visagrunt wrote:
theWanderer wrote:
I would like to see it established that forcing anyone to "function in a classroom environment" is inherently child abuse. Period. Torture. Inhumane. Vile.
I suffered through public school. I even had a few very good teachers. In spite of that, I honestly believe that I could have learned far more just left to my own devices. In fact, I usually did learn more on my own than I learned in school. Public education taught me two things: 1; to be lazy (because I was so far ahead of the required work that I never needed to struggle to do any of it), 2: to loathe being required to do anything "just because" to the point where I am totally unable to endure anything of the sort, even in situations where I am intellectually aware that might be better. I already suffered far too much of it. As a result, I am less fit for living as an adult than I would have been if left alone.
This is probably the most interesting response here.
I am fed up to the teeth with the notion that any differential treatment of a child on the autistic spectrum is
ipso facto abusive. Self-righteousness and martyrdom are not becoming, and it descends very quickly into whining. When someone compares disorderly children to Gandhi's followers we have truly travelled from the sublime to the ridiculous.
But the notion that the compulsory primary and secondary system can be all things to all children is a deeply flawed premise in our public policy. Why was Christopher in this public school setting in the first place? Are our societies so bankrupt that we continue to deprive the education system of the resources to provide for
each child, rather than
all children.
I am sooo for homeschooling, but alot of parents cant do that due to cost and both parents having to work....even harder in a single parent households.
However there needs to be an alternative to public education.
As to what I would have done,
1st find out what is the problem and correct it.
If no problem to be found but the child is still going off, then I would remove the child and give him/her a quiet calm place to finish the episode, like meltdown etc. Then once the meltdown is over, give the child time to regain their composure and gentling distract them with things that interest them. I always found the blowing bubbles works good to calm and distract me when stressed. The swirling colors and the game of blowing the biggest bubble is calming. Plus the deep breathing used to blow bubbles releases endorphins which is the happy chemical.
Schools with special needs children need to have rooms that are designed to soothe and calm children who are having a meltdown, panic attack or some other stress related behavior issue. Like using special lighting that is calming, use padded walls and padded floors to prevent the from hurting themselves, use cool colors like blues, greens and violets, instead of bright warm colors like orange red and yellow.
And have some stuffed toys and other toys that cannot be used to hurt themselves with, a couch or bed/pillows
books on facinating topics
and of course bubbles.
Jojo
_________________
All art is a kind of confession, more or less oblique. All artists, if they are to survive, are forced, at last, to tell the whole story; to vomit the anguish up.
-James Baldwin
29 Dec 2011, 6:21 pm
