I think I just found my homies in Rushgeekgirl and Aspidistra.
Aspidistra–I’ve got several sets of small gauge double pointed sock needles (going to cast on a pair of socks this morning after I drop Slim off s’matter of fact) if you want to poke the school district people with me.
Rushgeekgirl–((hugs)). We’re going to have our annual ARD some time in April (I think the second week) and I cannot WAIT for this to happen.
We’ve also chosen to not medicate Slim for his ADHD…we tried one medication (not Ritalin though…I refuse to even THINK about that shit) and because of what happened during the year or so he was on it, we’re a little gun shy about going back on ANY kind of meds. It was absolutely the WORST YEAR EVER. I practically had to hogtie him to get him to take his meds in the morning and then, by the time he got home from school they’d wear off so doing homework took forever not only because I had to redirect his attention but little teeny stupid things would cause him to have massive meltdowns. After he’d rage and rage and rage, he’d come to me bawling his eyes out and apologizing for his behavior, asking me “What can I do about it?”. I didn’t know if he meant what could he do about the meltdowns or his feelings or what because he couldn’t explain what he meant.
A couple of the staff members at School B want us to put him back on meds and one of them has even cornered me in the office when I came to sign in to volunteer (I hang out in the library a lot). It took everything I had (esp since the secretary and the school nurse were RIGHT THERE) not to smack this six and some change foot tall ex-Marine upside the head because we’d told him we were going to take Slim off the meds.
hands out coffee with your choice of alcoholic additions We’ll get through this somehow, right? For some reason I have part of a Destiny’s Child song stuck in my head right now: Imma survivor, I’m not gonna give up. I’m gonna work harder. Imma survivor.
You don’t have to try a drug for a year to know it isn’t working for your kid. Unmedicated ADHD is hell for him, his teachers, and his classmates. Try something else.
The thing is though, he was making good grades regardless of the meds. Granted, he was only in pre-K/Kindergarten before we introduced the meds.
Slim actually told us at one point that he didn’t want to take his meds anymore and I know that while he was only about 7 at the time, we listened to him. According to him, the meds made his brain feel fuzzy and he HATED that.
He is, by all accounts, an extremely bright kid (one teacher said he might even be a genius, but she might have been trying to blow smoke up my ass for all I know). And Hubs and I expect good grades from him…when Slim is at home, even if he’s finished his homework for the week (which happens usually by the second or third day), I find things for him to do. I make up worksheets and make him write his spelling words several times until he can spell them without even thinking about it. I am NOT one of those parents who, because their child has an issue, lets them get lazy/skate by on schoolwork. I know that having his issues and being unmedicated makes things more difficult for him, but that doesn’t mean he can’t learn to manage his issues without meds.
The thing with ADHD meds is, regardless of whether is Ritalin or Focalin or Statterra or whatever, they all have similiar side effects–loss of appatite (which we experienced…it was a booger to get him to eat ANYTHING at all. I swear he was living on air and Pop tarts), trouble sleeping (again…something we experienced), anger issues, that sort of thing. It’s not worth it TO US to put ourselves or our son through that kind of hell again just to make life easier for his teachers and therapists at school.
If Harrison Bergeron erred in its predictions, it was only the belief that we’d need a Handicapper General to impose disabilities on ourselves externally, rather than rely on our own enthusiasm for medicalizing our own shortcomings and bad habits.
What does that even mean- can no one actually be disabled anymore? There is a world of difference between “shortcomings” and true disabilities, even if you want to make it so. It’s like saying because some people limp because they pulled a muscle polio doesn’t exist.
The kids that have learning disabilities have these conditions to such an extreme that normal techniques in management do not work. That’s when it becomes a disability.
FTR. . .
My kid is not disabled, not even close. She has needs that require special educational methods that go beyond regular placement in school, which is why she has an IEP in place, but having autism does not disable **her **one bit.
Yeah, thats kinda how I felt when I read this thread. So, your kid is getting As and Bs but he used to do better when he had something that sounds like individual tutoring. Imagine that.
I’m sure I’m not getting the correct picture because it sounds like an invitation to pit the pitter.
On the one hand, we have gotten better at diagnosing these problems in kids (especially suburban white kids and especially RICH suburban shite kids) and we level the playing field for them (we give them extra time on the SATs and even on first year law school exams (which determine whether your first job out of law school is going to pay $160K/year or 60K/year.
I don’t doubt that people have learning disabilities but I never understood giving them extra time on tests and letting them take the same test multiple times. It is especially obnoxious when I hear that some rich kids pay some psychologist to give thema note that will double their test taking time on the SATs. Don’t rich kids have enough advantages in life that we don’t have to throw them this little nugget?
