr. E's eval last week. I am up to my EYEBALLS in literature, trying to sort through and figure out where we go from here. Our psych is amazing, but in a private practice - and the first two sessions of the 4 session evaluation ate up all of our health coverage. So we are limited as to how much we can use that amazing resource. I am currently trying to communicate with Mr. E's school (he is in grade four french immersion) to try to get some support in place in the classroom. Mr. E is not disruptive, but has an extremely hard time getting his work completed, is teased constantly by his peers and has no friends, and is very stressed out by transitions and change. He has given up on trying to socialize on the playground and spends most recesses in a corner reading a book.

Any advice from seasoned Aspie parents as to where we should start, would be greatly appreciated!!

The issue that jumps out to me in your post is this one: teased constantly by his peers. That needs to stop, and the school needs to take responsibility for stopping it. I guess, knowing only what is gleamed from your post, that is where I would start, getting that issue tackled and removed.

Now that you have a diagnosis you can hopefully counteract any arugment the school gives you for not nipping the teasing in the bud.

Otherwise ... what do you feel is the most immediate concern for your son and your family?

If you don't find a way to nip the teasing in the bud, he will grow up to hate his peers and his own generation. I was teased a lot between grades Kindergarten and 10. I've developed a disliking to anything that has to do with the music and fashions of my generation, I don't really think that most NTs my age or younger are all that great and I've started turning to the 60s for comfort during my high school career. I love The Kinks and the 60s, but I don't want your son to end up hating his generation like I ended up hating mine. I was going to High School between 1988 and 1993. Just offering my two cents.

So that's why I hate the '60s!

That's fine, the '60s were worthless anyway. Give me the '80s any day.

You have an evaluation and a diagnosis? If you are in the states, submit a request to the school for an evaluation and back it up with a copy of the dx by the doctor. While you are waiting for that evaluation, ask to meet and discuss an immediate educational intervention plan to address the teasing, the transition difficulties, the social skills and anything else you see as an immediate need. Submit everything you request of the school in writing and keep meticulous records and even meeting notes.

Don't let it wait until you read through all that stuff. You'll be learning alot in the weeks and months to come. He needs the help now.

Let us know how it goes.

Yes, we have just recently completed the evaluation process and have an official diagnosis. We're not in the US, we're in Canada. I've been in touch with the school and am waiting to hear back. There is a shortage of classroom support in our district and they don't automatically take on cases when there is a new diagnosis - it's on an individual basis. Our biggest concern is with his inability to get his work completed - he has an extremely difficult time focusing and following through, and of course, the teasing and lack of friends. His teacher is very supportive and watches out for him - unfortunately, some of the things she does to prevent kids from being mean (ie. changing the seating arrangement to put him next to nicer kids) make things more stressful for him. I'll arrange a meeting with his teacher and possibly the principal next week to see what things we can do. He only has one more year before he moves up to middle school, which worries me greatly.

Quite common at that age.

Some factors:

1) Sensory issues. He may be distracted by something the rest of us aren't even aware of, that is like nails on the chalkboard to him. The strategy here is to figure out what the sensory issues are and mitigate them to the extent possible. Encouraging him to engage in a self-focusing stim can also help; my son, for example, likes to chew (straws work for that).

2) He can't see his way through it. AS seems to be a condition where hedges turn into concrete wall. The task seems too daunting. Breaking up the task and providing rewards for each piece completed will help with that. Blocking off (black marker or white paper cover) sections of the assignment helps, too, reducing the visual impact and making it less threatening.

3) Executive disfuntion. Many AS have life long issues with this while others may simply lag in the development. Assume that your child's brain doesn't have the developmental maturity and organizational ability that is expected of him. At your son's age parents and teachers can act like support personal, helping with these skills until he either learns good work-arounds or grows into the skill. Just like a school wouldn't expect a kindergartner to remember where and when to turn in his work, or have the self-discipline to follow through on the task, you can't push an AS child to utilize a skill they simply are not developmentally ready for. The people around your child need to be willing to take that extra step of reminding him, helping him, and providing additional supports and structure to help him meet expectations.

Something our son's teacher did that was of huge help at that age was telling us to time out homework. The goal is for the child to sit down and stay on task. Less important is actually finishing the homework. So one thing you can do is set out a timer: if you work hard for 45 minutes when that timer goes off, we sign off the rest, and you get full credit. This can be broken out into parts, too, using 20 minute sessions instead of one lump. It takes away that sense that something can't be done, or will consume the whole night ... you know how kids get. Now it is known exactly how long the task will take. All the child has to do to earn the guaranteed cut off is stay on task.

What we found interesting was that rarely would either of our kids (one AS, one NT) actually want to stop when time was up. By that time they were on a roll, and preferred to finish. The timer is about helping them START and stay focused, they need to believe they understand where the end is just to take step 1.

Hello! I'm not sure if things are different up there, but here in the US if your child has a condition that interferes with his/her education they have to put a plan in place. Don't feel bad about calling them and calling them back again!

They also are responsible for stopping the bullying. No questions asked!

