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Special Needs
Only the 3rd day of school!
I am so frustrated and the school year has barely started! Monday I had to bring ds1 a change of clothes because he had trouble opening his fruit cup and he spilled the juice all over himself. We ended up leaving early because their wasn't much time left in the school day by the time I got there. Today I find out that the teacher has been trying to get him to bring a folder home for the last two days that had two homework pages and all of the usual forms for the front office, PTA, and other information for me (the parent). {His lack of organization is actually a goal of his on his IEP, but he was avoiding homework on purpose and lied to me about it when I finally asked him about it on the second day.} Also, his teacher mentioned that he had a break-down of sorts the last 30 minutes of the day. Apparently, he started rolling around on the floor, calling everyone a baby, and kicking other students. And to top it off, the teacher wants me to fight for him to have an aide despite the resistance I got last year when I brought up that he had one in his other school, but he shared her with another student.
I just ate a giant cup of ice-cream. I'm going to have to call the county advocate about the aide. Academically he's at or above grade level in all subject areas, but he strives for attention and needs someone to keep him on task. On top of that his classroom this year is on the opposite side of the grounds from where his pull-out classes are and can not walk that far by himself. Any ideas?
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Re: Only the 3rd day of school!
No, his behaviors were never extreme and we were able to keep him under control in the past.
Yes, he was diagnosed with an ASD at 2 1/2. He went through EI and started pre-k at age 3. He is now starting 3rd grade. He started at this school halfway through last year when we moved. He was "in a cluster program" in his old school even though he was mainstreamed mostly the full day with an aide.
Common reasons for homework refusal are:
1. Rigid thinking around school and home. Some ASDers get stuck on the notion that school work happens in school; in a black&white world homework is a violation of the santuary that is home. Some ASD experts, natably Attwood, suggest fading all homework for kids on spectrum. I don't think indulging rigid thinking is a plan for success, especially for a bright kid who may want to go on to college.
2. Rigid thinking around the subject. Some kids refuse to participate in academic endeavors where they don't find the subject interesting or relevent. Sometimes you can offer a carrot, like screen time, for completion, sometimes you can tweak an assignment to be more appealing by. DS despised math early on, we often re-wrote word problems to feature trains. We allowed him to do his grad project on the history of a local railroad. We didn't do this for every assignment, but it helped with things that were difficult or seemed "stupid" in his mind.
3. The work is busy work. Depending on the kid, some kinds of homework is pointless. If the teacher is passing out review sheets of addition facts and he's already doing pre-algebra, he might not need more addition. The teacher could test for mastery (critical piece) and give him something new or give him a pass. One of DS's best teachers gave all her kids a single "get out of jail free homework pass" and the opportunity to earn others each term.
4. The work is hard. Around 3rd grade or so, the curriculum starts to favor analytical and higher order thinking rather than memorization. This doesn't come as easily for kids on spectrum and many shut down when things aren't very easy for them. Be careful around this. Nine times out of 10, when a kid says he's bored by material he really means "this is hard for me". Don't be fooled into thinking he knows something because he says he does. Verify.
There are a lot of strategies for managing this behavior, Your team needs to recognize what drives the behavior and be proactive in managing it.
I don't know that I would consider this a function of poor executive function (organization issues), it sounds like he made a choice to not bring home the documents to avoid homework. What does his IEP say about organization? What is the goal? How is it measured?
We lived in homework hell from about 5th-9th grade in some form or another. When the situation was pure refusal, we instituted a "study time" on any night DS didn't bring home assignments. DH would set up problem sets in math and I would do spelling sentenses and/or reading of my choice. Given that his teachers were assigning less than we did, the papers started coming home more reliably.
When DS truly forgot some materials (we had a take home set of books in 4th-8th as per his IE; most high school classes have take homes sets for all kids) he had to come up with a plan to obtain the materials he needed. Many teachers had downloads available on the school website, or else he had to call a classmate which was a least preferred activity. Ask your team what options work.
One thing that helped the lying was the knowledge that the adults in charge were on the same team and were communicating regularly. Given that he's young, it would be reasonable to ask for a para to help him pack and unpack daily. He should also be using a graphic organizer so you know what's expected- have teacher/aide sign on the way out and you sign before it's returned to school.
Thank you for this! I appreciate the insights to reasons behind not bringing homework home. His goal is that given peer assistance and visual cues, he will maintain organization for his desk, assignments, and agenda, without losing assignments or belongings, 4 of 5 days. (Looking at this, it needs to change. New teacher, new rules.) He does have an organizer that is signed by his teacher and then myself before it's returned to school.
You need an FBA and a BIP. I would open his IEP today and insist on it. It needs to be independent (not the school psych) and done by an expert in ASD behavior. I would rather see an effective plan for dealing with behaviors or a more restricted setting than a para. Aside from assaulting other students, nothing says "Special" quite like an aide. If possible, I would rather see a kid in a more restricted setting to master self regulation and social behavior before mainstreaming. An IEP can ensure any level of academics can be delivered to a self contained classroom. Other kids have long memories.
The other issue I have with aides is that teachers do not take ownership of students who have paras assigned. With pull out services and a para wrangling behavior, a child becomes a guest in the classroom.
I just feel like putting him in a more restricted setting is going backwards. He is no where near the level that the students are in the restricted setting and mimicks their behaviors. That is one of the reasons that we pushed for mainstream to begin with. I agree with a strong and effective behavioral plan, though. I know our local CARD center provides these services at both the home and school settings. I will look into that.
You need to reopen his IEP. I disagree strongly with the idea of not bringing new teachers in. When DS was in elementary and middle school we always had his classroom (elementary) or key teachers (middle) attend his IEP meetings. Our district has rolling dates and we had June. The middle school teachers came to his elementary school for his transitional one.
Yes, I need to reopen his IEP, for sure. I see that now. Thank you. I had a meeting with his teacher this morning and found out that she team teaches with the teacher next door to her. The entire class is having issues with transitioning because it's so fast paced at this grade. Thankfully he's doing wonderfully with the actual academics. I have asked his teacher for his daily schedule so that we can go over it at home and he can learn what is expected of him and when. Then we can practice the transitions and find out how much time he really needs to clean up and gather materials needed for the next activity. I'd also like to work more on his fine motor skills. I'd rather not just take away his fruit cups because he can't get them opened without spilling them. DH is thinking about purchasing a building kit of some sort so that he can practice working on something with his hands. I'd like to get some difficult to open containers and let him practice with them while they are empty and gradually filling them with something he might want. He just needs to strengthen those finger muscles.