Does anyone else homeschool their child with ASD?

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No, I was never homeschooled. My Mom gave me special help with homework though. I spent alot of years getting physical and emotional abuse from other kids and one teacher. She was a evil b****
My parents would never take me out of school. I always came home crying. HS was fine for the most part.
I went through public schools for 19 years- one year or two I spent in a private preschool.

I have a question.

We currently have a kid in our charter school who has leukemia. Long story short, the issue is that he has not been able to attend school at all for two years because he has no immunities. The family personally knows other such children who tried it and died. The school is holding the spot open for him, should he ever return, and has hired a teacher to visit him for about ten hours a week.

I have a friend who had a severe physical injury in middle school (during the early 1970's) and could not attend school for about a year. The school hired a tutor of some kind, even back then.

Another friend had a kid who was a preemie (1988 or so). He was born just before the "cut-off" date for eligibility for kindergarten, but should have been born after the "cut-off."
He was recognized as needing early intervention, and got it, through the public school system.
The parents were happy with the preschool program.
When the time came, he was no longer legally eligible for the preschool program (which would have been appropriate for him), was not "ready" for their regular, half-day kindergarten, but the only thing they could offer was a full-day program in a self-contained class, mixed with five-to-eight-year-olds.
The parents pulled him out and put him in a regular, commercial preschool, at the parent's expense. The teachers hinted at this, and nodded their approval, but were not allowed to say it outright for fear of losing their jobs.

So here I go:
The school is happy to admit that the kid with leukemia can not tolerate the school environment -- elements of the environment that are not a problem to most kids -- and that they can not control it. For my other friend, they were happy to admit that they could not make reasonable accomodations. Home schooling, at the public expense, made sense in both cases.

Am I missing something here?
MaryB69, KID, trialanderror, wiccanaspie, Mon, PunkyKat, ouinon, rachel46, SIXLUCY, whatamess, Have you ever heard of a school letting a kid stay home for special-ed-type reasons? With professional support and at the public expense? Obviously, this would be the most "free and appropriate pubic education in the least-restrictive environment." It would be in the best interests of both the child and the school. Has anyone ever asked?

Personally, I would pull him out from middle school and consider sending him back for high school. Middle school is where the abuse is the worst.

That is a really good question. I have heard of some parents being allowed to do this, work through the school for homeschool, but it strikes me as rare. It is really going to depend on the district and how far the IEP team has come to admitting that the problem is the environment, as a whole, and not just one little thing that they can fix some other way. I THINK my kid's school is working with one family who just pulled their child out; there are two from the same family still at the school. I know the one child is now homeschooled, and I know the family continues to meet with the resource team at the school, but how much official help they have through the school I have not asked. Basically, the boy couldn't handle the sensory situation of 20 kids in one room. We actually have excellent accommodations, like allowing special needs kids to slip out into an anti-room whenever they want, but apparently this boy's classmates were so overly sympathetic they would always wanted to help him when he did that - not able to grasp what he needed was to be alone. The family doesn't fault the school; some things simply cannot be changed, and the fact that there are going to be 20 children in one class is one of them. From what the mom tells me, the school wishes they had a better answer, but admit they don't.

The thing to remember about public schools is that they don't have that much freedom. Because they are accountable to the state (ultimately), they usually have a checklist that has to be met before they can do anything different than the norm. Our school will work backwards, as in decide what is best and then figure out how to work the checklist to get it (without lying), but not all teams take that approach. And even with that approach there are moments they find their hands tied. I've that with our team, and I've seen how frustrated THEY get. We've been lucky that my son's needs can be met using the available resources and methods, so far at least (in the fall he'll be in middle school, new team, new obstacles), but not all the families I know have been able to work it out, and have chosen to pay for their own path, DESPITE loving the school and the IEP team. It all is SO very personal to each individual child, and there simply isn't a way to make a beaurocratic checklist that can address all that.

This morning I dropped my daughter off at a new day camp (for her), and discovered that one of her friends from school was there. That child is very, very poor, so it surprised me. This day camp is privately run and pricey (this one week is a "treat" for my daughter). I found out that someone, not a parent, bought camp for the child for the entire summer. I can guess who it is. A member of our school's resource team. He does this sort of thing ALL the time. He is THAT committed to meeting the needs of all the children he works with. And even with that, with all that generous spirit, I've known that he has had to throw up his hands at times and say that he doesn't have an answer. Sigh.

