resourcebase

9 Comments Posted on May 14, 2015February 6, 2017 Autism

Autism and Education – Please can you help my wife and I with a problem? Thanks

Autism and Education

Yes I know the theme of this weeks blogging about autism seems to be education.

But I can defend this on the grounds that John, our eight year old son, is still in education. So it is of great interest. But I really need you help and advice with a problem which has just arisen.

So firstly a bit of background!

As we have mentioned before our son attends a ResourceBase which is a halfway house between a specialist ASD school and a mainstream one. I’ve blogged in some detail here if you are interested.

Now as I have mentioned in previous blog posts both my wife and I are very pleased with John’s development at the Resourcebase. The numerous staff are committed and caring. Above all they are properly trained to do their jobs and that training is on-going.

Indeed John has progressed in the nearly two years he has been at the ResourseBase in leaps and bounds.

That being said he still has some way to go before he reaches parity with his peers. There are a number of reasons for this, but most especially, there are his problems with handwriting which in turn are caused by his many issues with fine motor skills. He does need some intensive work, in particular, in occupational therapy to help him go forward.

So his mother and I have suggested to the school that they keep him down a year next year so that he can cement the skills he has already learned and develop those he needs before it is time to move on to new challenges. He also needs to make up for lost therapy during his time in mainstream education.

The school’s reaction has so far not been positive. This is not really from the school but from the local government body which deals with education. For those of you who do not know my family and I live in London England.

There are a number of reasons stated – but mainly it come down to transitioning our son to other schools when he has finished his current stage. In the UK this transitioning normally takes place at the age of 11. But we know from our own experience that it has been common for children with ASD to be “kept down a year”. In fact with much success.

So why would we like your help.

Very simple.

It would be great if you could share your thoughts on this problem in the comments section below.

In particular we are interested in your views on the following questions.

a) Do you think keeping a child with ASD “down a year” is a good or bad idea in principle?
b) Have you any experience of this yourself? Please tell your story in the comments section below.
c) What happened when you child transitioned out of education or to a new level such as high school or university?
d) In general when you disagreed with the proposals of your child’s education providers how did that work out?

My wife and I would love to read your comments so that we can help prepare a case to give our son the best education possible.

Many thanks in advance.

PS If you know of anyone who might be able to help with any of these questions please can you share this blog post with them. Thx.

Leave a comment Posted on March 21, 2015 Autism

Raising Money for the National Autistic Society. Part of World Autism Day.

Today was spent at my son’s school supporting their work raising money for National Autistic Society.

Raising Money for the National Autistic Society

As my regular readers will know my son (age eight and on the autism spectrum) attends what is referred to as a ResourceBase – a specialist autism unit within the mainstream school. You can find out more about this halfway house solution to autism education at a previous blog post by clicking here.

Support autism related causes is pretty standard for a school which supports children on the spectrum. But I have to say I was very impressed with what I saw today.

Tracey and Lidia who run the unit organised a cake decorating stall at today’s

Raising Money for the National Autistic Society

Eater fair. As well they were selling cupcakes in the colours of the National Autistic Society.

Given it was a Saturday and given how hard they work during the week I’d like to play tribute to both of them and their team of support workers for doing such a great job. And for helping promote World Autism Awareness Day.

As you can see I have share day few photos of the day.

Raising Money for the National Autistic Society

John explained to us on the train home that he had enjoyed the event but liked the ice cream and the animal petting area the best.

If you have a few coppers to spare why not make a donation to the National Autistic Society. You can find a link to their site by clicking here.

Alternatively if you have another autism related charity you think is worth supporting please feel free to share a link the comments section below.

12 Comments Posted on January 30, 2014September 21, 2017 Autism, Patient Talk

Autism and Challenging Behaviour Part 3– Biting and Scratching at School – With updated comments

ResourceBase for Autistic Children

As regular readers will know our son, who has classic autism, attends a ResourseBase for autistic children based in a mainstream school. You can read more about the concept and how it works here https://patienttalk.org/?p=1614. (As I mentioned I’m really impressed with the quality of support he gets from the school. Indeed he has just returned and is literally asleep from all the stuff he does during the week. With a ResourceBase it seems not a moment is wasted).

