issuses in school....

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My son is doing very well in school, for the most part. But he has problems answering questions if the answer is not "black and white". If he has to answer a question in his own words, he can't to it, and then gets extremely frustrated. Anyone have any advice? Any ideas how to explain to him how to answer these sorts of questions?

I don't know how old your son is but my suggestion would be to ask the teacher to only ask him questions that have black and white, finite answers unless they are willing to take the time to walk him through less clear problem solving.

sorry if my english is bad, not a native speaker. (translatingmachines ftw )
I feel his pain, I've been having the same problem for a long time, and after arguing with the person that the school got me to help me with this issue. He told me that I had trouble with answering in my own words because I had trouble linking lots of stuff in my mind together and my mind would get knotted. We made this standard procedure for me to use every single time I had to give an answer in my own words. The idea is to minimize the steps you make in your mind by working them out on paper.

1: Read the question
2: Rewrite the question by replacing any "Big words" by their exact definition and all references by their targets

you now have a crystal clear question

3: Start answering the question by stating the question first
4: finish the answer in your own words (it will be loads and loads easier)

After using these steps for a while I didn't need to write it all down anymore and I could do it in my mind. Hope this helps.

yours sincerely,

bob

How old is your son? Can you give us an example to use?

Good question. It could be speech issues or it could be something else.

A lot of kids on the spectrum have much better receptive speech (understanding of speech, basically) than expressive speeech (what they say). Putting answers into one's own words can be a very difficult skill.

Anyone have trouble with 'special' days at school setting off your Aspie?

My son is in 1st grade and today is p.j. day. The meltdown was terrible this morning with him crying hysterically, then calming enough to get it out that he "needed" me to call school and "cancel pajama day".

Worked through enough to find out that what was most upsetting him was that last year when they had p.j. day we compromised and he wore his robe over his clothes (because p.j.'s are not meant to be worn during the day, no switching compartments allowed). It was a good compromise I thought. But he said people (teachers) asked him last year why he didn't have pajama's on and he's still upset over that.

So we made the same compromise today that he'd wear his robe over clothes so that he doesn't totally stand out as not joining in. and we scripted and planned what he could say when someone asks him why he's not wearing pajamas. He helped figure out what he could say, we worked it out together, he will say "Some people like to wear pajama's and some people like to wear clothes."

And with that bit of 'armor' he walked into school and class without tears!


I then emailed his teacher and the school counselor to fill them in and to ask that they keep watch for problems and more meltdowns throughout the day.

and my husband says I don't have a full time job.

My son is 11 in 5th grade. If they asked him a question using .... what to you think, or do you think this was the right choice... He can't seem to grasp that there really is no right or wrong answer. He can't come up with his own answer. Or when he is reading in his social studies book, he will look for the EXACT word for word answer! If he can't find that, then he gives up and says he can't find it.

Yeah, my son also.

He will give an answer and then look at me and say "right?" I'll say sure if that's what you think and he will freak and have a meltdown saying he doesn't know "is that right???! !! Tell me, is that right??! !" and the question may have been do you want ketchup for your fries?

It could be a speech thing, or he could be very inflexible. Either way, practice answering questions at home would probably help.

There are a number of children's games out there at toy stores, Lakeshore Learning, teacher supply stores, and online teacher supply stores that involve answering questions. I would try doing these with your son and see if this helps. Maybe he is anxious about stating his own opinions and a little practice would help with this.

On the other hand, if you are dealing with a speech disorder, you might benefit from speech therapy or you can try making questions and suggested answers for your your son.

For my older son with classic autism and a history of speech delay and learning issues, you can ask him questions all day long, but if he doesn't know the proper sentence structure to use when answering the question, it will just lead to frustration.

In kindergarten, the teacher found that he could answer oral questions in class if given choices--multiple choice or true/false.

With my older son, I had to do extensive work with him in order to get him to effectively answer oral questions, which are the basis for conversation. You can see examples of the materials that I made for him on my free Speech and Vocabulary Channel on YouTube in the "uploads" section. ( www.youtube.com/user/vids4autkids3 ).

I also have tons of links to teacher supplies, educational websites, speech materials (generally free, with a free trial, or at least reasonably priced) on my free website, www.freevideosforautistickids.com.

With my older son, I would read him a question on a flashcard and let him read the answer to me, letting him see the question, suggested answer, and accompanying photograph or drawing. We would do this over and over, with many similar questions grouped together until he learned the appropriate pattern and could make up his own sentences and responses.

We have also worked extensively on vocabulary, which has also contributed to his issues.

Good luck! The situation sounds fixable.

I always dreaded assembly days, field trip days, fun field days et cetera. While my son often looked forward to them, he had in his head what would happen, and rarely did it ever turn out that way. I found out last year (4th grade) that the principal would seek out my son the day of assemblies, special days, and substitute teacher to remind him personally and see if he had any questions. She would then stay by him during the assemblies, or check by the classroom often to see if he was doing okay. (In some ways, I love that the principal went out of her way to make sure he was doing well. But I didn't know how "bad" it had become, or how much they were accommodating him, so he didn't even get tested, nor did we even consider a diagnosis until last year. It was like they hid how bad it really was from us.)

By the way, awesome solution to the PJ day/robe issue. Great job!

Thanks, I got an email a little bit ago from the counselor and his teacher telling me he's doing well, so the robe and 'script answer' helped him. yay!

I agree, very awesome that they were looking out for your son but they really should have let you in on it.

I've had to push my school to get eval's on my son for IEP, he's now just starting his second and the first they based most on the speech teacher............. he's been talking adult-like sentences since he was 15 months old, duh, aspie????? so he was denied.

It's like they didn't want him to have an IEP, I felt like I was being roadblocked and looked at as an over reactive mom. I'm not at all but I am a pro-active mom which is why my son has done as well as he's done.

It took me writing to his teacher and school conselor asking, not threatening, "did they think the school is possibly not the right match for him and would they feel that trying a montessori would be appropriate?" I simply said "If he's a square peg we shouldn't be trying to fit him into a round hole."

Guess what, I got immediate attention as there is no montessori in our district and he'd have to go to another district which = loss of money for my school district. Interesting how that happened.

anyway, seems that my son's school was quick to accept that he has Asperger's but not so quick to want formal IEP concerning it.

son came home so happy today! He made it through pajama day with no tears! Sucess!! he learned something valuable today about diagnosing what the problem really was and working out a solution and compromise and he gained some strength to his self esteem as a result.

Today was a good day.

Get to know the IDEA, the advocates in your area, and the state special education board. They might not want to give your kids an IEP, but if the kid needs one you can fight for it. No fun I know. Nice job handling the pj issue.

He has an IEP, And I am working on getting a behavioral aid to come in and help us with homework issue and such. It just seems that when he decides he doesn't want to do his homework that's that. He won't do it. I have had to send him to bed several nights after he has spent 3 or 4 hours sitting at the table doing 4 problems. I feel that a lot of it is that he wants me to sit over him and help him. I have 3 other children and don't always have time to do this. I know that if he would just try he can do it on his own. it;s just that he doesn't want to, and I don't know how to encourage him to work on his own. But when he is motivated he can get his homework done in no time! I understand this is part of aspergers, but I just don't know what to do sometimes!

If he's spending that long on homework it might be too much. He may be able to do fewer problems and do fine. How much does he need to do to understand the subject?

Is he better at some types of assignments than others? Has he been screened for learning disabilities?

My older son with learning disabilities, is good at doing math worksheets once he has the concepts down and the math facts memorized, which is the hard part for him. However, he has a rough time when told to write a paragraph or short essay about _______.