Are meltdowns necessary? Help me understand

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Seasoned parents and adult aspies:

It seems like 2-3 times a week my daughter comes home from school, does a little down time, and then when it's time for homework she completely loses it. She is really doing well academically and knows the material. I have really been paying attention to these episodes, trying to understand what is causing them.

It seems when she sets out at the daunting task of homework, even if she knows the material, her brain somewhat freezes and she escalates in this idea that she can't do it. She cries and gets very upset, talking to herself loudly, pulls away and gets non responsive and has an hour or more of this. Then, she will calm down and sit and do the work.

I've thought that perhaps she has too much homework but I'd really rather not get an exemption because #1 I don't want her to learn asperger's is an "excuse" to get out of homework or #2 teach her that she can't do what the other kids do or #3 give positive reinforcement to the meltdowns.

How do I figure out what is going on? Are these meltdowns just her "letting off steam" and in that sense are ok? It is so painful for me to watch her suffer through them and she will often say to me "you just don't understand!". I want to understand. And I want to do what's best for her in the long run.

Any advice?

I can't say whether your daughter's meltdowns are "letting off steam" or not, but one thing that we've struggled with is that "school brain" gets turned off at the door - which makes homework really, really difficult for DS. He gets TV after homework, and has been able to help himself work through that frustration with the knowledge that there is a reward.

However, another poster here a while back suggested that another way to help kids who struggle with this transition is simply to have them do their work at school. Does the school offer a "homework club" or afterschool library access? If you can have her simply go do her homework, and then go home and have done with it, that might help a lot.

no, not only is she not able to do her homework at school but any class work she doesn't complete comes home as homework. So she has quite a bit of work to do at the end of most days. She's meticulous and slow, but accurate in her work.

I don't remember how old your daughter is, but my guess is that she has too much work. The fact that she's bringing home uncompleted work from school, to complete as homework, on top of homework, suggests that she is overloaded. How much of her "slow" work is the result of slow writing speed?

Many of our kids have some form of dysgraphia, and need accommodations in order to have a functional means of transcribing their thoughts. If her handwriting speed is a major issue, she should be using a keyboard (laptop or Neo), and receiving keyboarding instruction. She may need to have the option of dictating to a scribe for some assignments at school, until she becomes proficient with the keyboard.

If writing is not the cause of her slow speed, other things should be looked at - actually, whether or not the act of writing is slowing her down, you might want to look at other accommodations as well. If the class is given a sheet of problems in math, for instance, and she understands the math, there is no real reason why she needs to do all of them. Let her do the odd numbers (or even numbers - let her choose!) - work with her teachers to develop accommodations to make sure the goals of the lessons are being met, but that she is not being overloaded. She should not EVER have to bring home school work unless she was not working at school when she was supposed to. You aren't sending school her home chores for her to finish at school; they shouldn't be sending her school work for her to do at home. You have enough to deal with.

Does school know about the difficulty with homework? Some schools don't care, but some schools don't want homework to be that kind of battlefield. You should find out how long homework is supposed to take, and have her spend that amount of time working on it - no longer. Send a note, if she doesn't finish it, saying that she worked very hard for x amount of time on the homework, but after that period of time, she was fried, and in order to maintain the positive attitude toward learning that "we" all want her to have, you want to be sure not to have her working more than the recommended amount of time. If possible, you should have a meeting, or at least a phone call with the teacher, to make sure that everyone is in agreement with this plan. If your daughter knows that her homework will be time-limited, she might cope better. Also, talk to her about the changes as you institute them. Let her tell you about how much she hates homework. You can sympathize and explain how important homework is, and then put forth the plan as a compromise that she might feel a lot better about. Ask what she thinks. She'll probably like it.

A lot of our kids feel like homework is "stealing their time." It's a very, very intense feeling that doesn't compare with their peers' dislike of homework.

I understand your reasoning for not wanting to reduce or eliminate her homework however jat has a point too, we don't send them to school with home chores to finish! Perhaps you could do a test - what if you reduced the homework significantly for a short time just to see if it has any effect on her meltdowns. You would probably need to do this for a few weeks so she could really internalize the difference. Whether the meltdowns decrease or not, this might provide another piece of the puzzle.

Is the work she is bringing home "busy work" or is it material she needs help in?

The reason I ask, is that if you choose to go for a drop in total work sent home, your case will be stronger (and you will feel better about it) if she does not need the extra help.