In fact the ResourceBase played a major role in helping to solve at bit of a challenge which came our way a few weeks ago. I became aware of the problem when I received a call from Tracey, the teacher in charge of the unit. Tracey explained to me that there had been a problem at the lunchtime play break and our son, John, had both bitten and scratched another student.. He had been surrounded by a group of children and rather than joining in with their play, as they wanted, he had become overwhelmed by the experience which made him angry. So he lost his temper and attacked another pupil.

Obviously the other student was very upset and, of course, did not appreciate why John had reacted like this when they only wanted to be friendly.

Tracey spoke with John, privately, afterwards to find out the cause and see how she could help. While they decided not to punish him they did decide that he should not attend his mainstream class that afternoon.

Unfortunately there was a similar but milder incident the next day. So a tactic to prevent this occurring again had to be found.

Tracey asked me to drop into school one afternoon a couple of days later to discuss how we all should deal with the situation.

The solution she had hit upon, I have to say, was a bit of inspired genius.

After each morning and afternoon session John would go to her room. If he had not bitten, scratched or fought with another child then he would be able to put another bit on Tom.

So who’s Tom?

Tom is a glove puppet (in this case a monster). Different parts of his body can be added one by one to create a complete puppet by the end of each week.

If all has gone well John will be able to play with Tom at the very end of his school week as a reward for his good behaviour.

Does this kind of reward work? Well in John’s case it seems to. In the first week another child bit him. Instead of lashing out he curled up into a ball and refused to do anything as he did not wish to lose his time with Tom even if he was angry,

Obviously we are still in very early days but, for us, this seems to be a strategy that works.

So what about you? How have you dealt with biting and scratching by an autistic child? It would be great if you could share your story in the comments box below. You might like to consider some of the following questions when putting together your answers:-

1) How often does your child bite or scratch in school? Are they violent in other ways?

2) What triggers these kinds of behaviours?

3) What techniques have you used to discourage them from violence in school? How effective were they?

4) What do you think about using a reward system like Tom the monster puppet?

I really look forward to reading your responses

Thanks very much in advance.

SamanthaMedrano	My sons 3 and he only bites me his mother or family or himself. He gets too overwhelmed while in public he also has sensory issues. We have a chew tube with him at all times it can also go arround his neck. But no issues in school yet.

