Schooling your child with Asperger's Syndrome?

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My daughter is alomost 6 and is going into SK this fall. She was just officially diagnosed with Asperger's Syndrome. She already greatly dislikes school. Her class is half day but with french immersion. She dislikes french as much as school its self. Her school only has the option of no french immersion for JK. The psychologist added that without a structure that works for our daughter that she would probably be miserable and her behavioral issues would just become worse. I have already looked into outside help with CBT, and I am currently looking for an OT to do an assessment, which was recommended by the psychologist. There is another school in the area but it would be worse than the one she goes to now. The one she goes to now has yet to impress me... at all.

So basically what did you all end up doing when it came to schooling a child with Asperger's Syndrome?

My daughter was home schooled for the most part until 16.
She then went to College and is now at University (UK).

My son was in a very good elementary school, mainstream but good with AS kids, and good for him in particular, so there never was a hard decision to make. The school fit, and it was obvious. But I am friends with two special needs families that eventually pulled from the same school eventually settling into a private special needs school. Both had children that qualified for personal aids, and that just wasn't resolving all the issues these unique kids had, so they opted for something else. A good school can do a lot, but it will never offer true one on one with a trained teacher (aids are not trained teachers and vary widely in quality) and they will never be able to get rid of the 300 other kids in the school.

Preschool was not a good fit for my son and I have always wished I had been brave enough or smart enough or (who knows) to pull the plug on that one.

Middle school was a mixed bag, and we offered to home school our son, but his choice was to stick it out. It worked out for him, he ended up resolving or adapting to most of the issues on his own, and got a solid education if the test scores are to tell us anything. But I think it is more a sign that he reached a new maturity, just developmentally grew up, than anything the school did. Or anything we did. Kids are either ready to take on some challenges, or they are not, and those challenges are either coming in manageable proportions, or they are not.

Which leads me to this: nothing in CBT or any other therapy is likely to help your daughter fit into a school that is not right for her, and she will not learn all she is capable of learning, or grow in all the ways she can grow, if the environmental challenges of the school are overwhelming her. From your description, I get a sense of a child in the wrong school situation. Which means I would do something to change it. Don't be afraid to change what is not working for your child, These are critical years and AS kids face enough challenges without having any unnecessary ones loaded onto their plate. The more the environment conforms to her needs in these early, the more likely it is that she will be able to make the choice to confront challenges later in middle or high school.

I would have commited sucide if my parents made me stay in public school.

We homeschool. It's not hard with one aspie child. My 10yo son is learning programming b/c that's what he is intersted in and what my husband can teach him. Homeschooling gives a different mix of opportunities. I have it more difficult with multiple special needs children but we get by. Most communities have plenty of coops or "partial schools" where they go to a cooperative learning school 2 days a week and do home learning the other days on those subjects. We do Classical Conversations which is growing leaps and bounds. Online schools are also a very nice option. What is in your area?