Also since she is being sent classwork, too is some of this work redundant? If so, maybe try having her not do anything that is redundant--either let the teacher pick which is more important or make the executive decision, yourself, depending on what is best for your situation.

Slow work is not necessarily only because of writing speed. When I was in school we had to take aptitude tests. I would do well in all except "clerical skills" which involved quickly looking at choices relating to a super simple question and filling in the bubbles. I did badly because I was anal retentive about filling in the bubbles, correctly, and I would double check my work, even though it was supposed to be a test for speed. Your daughter sounds like she might have these kind of issues, also. I do not know if this is an option but maybe you could put the ball in the school's court and ask them to help her manage rclasswork better. This at least sounds like something they should be helping her with.

As far as the meltdowns, I don't know about necessary, but, oh boy, do we get them: Especially when the teacher thinks she is "helping" and sends extra coloring/handwriting stuff for my son to work on. Even when nothing unexpected comes in, as another poster said, it does steal his home time away. Also it impedes with silly time, and we have issues because he would rather scribble or doodle on the page then do the boring assignment. When "surprise" work comes in...oh boy!

I do not remember how old your daughter is, but if they could some how make the homework more structured that might help some. For example, my son knows he has certain types of homework for each day of the week. Some of it increases in quantity as the year has gone on, but he basically knows what is coming barring increases in daily workload due to a holiday that compresses four nights of homework into three, or "extra" work assigned.

Also depending on just how much extra work she is given it really might be too much for her.

This is really, really important!! ! If your daughter has this problem, whether it's the issue of perfection, that ASDMommy is describing, or it's because of a visual-motor planning issue, or something else, bubbles, or going back and forth between a test booklet and an answer sheet can be a huge issue for some children. If it is for your daughter, this needs to be identified as soon as possible, for many, many reasons. One, of course, is that if it is interfering with her education, it causes a problem now. It can be slowing her down if there are problems in a book that she has to answer on an answer sheet or in her notebook. But also, it means she will need accommodations for all standardized testing, including college boards - they might be as simple as being allowed to mark her answers in the question book, and later someone else transfers them to an answer sheet for scoring, but these kinds of accommodations are frequently made for students who need them, and if she is one of those students, it can make a world of difference in many parts of her education.

Also, I was wondering, from the questions raised, whether there were problems with your daughter needing help with her work. From your post, I had the impression that she did not. If she does, school should be providing more support. You shouldn't have to teach (or re-teach) what was supposed to be learned at school. On the other hand, if she "gets it" at school, and then forgets it by the time she gets home, that's something school should know about. It's also something you should talk to school about because different schools have different expectations - some want parents to help children get the work done; some want to know what the child knows - we parents have already been through school, and the schools' attitude is that they figure we already know the school work. They want us to have a reasonably quiet, distraction-free area for our children to work, but to let our children do their own homework. I've had teachers say (e.g., at back-to-school night), that if the kids don't understand how to do certain math problems, they want that to be clear from the homework. It gives the teacher important feedback about what needs to be reviewed (or re-taught) at school, because kids didn't get it. Personally, I love those teachers.

And, as ASDMommy pointed out, the kind of work she's bringing home is important. If there's too much (and it sounds like there is), the goal(s) of each assignment should be identified; a reasonable number or proportion of the questions/assignment should be selected for your daughter to complete, that fairly represents the goals of the total assignment, and if/when she is able to build up to a larger proportion of the homework load of the rest of the class, she can. It won't help her love of learning, or her ability to deal with the continually increasing workload, if she is traumatized now.

A lot of the work brough home might be considered busy work. It is a mixture of worksheets and copying either spelling words or math problems.

Math really seems to be the issue. This year (3rd grade) they just haven't done a very good job gradually building on math skills. They started with multiplication, but didn't do much except escalate quickly into multiplying 3 digit numbers. Now they are dividing 3 digit numbers by 1 digit numbers. If my daugter is calm and stress free she can do these. But like I said it's almost like her brain freezes and she looks at a page of 12 math problems and loses it. One page of 12 division problems can take anywhere from 1-1.5 hrs to complete.

Now for the really dumb work-they started timed tests in multiplicaton! I got an exemption for my daughter on a verbal timed test and that seemed to piss them off (or maybe that's my impression) because they turned it into a timed writing test. She gets 1 minute to complete 30 problems. Any problems not completed (which turns out to be A LOT) have to be re-written. Every time it escalates. Now she is writing EACH one 6 times, but it can escalate up to 11 TIMES. It's really stupid because she is painfully writing problems she's known for years such as 2 X 1, simply because of her immediate recall issues. Her slowness is a matter of the information travelling from her brain to her mouth or hand, then some issues with writing and perfectionistic tendencies.