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ThomasRaphaelHyle	I’m going to guess 8 years old
ThomasRaphaelHyle	I have only ever been violent when provoked. I am always highly suspicious of stories about other autistics being violent. But this story particularly smells; “playing” is often what bullies try to claim, and I remember as a young child being surrounded (repeatedly) by other children in school and they were not playing “with” me, but “at” me, if you will. I was not a playmate; I was the object of play. The teacher told me nothing was wrong and to go back to playing with the other children. Eventually I did snatch one of them from the mocking, dancing, throwing, hitting ring, and beat his head off the floor repeatedly.
ThomasRaphaelHyle	being surrounded does not sound friendly to me. That story has a smell about it.
smckee0707	My daughter is 8 she is autisic as well she is known to pinch hit throw chairs whatever she can when she is upset bc like other kids with autism explaining whats upsetting her isnt gonna happen she is in special ed all day besides for like P.E. ex and 20 mins a day in regular class which seems to be a little to much stimulating for her bc thats when she gets upset the reason i posted on this is bc right b4 her 8th birthday is when she was diagnosed with pervasive developmental disorder/autism and the school has done nothing i took up her diagnosis from the doctor to the school when she was enrolled i made sure i put all that information on her paperwork and at school she was put in detention for pinching a kid who she asked 3 times to move the little girl was leaning over her desk while she was trying to work my daughter couldn’t concentrate at all and she got upset. ..now i am a believer she needs to be talked to about her actions bc violence is never the answer but after speaking with the special ed department the lady told me my daughter did NOT HAVE AUTISM so i politely said are u aware u are speaking with her mother bc she does have autism i do have papers from her doctor and from the social security office saying she is disabled she said oh ok well bring in her papers to me tomorrow and we will work on this so.!!! Question am i wrong for being upset ive done everything by making the school aware of her autism but bc she doesnt LOOK like she has autism its been over looked so i am so upset and a littler nervous to have the meeting with the school tomorrow bc its a very big deal.my child has had such a hard time learning she is suppose to be in 3 rd grade and is only doing low kindergarten average work and it breaks my heart bc i did all the early intervention started at 2 and was told from 2 until almost 8 idk whats wrong with your kid and things like this are still being ignored so my plan i think is to get a good nights rest and go in there as positive as possible but this so un called for and i hate this keeps happening to my daughter she has such good potential. .
homeschoolmommy	We had problems with our daughter getting over stimulated at school. She didn’t get aggressive but would start crying and withdraw. They disciplined her by making her sit out at recess and lunch, as many as 3 times a day for “pouting and being uncooperative”. After addressing this issue with them and being told they could not have special rules for any student, I pulled our daughter out and home schooled her. It is working out beautifully. I am able to control her environment better and help guide her through difficult circumstances.
go botherdaddy	PaulineEstherHunt PLeas do not take offense. I am a 34 yr old woman, with a 34 yr old husband who has aspergers and an 8 yr old son with autism. The problem is the rules and regulation of mainstream schooling. Alot of parents believe it will benefit children. My husband was in mainstream school because his family denied and his his condition. I have a friend who’s son is the around the same age as yours which she is going to start home schooling. My friend’s son has just started middle school. The assistance for special needs is limited. In a school built around autism the accommodations are endless. As you described, your son liking to work on his own….the overwhelming stimulation is probably what is getting him going. Your son has even admitted he functions better with the tasks at hand and behavior without it. A special school would allow him to be involved in class but remove him for personal time during his studies if need be. There are classes that only consist of 6 students per grade. If he needs a “time out” from the stress (which my husband still needs after all these years. he sits in bathroom and rocks while he cries) they will give it to him as need be. Everything is arranged more personally to fit your son than main stream schools such as courses, time invested in them extra help etc. Alot of people dont like the stereo of an “autistic” school. I didnt either. I believed it would have made my son “worse”. I was never more wrong. He’s happy and thriving. I said to myself, “He’s happy and it works for him…” One big problem my friend is having here (Upstate NY) is that because she said her son didnt need the extra help his whole life, not that everything has caught up with him and he’s struggling, the school board is denying her the help she needs because she has had him go this long without it. It costs the school board 4x as much to supply the full assistance for special needs, and by putting him mainstream for so long it give the board the right to save their money for someone else by arguing and defending that the 8 years he coasted without proves he can get by. Best of luck. And Hope and wish nothing but the best for you and your son.
go botherdaddy	FInd the underlining message. What causes the repeat offense. The action of biting etc is to get a quick and clear message instantly across to someone. For example. Like clockwork, my husband will try to lay with our 8 yr old autistic son on the couch. My husband will put Isaiah (our son) on the inside of the couch and after a moment Isaiah will bite him in the shoulder. Its Isaiah’s reminder to my husband “Dont confine me!” Now, knowing this to decrease the negative behavior, everything thing we do, we ask ourselves , “Will this confine and upset ISaiah?” If the answer is yes, we find a way around it. My son pinched, dug, bit, kicked since he was 2 yrs old chronically. Breaking it down, using this approach, on average twice a month.