Mary,

It sounds like you know your son best and are making the right decision about homeschooling. I sent my son to kindergarten and it was a disaster from day one. We stuck it out until 2nd grade, but if I had to do it all over again, I never would have sent him to kindergarten. Public school put him behind academically and socially. Things have gotten so much better (in all areas) with homeschooling.

I was advised by a public school teacher, child advocate, psychologist, and special ed attorney to never sign-off on a homebased setting on an IEP. It's not a full program and you only receive a fraction of related-services and it is the most restrictive placement possible. It is not equivalent to operating your own homeschool either. If you want your child at home and have the means to operate your own homeschool, that's what you should do. If school does not have a placement for your child and you don't want to homeschool on your own, I would prefer to have the county pay for private placement in a specialized autism school. Those are very pricey and the school system would be happy if you agreed to homebased IEP, but private placement is less restrictive than homebased and should not be skipped over in the placement process.

You know, that makes intuitive sense to me. If public schools have their hands tied in so many ways, why apply that to a home based setting? I'm not sure the professional input you might get will be enough to justify the restrictions that are likely to occur. I'm sure it's all very individual, and still district by district, but once a parent has made the decision that they will be the best teacher for their child, it seems that they would want as much freedom with that as possible to adapt the curriculum, etc.

That's part of the reason why I'm keeping him home. He also has LOTS of dietary issues. He doesn't see danger at all. On Thursday he broke his arm. We were in the process of putting a deck in front of our house and he got the front door open and literally walked out. It was quite a dropoff so you can imagine. I had turned my back just long enough to change the baby and he moved that quickly. By the time I was finished I noticed him crying and went straight to him. I could tell just by looking that it was broken. He didn't even cry when they set it though.

Oh, no! I'm sorry to hear that he broke his arm. How, terrible!

You mentioned dietary issues. I think that's a frequent problem with ASD children attending public school. My son is a grazer and prefers to eat several small meals a day. He never got used to that at school and, most days, he wouldn't even eat during the school day.

One time at the school, I saw another mother who was there waiting for an IEP meeting to start. Her son had autism (classic, non-verbal). The teacher told that other lady that her son only ate a packet of ketchup for lunch. No wonder the kid was having behavior issues. He was starving during the day.

I know I still want to homeschool the kids, but I don't know how to go about getting Chip the help he needs. I know it won't be easy though.

Homeschooling is a bad idea. Its a quick symptomatic fix for a lot of the social problems that aspies face in school, but it hurts them in the long run. I went to private school, but that was obviously a mistake too. Private schools tend to be much smaller than public schools.

The public schools must have the proper social training classes for kids with AS. The kids will benefit greatly from that training. Aspies don't usually have much trouble with the rest of school except for maybe PE.

To the point, the biggest obstacle facing aspie kids is social and not academic. They need to learn how to interact with other people their own age. They can't really do that at home.

I'm not even listening to that last remark. He's my child and I know what's best for him. I know his dietary issues. There aren't many schools out there that can avoid the foods that we have to avoid. I'm not defending my decision to homeschool to anyone. That's not why I came here. I came here to ask if anyone else homeschooled their ASD child.

Oops. Sorry.

I started a new thread with this question:
"Social Training – Did You Benefit?"
http://www.wrongplanet.net/postp1606670.html#1606670

I just came back here to say "I hope you don’t mind…"

I know it's not easy. You have a thousand factors to consider.

Some children with ASD have significant academic issues. In our case, I don't view homeschooling as quick fix. It is a necessity. Thomas Edison didn't learn how to read until his mom pulled him from school to homeschool him at age 10. I see my son as the same way. He is very bright, but learns in a completely different way.

As for social stuff, my son made his first friend after I started homeschooling. Previously, he had none.

My little brother is ASD and homeschooled. It's helped him a lot.

i struggle with this too, not sure ow they'll accomodate his unique needs but i also lack the faith in myself to do it. he'll be surpasing me in math within the next few years.
i love my kids but i'm not sure i could handle having them with me all the time.
and he loves school so far, it gives him bettter structure than i do.
but we'll seehow the rest of school goes he's only going into kindergarten this year.
i know that if it comes down to it i would pull him out but i also agree that he will need to learn how to cope with other people and ral life, but i do agree with the fact taht if you're not there to teach them how to do it they may not learn.
i guess like someone else said we'll see how it goes.

I imagine it would take an enormous amount of patience (which I don' t have). I'd be writing and reading all day and he'd be doing his thing. I'm not a good planner.

Also, I don't have the luxury of staying home with my nine-year old. I need income and insurance.

IOW, it's not a choice.