Another part of the math issues is the math teacher I think. She is just not relating to my daughter at all and believes fast drills create better comprehension.

This happened to me all the time in school, from elementary school throughout college. For me, my homework meltdowns in early years were because I'd have to stop doing my special interests and start a new task. I hate switching tasks and being pulled away from my special interests. I've always had homework meltdowns about writing essays, due to the fear of not doing well and failing. I had a bad breakdown from the anxiety of writing one particular paper my senior spring semester of college. It didn't matter that I was 21 years old. I reacted the same way (and still would react the same way at 24) that I did when I had to write a paper for elementary school. Math, up through sixth grade in particular, has always been a struggle, too, due to my then-undiagnosed NVLD. I vividly remember my mother taking hours to help me finish a sixth-grade math assignment, and I got so upset that I angrily crumpled up the paper and threw it across the room and had to start all over. We Aspies cannot control how we react. Our emotions are intense and instantaneous. My mother often says that it's like I have a "switch" that makes me go from even-keeled to meltdown in seconds, and it really does feel like that inside. There's no warning.

The amount of homework your daughter is getting, is excessive. A third grader should not get more than a half hour of homework. Period. Re-writing problems because of slow writing speed is cruel. Increasing the number of times the problem has to be written shows a fundamental lack of understanding of your daughter's issues, and is probably the exact wrong thing to do.

Has your daughter had a neuropsychological evaluation? If not, she should. You can ask the school district to have one done (you are in the US, aren't you?) - just be sure to put your request in writing. Your reasons are that your daughter is showing signs of dysgraphia, possible issues with visual motor planning, problems getting thoughts on paper (if this is true), slow writing speed as compared with peers, and anything else you can think of. A regular psycho-educational evaluation won't give you enough of the information you need to stop your daughter's math teacher from torturing her.

If you disagree with the results of the schools neuro-psych eval, you can request an independent educational evaluation, which would be done at the school district's expense. You would have the right to choose the evaluator (although some districts try to persuade parents that they have to choose one from the district's list - this is NOT true). If the district refuses to pay for an IEE, they have to go to due process to prove that they have a case for not doing so. You do not have to tell the district why you disagree, if you ask for an IEE - just that you disagree and that you want an IEE. They can ask you why you disagree, but you don't have to tell them. (I know, this sounds crazy, but it is the way it is)

One of the issues my son (and more than likely, I,) has with complex math problems: sequencing.

I don't know if you have time for this, but try drawing step-by-step instructions for completing a math problem. Keep in mind that a child on the spectrum needs implicit or assumed steps spelled out (for instance, my son needs "carry the one" explained as "now you copy that one so it's just above the left side of the number in the tens column, and then you act as if those two digits are together to form a number." Saying this, I'm realizing I would have to stop him from adding the two digits, but I'd have to explain that in the moment.)

Also, I don't know if you are allowed to teach different methods, but my son really struggles to do complex multiplication traditionally - but can do it pretty well using this method, because it's more visual: http://www.coolmath4kids.com/times-tabl ... ion-1.html

First off, I would try to get her to get un-timed math tests, period. How are the teachers supposed to figure out if she can do the work or not, if she is worried about the time element. Anxiety is part of our kids' deal, and causes their brains to overload.

My son is only in first grade so I am not familiar with official 3rd grade curriculum. Bear with me. Based on what I know from first grade there are things that are considered math "facts" which are expected to me memorized vs. just regular math problems that are supposed to be figured out. So if she is supposed to know say her times tables as multiplication/division "facts" test her at home when you have a chance under the least stressful conditions. If you are secure she knows them, don't stress too much over them. If she doesn't, then she will probably need to prioritize that to some degree.

As far as regular figured out math problems, she should not have to be writing those out multiple times for getting them wrong. This is work in applying a concept not memorization like math "facts" or spelling might be. She should just do x number (reasonable based on her speed and how long it takes her) of problems applying whatever the underlying concept is ---multiplying 3 digit numbers, etc.

Alternately depending on how much math help she needs you could increase the quantity of math done if you agree to do the bulk of the writing (say copying problems from the textbook) and she does the answers or something.

