Parent Survey

Post Reply New Topic

If you are a parent of a child who has autism, could you please take a quick look at this? I posted this a few days ago in the Parents section, but didn't get any replies. This area looks more active, so I'm going to try my luck here. Thanks so much!

I am taking a post-graduate course in special education to add my elementary education degree. I'm doing an assignment on parents in the special needs community. I was wondering if someone would be willing to answer a few questions for me. Here is the list of questions:

Your name:
Your special needs child's name:
Age of child:
Other family members who live with you:
Where do you live (just the state is fine)?
When did your child get diagnosed with autism and how did you and your family handle it?
What types of things work best for your child in terms of rewards and motivation?
What has been your greatest joy with (child's name)?
What are your child's biggest strengths?
What are your child's biggest weaknesses?
What is your child's greatest fear?
What is your greatest resource?
Do changes in routine or transitions to new activities affect your child’s behavior?
In your view, what is the most important thing about discipline that we should keep in mind should a behavior issue arise with your child at school?
Feel free to add anything else I should know!

If someone could post a reply to this or send a private message, that would be wonderful! Also, feel free to add anything else you think I should know! I was a little surprised I didn't get any responses on my original post; I hope I'm not being too invasive. If you need proof that I'm a student or something, let me know. I'm not a creeper just fishing for information, I promise!

Not to be overly blunt, but does your school teach anything about the ethics of jumping onto a support forum for people who might not be treated all that nicely by society only to treat them as your personal lab rats?

If not, I'll give you a brief synopsis:

It's offensive. It will also almost guarantee you get only a certain biased set of responses so it's usually not considered a valid way to collect data, either.

I don't intend to offend anyone at all. If I did, I'm sorry. I'm actually a special education teacher who has had quite a bit of experience working with autistic people and, while I don't claim to know everything about their cultures and struggles, I am familiar and able to empathisize with them. I just need some help on a school assignment and these are the questions I'm supposed to ask. I'm supposed to write a short paper based on the interview questions. I'm not collecting data either. I just need to base my paper off of the questions.

If you don't want to help me, fine, but don't accuse me of treating you as "lab rats" because that isn't fair. I just wanted to get some insight from someone who has raised a child in the autism spectrum.