PaulineEstherHunt

Hi I have a 12 year old boy with asd who is currently in mainstream school has just been given his fourth internal exsclusion for violent behaviour towards another pupil. School policy is to exclude however for my son he likes to be on his own and to be in a room all day on his own with the set work is heaven. He has openly told me he likes it as there is no noise or rushing around and noone bothering him.
The school do not except my query as to an alternative punishment for this reason and simply continue to say he will be punished as per the policy set.
In the long run this is not helping he is lashing out more and more and he knows with very little effort he can get one or two days on his own.
We are still searching for support and advice to help and or ease the situation!
: (

LisaGillen

I love this idea, and i am going to try it! However I foresee my 3 year old student as having fits every time he is allowed to put another bit on, and still not play with it until the end of the week. My student loves to play with those bead toys that you can move along skinny metal tubes. I thought maybe I could allow him to move some, and let him know if he doesnt hit all week we can get it down (or some other distraction toy) on Friday and he will get to play with it

5 Comments Posted on December 10, 2013February 14, 2017 Autism, Patient Talk

Autism, Exercise and Occupational Therapy – What are good types of OT for children with autism?

Swimming as OT for autism

Before I start the blog post proper I want to get something off my chest.

As readers of this blog know, our seven year old now attends a ResourceBase rather than a mainstream school to access learning. One of the key reasons from our point of view was that his old mainstream school was not able to provide him with the Occupation Therapy (OT) which, according to government and healthcare officials, he needs. The ResourceBase would be able to meet these requirements or so we were told.

Well, on Tuesday we met with his various teachers at the new school and were rather surprised to be told that he had received no formal OT that term. The reason was that even with daily phone calls from the school the relevant authorities had not provided one until that week. Even then this OT support would end with the current semester.

So not exactly what we bargained for. I have to say I’m a bit troubled that even the school have asked us to complain to the relevant local government department. Which I fear will give them more chance to prevaricate and not deliver what they have agreed to. Out of interest, do you have similar issues with statutory funding/support for children with special needs where you live? If so please add your thoughts in the comments box below.

Not to say that our son gets no OT support. The teaching staff and my wife and I provide as much as we can but none of us is an OT professional and I’m concerned our son may lose out. For John OT is particularly important because of his handwriting and concentration issues.

The main theme of this blog is not a whine, in fact. It is much more about what we can actually do with John.

While both we and the school do OT exercises such as the wheel barrow, his main love is swimming. It is great for both co-ordination and self-esteem.

Originally we just used to take him to our local pool each week or so. But when he went to his new school we decided that he would benefit from proper swimming lessons. As luck would have it, only ten minutes’ walk, from his new unit there is a swimming school which provides special needs swimming lessons. (At a discount as well). Due to his autism he has a one-to-one session rather than learning in a group situation. Which is sort of a shame but necessary in our son’s case.

Here I’d like to pay tribute to Keith, John’s teacher. Not just can he put up with our son, he demonstrates the patience of Job. Indeed they were introduced when John was having a full scale melt down but around five minutes later he was in the pool immersed (in both senses) in his lesson.

As a point of information Keith uses John’s interest in space and science fiction to provide an imaginary framework for the lessons. So a take away for other autistic parents who want their child to learn something like swimming is to use the childs special interests as a way of getting them to embrace the activity.

Obviously for any autistic child progress is not as straight forward as we would like but in eight weeks real strides have been made. He has moved from the doggy paddle to nearly being able to crawl and do the back stroke.

That being said I’m interested to know where we go from here and your advice would be much appreciated. For example I’m very interested in the following questions:-

Does your child do any sporting activity?
How do you encourage them to participate in team as well as individual sports?
What sort of OT support does your child receive?
What difference has exercise and sport made to your child?

Thanks very much in advance

PS I have to say Keith is a marvel and I have every intention of getting him a bottle of Bunderburg Rum for Christmas by way of thanks.

7 Comments Posted on November 21, 2013July 13, 2017 Autism

Autism and Education Part Two – Compromise or Half Way House? Our Autistic son’s educational journey explained. What is your child’s journey!

Autism Awareness and Education

Sorry about the odd title but this is one of those opportunities to write a more personal blog about autism than usual.

As you may know we have a seven year old son who was diagnosed just over four years ago with what can be described as classic autism. Pretty much since the day of his diagnosis on 1^st September 2009 (around 11.00am) (yes I do remember without having to look it up) he has been in the education system here in London, England.