Another idea if she is a logical sort: I would talk to her an see what amount of homework she thinks is reasonable---if she comes up with something that sounds reasonable (not "none" or 1 minute etc.) that may give you buy in. Ask her if you can get the school to agree if she would be able to handle (whatever) number of minutes calmly without melting down. If the answer is affirmative, try paring it down, and prioritize the work according to what she needs the most help in based on you and her teacher's thoughts. Say 30 minutes of homework 10 minutes spelling, 10 minutes math, 10 minutes reading ---or whatever makes sense.

We have the sequencing steps written out and she references the steps each time. Division is extremely tedious because of the many steps involved.

Don't get me wrong-she can do it. But shifting gears between multiplication to subtraction to bringing down to multiplication to subtraction, etc and keeping the numbers all lined up, and circling when they want you to circle, is just a lot to handle. She has trouble keeping the numbers lined up, and erasing a lot, which tears the paper, which she then won't work with that paper, etc, etc, etc.

She has had a full neuro-psych eval. We are in a private school. Things are a bit different in a private school. I can ask for changes but I need make sure the changes are beneficial. I am still trying to figure out exactly what the issue is so I can remove it or help it.

She is doing much better memorizing her multiplication facts. We used an app called Math Ninja and it has improved her skills a lot. But I truly believe she could KNOW her multiplication table perfectly and still never be able to complete a 60 second test with 30 problems. Her processing just doesn't work that fast. Her testing showed issues with memory and processing...I am just having trouble figuring out what to do to address that issue.

I also want to state that in spelling-using the method of writing and re-writing the words DOES help facilitate her memory. So I don't think writing or re-writing math problems is harmful really, unless it is just "busy work" or misguided writing and re-writing that she just finds tedious and stupid. She really rants about how her math teacher is unfair and I think this math teacher has said some things that my daughter took very personally (generalized statements such as "no one is practicing at home!" (which pisses my daughter off especially since she is spending hours practicing at home) and the teacher said "you are getting your parents to do your homework" (I think was meant to be funny but my daughter took it as though the teacher REALLY meant that she was cheating). So it may just be that this math teacher has burned her bridges with my daughter and once my daughter gets a negative opinion of you in her mind, hell will basically freeze over before you can change it.

Does she have a home schedule?

She may has set up her own schedule and the meltdown has become part of it. In my kids Therapy Center there is a boy who has done this. He would come in, hang up his things, put on his slippers and then sit on the floor and scream for a good 15 to 20 minutes because it had become part of his ritual. They slowly tried to get him out of this by timing his meltdowns, taking a minute off after a few days, that did not work. So they gave him another ritual that was noisy because obviously he needed the sound....it is a big old house and the acoustics are great. So they let him pick out a musical instrument and he blows his recorder now instead of screaming and it does not last as long, then he is ready for his day.....just a thought.

My son used to categorize people in his mind, as to whether they were "good," "bad" or not yet decided. If they were "bad," there was no redemption possible in life - ever. It was a problem. Someone who was in the "good" category usually had enough positive stuff "banked" so that if they did something wrong, they could redeem themselves, but if they got themselves into the "bad" category, there was no way!

If your daughter learns by writing, and it helps/helped her learn basic math facts, that is very different from writing a problem that requires computation, repeatedly.

You may want to figure out which problems your daughter would be better off working out (physically) on her own, and which she should dictate to you - if that would help. It's possible that dictating is a useful strategy - or not. Graph paper (large squares) can be very helpful for kids who have trouble keeping their numbers lined up. If the writing part is really not feasible, because of the erasing and etc., you may want to look into using a computer for math. I have heard that MathPad Plus is a really good program for young students to use for math. Once kids get into high school, I have heard that Efofex is a great program (for math and science) and it is available for free to kids with special needs, if they have a letter from their school saying they have special needs - the diagnosis is not needed.

I understand the issue with the Math teacher and speed. I have run into this a lot - math teachers value speed and don't understand that processing speed can interfere with a child's ability to answer questions quickly, even if the child's understanding of the material is superb. The teacher's insistence on staying with lower level material until the child can work more quickly is frustrating for everyone. I had one child turned off to math for several years despite having very high aptitude for the subject.

Did the neuro-psych have any useful recommendations that you can bring to the school? Even though it's a private school, they might be willing to make accommodations, despite not being required to. If they aren't you might be stuck looking for schools (again). Your daughter's needs for accommodations aren't going to go away.

Meltdowns over school/home work can be very stressful. It takes a lot of sleuthing to figure out what exactly is going on.