Help him sit down with maybe a binder where everything can be kept. Created tabbed folders or files inside of this binders where he can put his work. Something I do for the kids in my classroom is create an in and out folder as far as homework is concerned. That way it is in one place when he does his schoolwork at home and if he "forgets" to turn it in, which happens, his teacher or teachers know right where to look.

Don't ever feel bad about advocating for your child and I know you are overwhelmed right now, but when the dust settles a little try to teach him to start advocating for himself especially in middle school.

Breathe...

Thank you so much for your input, everyone. Greatly appreciated! We will be planning a meeting with the school and his teachers and M&R in the near future.

Go online to your Ministry of Education and review their Special Education policies. In our district, Autism Spectrum Disorder is a Level 2 funding category, meaning the school receives a designated amount of funding for that child. They are also required to create a school based team, and an IEP needs to be created to address your child's specific learning needs. I bought and donated the book School Success for Kids with Asperger Syndromehttp://www.chapters.indigo.ca/books/School-Success-Kids-Aspergers-Syndrome-Stephan-M-Silverman-Rich-Weinfeld/9781593632151-item.html?ikwid=aspergers+school&ikwsec=Home for my school. Will it help? I don't know, but it certainly can't hurt. Apparently this school does not have much experience with kids who have learning issues such as Aspergers, trying to get them to move beyond the behavior problem model has been a challenge, but we are slowly chipping away. I also called up the district's Autism Teach Specialist and enlisted her support and assistance. While she cannot be formally involved as my son has not yet been diagnosed, she has been able to provide the school with piles of information about how our kids learn and how they don't always conform to standard expectations. You can find out if your district has an Autism Teacher Specialist by again looking at your districts website staff contact list. Mine was listed under Learning Support Services (LSS) and has the title Helping Teacher - Autism. Hopefully your district has a similar role.

I hope this has provided you with some helpful information.

cutiecrystalmom

edited to change school district to Ministry of Education

Hi,
My son is having his 9th birthday today, he was diagnosed with AS when he was seven.

The one thing I would say to you is;
Things move slow.
Even talking with social workers, getting school help, it all moves slow. It's going to be frustrating.

The most important thing I could say to you is:
Equip your son with the truth.
Make sure he understands that he's different for a reason, he has trouble doing things the other kids find easy- for a reason. And that you, his parents, know that reason and you understand that he is not a bad kid.

Next is to get him to understand that.

As long as he knows he has his family's support not matter what, whatever happens at school will be easier to bear.

In the end, you might find, like I did, that just accepting him, and having him accept himself, is the best therapy you're ever going to get.
And there's no waitlist to start working on that now.

Congratulations on getting through the assessment process.. and entering a new phase in your life, that will be daunting and challenging and hopefully rewarding. As your child's parent, you are his Number 1 advocate. The teasing has to stop. Right now. It has to be tackled by the school head on. It's bullying and it's unacceptable. Period.
My only reason for going through the assessment process was so that my son could get some extra help at school. He went to a very small catholic school - about 200 children, and 1 class of each grade, with 30 - 35 children per grade. No teacher's aides, just devoted parent helpers in the classrooms. He was really very behind, and did very little of his school work until an aide was employed with his funding to work with him for about 5 hours a week. With the aide and some sessions with an OT to help him with fine motor skills, he made slow but steady progress. One of the first things i got involved with was getting John a laptop computer at school to do his work on. His writing skills were minimal, still are, but he learned how to touch type and got to do most of his work on the laptop. As a stay at home mum, i was able to spend quite a few hours in the classroom, not necessarily working with him, but having me there in the classroom worked really well for him. It also helped him socially. The other children were kind when i was there, and quite a few of the little girls in his class mothered him very sweetly through most of primary school. The bullying and teasing hit a peak in high school, where there was boy who would tease him and bully him mercilessly, telling John that he was going to kill him, and kill all of his family. He didn't tell us about this at the time. We found out because one day in year 8, he took a steak knife to school, and when this kid slammed hJohn's hand in his desk during an english lesson, John pulled the knife out of his bag, and told the boy that he was going to stab him if he didn't leave him alone. He did that in front of his whole english class, including his teacher, and was suspended from school for 2 weeks. I was horrified. I really hadn't seen it coming, and he hadn't talked about it at all. In the end, it was a good thing.. John got a private space at school he could go to where nobody could bother him if he felt the need, and he was on "line of sight" supervision during recess and lunchtime. Since he left school, he has been recalling some really dreadful examples of bullying that he did not feel he could share with us at the time. There was a period of time where the girls in year 10 found it really amusing to call him over to somewhere private and then kick him as hard as they could in the groin. This also happened during sports class if they were doing sport on the oval.

My son kept a lot of things inside. I feel as if I should have asked a lot more questions. When he said he really hated school, I thought it was just that thing that teens say about school. I guess I'm guilty of only asking the questions that I wanted to know the answers of. If there's one thing I would have done differently, it would be to have spent more time one on one with him, asking him about his days at school. It's no defence, but he is the second oldest of 5 children, and life was so busy back then.