I’m not saying that anyone is faking anything or that I want to abandon any kids but this learning disability thing has gotten a bit out of control. It is especially obnoxious when I hear that some rich kids pay some psychologist to give thema note that will double their test taking time on the SATs. Don’t rich kids have enough advantages in life that we don’t have to throw them this little nugget? And while I am a huge proponent of public education, I don’t think the purpose of public education is necessarily to provide accomodation for every kid’s individual needs. I don’t think we should be spending so much to make sure that a kid with innate disabilities can perform at their tippy top performance level while we leave so much aside for lack of resources in other areas.
I think this thread could inspire a really interesting GD thread.
It has been determined that the student in the OP has a sub-optimal learning environment at his present school, though he is still performing above average.
I have no doubt that the student has disabilities and challenges that should be addressed.
But sub-optimal environments are par for the course for most highly intelligent youngsters, correct?
I guess the argument is that he would be making straight As with individualized attention, which would also alleviate the physical discomfort induced by being in a mainstream classroom. I understand this, and I would definitely want this for my child, if I were a parent. But aren’t there other children who are stuck in learning environments that are sub-optimal for them, who would go from making Cs and Ds to As and Bs (or maybe even all As) if given individualized treatment? And aren’t there other children who deal with discomfort by being in a typical classroom setting? Like kids who get teased or have emotional problems (social anxiety, depression, etc.)
Overcrowding is a big problem in many schools. So it’s refreshing to hear that there are some schools that do care to help their students go as far as they can. So…I’m feeling like the OP really shouldn’t be pitting anyone. It sounds like the school district is doing something rather remarkable. Right? Or am I totally off-base?
People are getting too hung up on the grades here. With an Aspergers kid, it’s perfectly possible - even par for the course - to get excellent grades all the way through your school career but be completely unable to function in the post-school world due to inability to read social cues, or cope with the inherent randomness of day-to-day life.
Personally, I could give a shit if the Small Boy ends up getting straight As in his classes, as long as he ends up able to read, write, add and multiply. What I am concerned about is that he should end his school career able to meet people he doesn’t know without it causing a conniption, understand that if someone says hi to you you should probably say hi back, hold conversations on neutral topics like “the weather” and “last weekend’s footy”, look people in the eye when they expect it, and maintain at least one or two reciprocal friendships.
The possibility that he might not master these skills, which rank for most people in the “piss-easy” range, is a very live one and I would, in a heartbeat, move him away from a school where he was getting academic As and Bs but was not getting help to master these more intangible but important tasks.
In the case of Sticks’s kid, I suspect that what’s happening is that the school is unable to manage him behaviourally and that, through no fault of his own, he’s being a disruption in the classroom. The school is asking to put him on medication, where he doesn’t want to and the previous school was able to accomodate him just fine without it. Fuck that noise. Let him go to the place that can deal with him un-drugged. Since it’s there and has a proven track record of educating and managing him just fine.
And I still maintain that yanking a kid - any kid - out of a school he’s perfectly fine in for basically no reason is mean and unnecessary. WTF is wrong with leaving the current kids where they are and restricting NEXT year’s intake if they think they’re getting too big?
In CM, it’s as much about getting away from the noise/distraction of the classroom as it is about individual tutoring. The help is there IF HE WANTS IT (and sometimes he didn’t because he’s Mr. Independant).
This right here exactly..she said it before I could but that’s exactly how I feel. I like that he’s getting good grades, but for him that’s the easy part. Learning to be social, make friends, act in a socially appropriate manner…THAT"S the hard part. I was so happy I was almost in tears when I saw the list of students in Slim’s class the first day of school because some of the kids who’d come from school A also were in his class. It meant that despite the stress a new enviroment and a new teacher were going to cause, he at least had some kids he was FAMILIAR with to ease that a wee tiny bit.
It also seems that Slim has made a friend for the first time..another parent came up to us on Open House night and wanted to exchange info so her son D and Slim could hang out sometime. Apparently D could do nothing BUT talk of Slim and their mutual love of the movies CARS and CARS 2. I was cheering inside..“YES! He made a friend!”. Damuri Ajashi–we’re far from rich. We’re not poverty stricken but we ain’t rich either. We’re just barely making it right now and our district is one of the most poverty-stricken in the area. So we ain’t rich. We have some rich families who live in the McMansions down by the lake, but we ain’t one of them.
Well, that depends entirely on how developed their theory of mind is. Their levels of empathy will probably never match the average persons and it is probably best for them and everyone around them that they get to focus instead on doing what they love.
Getting to do what you love is IRRELEVANT if you can’t even make it through the interview process to get to that job (whatever it might be) because you can’t make some sort of a connection with the interviewer.
Not a mom, here, but it seems what’s being talked about isn’t a matter of kids who need to be taught how to be social butterflies, or even average socially, but to be FUNCTIONAL. Which later in life can mean the difference between being able to live on their own and support themselves, or instead ending up in something like a group home or unfortunately something worse.
If you’re not good at something, if in fact you’re so bad at it that it causes you problems in life, does it make more sense to practice that skill, or to go practice the things you’re already really really good at?