My DS has meltdowns at school over work, probably 80% of his meltdowns. (We have less meltdowns for homework) Through a lot of sleuthing and trial-and-error, we have figured out some of the problems for him to be able to provide the support he needs.
1. my son has a slow processing speed (from his WISC-IV) score - the tests for this are those kind of clerical tests mentioned by a previous poster. He does not do well looking back and forth and copying (his is not due to perfectionistic thinking). He is a visual thinker and the best I can figure is he holds bits and pieces in his mind and they get jumbled when copying, so he holds smaller bits (for example only one letter at a time) so when he copies "cat" - he doesn't think "cat", but instead copies "c" "a" "t" He also has a slow recall (processing speed) when it comes to time constraints due to anxiety.
2. My son is a visual thinker. He does not memorize things like other people do. I know he knows the math facts for example. When he was only 3, for fun he would answer questions in the car like if there are 3 people in a truck and 4 trucks pass by, how many people are there. He would very quickly answer 12. He could visualize this. But at the age of 11, if you ask him what is 3 times 4, he has to count it out. He also mixes up the times facts, like 6x8=48 and 7x7=49, he might say 6x8=49 and 7x7=48. I think it has something to do with his visual memory. So he consistently fails the timed fact tests. to help with the anxiety, I would do flashcards with him, this would set off his anxiety and we could focus on dealing with the anxiety in the moment. It didn't really speed him up, but it helped him not go into meltdown mode whenever faced with a timed test. We also did some rethinking, comparing his previous scores to his current scores and looking at improvement, not comparing his scores to class scores or standards.
3. he knows what works for him and what doesn't - so when the teachers ask him to copy definitions, he finds it difficult, slow, tedious and most importantly useless. He says "I don't read when I copy. I can't read when I copy. This does not help me learn the definitions." We are still working on this one. The spec ed teacher finally suggested maybe he needs a writing modification in his IEP - (I thought to myself - DUH!)
4. HIs anxiety about how long it will take him to do work prevents him from beginning the work. He has had several real experiences of taking a long exhausting time to do tasks and becoming overwhelmed. He sees a writing assignment or a long reading assignment, or a page of math problems and assumes it will take him a long time. He has an anxiety meltdown and does not do the work at school. To the school, he is not working, not trying, so they send the work home. I began working with him on timing him only when he was working - not "you have to finish with the timer" but "lets see how long it really takes you. I pause the timer whenever he stops working - and only run it when he is working. He guesses how long it will take him and then I show him how long it really took when you are looking at just work time. When you don't count the time it takes him to "calm down" and reduce anxiety - he does his work fairly quickly. It has helped him become more realistic in his evaluation about how "hard" the work is and how much time it will really take. As I said, we are still working on this one.
5. he has some major sensory issues at school. The students shifting in their seats, pencils sounds and eraser sounds, people whispering, getting up to throw something away, the sounds of someone walking by in the hallways, someone sniffing, all send his brain off track. he takes a lot longer to do tasks at school than at home. He has learned that if he can't get it done at school, it may not really take him long at home, because he is not so distracted. Again, at age 11, he is just starting to understand this.
6. We do homework right after school. For my son, if we put it off, the anxiety builds and makes him less efficient. He knows he is to change out of school clothes, get a snack and do homework, then chores. After all work is done, then it is TV, outside to play, Legos or video games. He requires very little parent interaction or intervention to complete and finish homework. If something is very stressful - vocabulary copying - he is allowed to ask to wait until I can sit with him while he does it to encourage him and reduce anxiety. So far, we have not had to implement the rule of we will only spend this time on homework or only do these problems, because the teachers have worked with us, and we have less anxiety and meltdowns in homework than at school. BUT I would have no hesitation to implement this if it was necessary.
7. Yes my son does try to get out or rush through just like many NT kids. If this is the case, then we deal with it that way. We have been working on a social story that is basically "People have many jobs. My mom's job is... My dad's job is... My job is school. Sometimes people like their work. Sometimes the work is hard. Sometimes people don't feel like doing their work. Work has to be done. School is my job and I have to do my work."

As for the lining up the math problems, using gridded paper or turning lined paper sideways helps.

There are many other reasons children with AS struggle with school/home work. I don't know if any of these sound like your child. But I wanted you to see it is often complex and individualistic. It means figuring out what is going on with your child. Once you figure it out, I see many suggestions in the previous posts that might be helpful. I would love to hear what you figure out for your child.