Just before his third birthday (I should mention that he showed serious regression around his second birthday) he entered a kindergarten/nursery which catered for pre-schoolers with autism. What was novel, at least for me, was the nursery was part of a mainstream school. Referred to as a ResourceBase it provided a specialist autism unit which existed within and was supported by the mainstream primary school.

The hope was that pupils in the unit would move on at the ages of 4-5 to a mainstream school, having been provided with the tools to be able to cope in such an environment.

Our son, after two years at the unit, progressed to our local primary school. The first year, we all felt, was a success for him and the school. However, he experienced a great deal of difficulty at the age of 5-6 dealing with the more formal instruction provided by the school after the initial year. I have to say here that both his teachers and his support workers were absolutely brilliant but it was felt, and we agreed, in the short to medium term that our son would benefit from more specialised support.

So you can imagine our delight when we found out that another school in the areas was providing the same ResourceBase education. This time for children aged 4-11. After a certain amount of waiting around he was offered a place. The key thing about this approach to educating ASD children is that, while they are based in a specialist unit, around 50% of their time is spent in mainstream classes with their own age group.

While the transition from mainstream to specialist unit has been hard, (he hates changes in routine!) we have found, two and a half months in, that we now see some real improvements.

Firstly he no longer cries when he has to go to school. Yes, a bit of complaining but nothing like the previous school. Secondly he is starting slowly to make some advances in academic work. Indeed this morning on the way to school he asked me how various words were spelt. You cannot imagine my delight – this has never happened before. Unless you count his discussion about numbers yesterday afternoon.

That being said, making friends still seems to be hard. He does seem to prefer the company of neurotypical children.

So, all in all, for our son the middle path between mainstream and specialist school seems to work.

So what about you? I’d be really interested in finding out a bit more about how our readers with autistic children have fared in the education system. You may wish to think about it in terms of the following questions:

a) What was the exact diagnosis of your child and at what age were they diagnosed?

b) How would you describe their overall profile in terms of behaviour and cognition? What are their biggest challenges?

c) What sort of education have they received? Do you follow any particular strategies both at home and at school?

d) Have they changed schools during their education because of their ASD? Please tell us how this transition has worked out.

e) How would you, in a perfect world, have had your child educated?

f) What advice about education would you give to somebody who has just has their child diagnosed with autism?

Please feel free to use the comments box below to share your child’s educational story. You can read the first part of our autism and education series here https://patienttalk.org/?p=977

Thanks very much in advance.

LindaGiguere	I Really Enjoyed Reading This Post. While I’m Not The ParenT Of AN Autistic Child, As A Teacher I’ve Come To Know Many.
lovemyboy	charlieandme234 lovemyboy I am glad the dyslexia has been recognised. It is sometimes argued that the frustrations of dyslexia cause all the behavioural issues so they may be trying to wriggle out of a autism diagnoses that way. If your son is anything like mine then the meltdowns are way more than that. Many children at the ‘higher end’ of the spectrum do make friends and do make moves to be social it is not until the rules get more complicated and the other children more observant that the problems really start. My son has only being having problems in the last year it started with party invites dropping off and now he is down to one friend and being bullied. Not trying to worry you but I would just encourage you to get a full assessment done. I was also told for many years that ‘he has friends so can’t be autistic’. My brother was diagnosed with aspergers at 27 (he was diagnosed in school with dyslexia), he made friends and didn’t have issues with other children until secondary school. Good luck and I hope the conformation of dyslexia helps with your sons reading and writing. x
charlieandme234	lovemyboy charlieandme234 hi there we have just had a cognitive report done and we have been told that he does have dyslexia which is a great step towards helping him at school but now they are say they are not sure if he is autistic because he is to social so we are back to square one it is driving me crazy we have another appointment with a doctor to get him another assessment. hope things are getting better for your boy
lovemyboy	charlieandme234 My son is also seven (coming on 8).He could not read or write until six months ago. He has been waiting for an assessment for ASD with an expected positive diagnoses (at the asperger/higher functioning end). He goes to a mainstream school at the moment and has terrible problems with socialization, I agree totally that our sons do not need fixing, it is the other children’s reactions to my sons attempts at friendship than anything he is doing ‘wrong’ that are the problem in my eyes. The turning point for my son was when he had a test for dyslexia (which is not uncommon to run along side ASD) and is now getting schooled in a way that he understands, he has really flown since and has almost caught up with the other children in reading and writing. It is very important that each child is taught in a way that they understand (they have not failed to learn, the education system has failed to teach). Good luck with it all. x
charlieandme234	my son is 7 and still can not read or write and it was thanks to his teacher we got a diagnosed and for thank i am very thankful many people thought it was that i need to discipline him more or feed him more fish oil and less junk food. The teacher thought it was ADHD but when told it was autism and that he was social and emotional age 3 she understood him more and has done everything in her power to help us. we are not waiting on a cognitive report to see how best to help him learn as the doctor told us it is not charlie that needs fixing but everyone else. It’s still not easy when everyone is looking at you with judgment in their eyes when he is having a meltdown after school or why he is always caring around his monkey teddy but we continue to try and education these simple minded people and carry on focusing on him and his education and always telling our self that is will not last forever
RaeRae1	Don’t any other parents feel like they are autistic too? I feel that way. Which makes it harder to work with the system I suspect. My 13 year old son was diagnosed with ADHD when he was 5, in kindergarten. It was too much, and I ended up taking him out of school and homeschooling him until 3rd grade, and we found a neat little charter school in it’s prime, it was a natural sciences environment where he thrived for a year until they made too many changes and moved away from the nature aspect. During this time we got a diagnosis of autistic spectrum disorder with some comments and a little social and physical therapy. I then home schooled him for half a year and got sick myself so ended up mainstreaming with an IEP for 2 years, which was mostly a struggle and I had to be in constant contact with the school. I feel rather disagreeable towards the constant interaction required for him to be treated humanely. He’s now in 7th grade, a specialized program full of kids on the spectrum where he goes to regular classes but has extra support and supervision. It’s hard to tell how that is going, because he got mononucleosis (Epstein Barr virus) from drinking from the school fountain how only an autistic kid would, so he has missed probably 2 months of school and it’s only December. But the bullying there seems pretty severe the times he does make it, so I am leaning towards trying a community college type approach or one of the online schools so he can still get the education he needs, but I would need to find some social therapies to involve him with if I go that route. It’s a constant challenge for me, as he is where I stopped being able to attend regular school as a child, but never having a formal diagnosis I never understood why it was so hard for me. I did great in college etc. but my challenges never were academic. The change and number of people and harshness of everything just seems destructive to my world, and I wonder the point of acclimating a child to it when even as an adult they will not tolerate it well and will find ways to work away from those environments. Anyhow, that’s just my two cents.
missyj6342	I have a son who is now 14. He was not diagnosed with Autism until the end of his fifth grade year of school. Up till that time we were told my son had ADHD and teachers and doctors were treating him as such but I knew their was something more to it. In elementary school setting he was primarily in mainstream class with resource help. But when middle school came and classes became harder and beimg popular was important my son regressed hugly. The school he was attending was not suited for a child like my son and the teachers couldn’t “handle” him. They tried to place him in a special day class and that made dealing with other students more difficult. My son was not meant for that type of class because he was not so slow in learning, he had more difficult time socializing. After only one year their with whay seemed no help from that school I decided to fight our school district to send him to another school. I foumd a school with a program that was for children who had more emotional issues then learning issues. Where he was taught everything in a mainstream class but this class was smaller and the students all had emotional behavior.this helped my son learn to cope with classes his emotions and the issues of being a preteen and teen. Now in high school. My son is taking all mainstre am classes with 2 periods of study skills where he is learning how to handle differwnt social environments and social cues. I truly feel that had I not changed schools and look for an alternative that my son would have continued to regress. Now at 14 he is thriving. Doing great academically and socializing in the minimum but still willimh to try