Post by lala on May 2, 2005 18:33:58 GMT -5
I'm not real familiar with this posting format so forgive me while I learn.
A brief introduction - I'm Laura and my oldest son (almost 9) is high functioning autistic. I also have a 6 year old son (who was diagnosed last year with ADHD) and a nearly 3 year old daughter who is typical so far.
My autistic son is fully integrated into a 2nd grade classroom. He is very bright and struggles mostly with the obvious social issues that plague our children. At this point he is recieving limited speech, which focuses on "social speech", but he doesn't have or qualify (according to the gurus in the special ed dept) an aide or any other services. Today I recieved a note home from his teacher that his stimming is becoming enough of an issue that he is actually falling behind in class and that she would like a meeting to discuss whether he should continue to 3rd grade or not. My heart is breaking because this kid is amazingly bright, but she's right. He would rather sit and stare at his hands than do his schoolwork.
His hand posturing has been an issue for some time. It is very pervasive and it seems that some days from the moment he gets up until the moment he finally falls to sleep, he is staring at his hands. I don't know what to do about it. I have tried several things without results. First we tried setting a timer and then at the end of that he had to "rejoin" us and stop with the stimming. Didn't work - at all. Then we tried asking him to stay in his room while he did that, explaining that it wasn't ok behavior around other people but ok to do by himself. He was pretty good about sticking with that at home (although it meant that he'd get home from school and then spend most of the evening isolated by himself which I didn't like) but it didn't help him with the behavior at school.
So now we're at this crossroads and I am completely clueless. How can I help my son to stop with the pervasive stimming so that he can function at school?
Any advice would be very appreciated!
Laura
A brief introduction - I'm Laura and my oldest son (almost 9) is high functioning autistic. I also have a 6 year old son (who was diagnosed last year with ADHD) and a nearly 3 year old daughter who is typical so far.
My autistic son is fully integrated into a 2nd grade classroom. He is very bright and struggles mostly with the obvious social issues that plague our children. At this point he is recieving limited speech, which focuses on "social speech", but he doesn't have or qualify (according to the gurus in the special ed dept) an aide or any other services. Today I recieved a note home from his teacher that his stimming is becoming enough of an issue that he is actually falling behind in class and that she would like a meeting to discuss whether he should continue to 3rd grade or not. My heart is breaking because this kid is amazingly bright, but she's right. He would rather sit and stare at his hands than do his schoolwork.
His hand posturing has been an issue for some time. It is very pervasive and it seems that some days from the moment he gets up until the moment he finally falls to sleep, he is staring at his hands. I don't know what to do about it. I have tried several things without results. First we tried setting a timer and then at the end of that he had to "rejoin" us and stop with the stimming. Didn't work - at all. Then we tried asking him to stay in his room while he did that, explaining that it wasn't ok behavior around other people but ok to do by himself. He was pretty good about sticking with that at home (although it meant that he'd get home from school and then spend most of the evening isolated by himself which I didn't like) but it didn't help him with the behavior at school.
So now we're at this crossroads and I am completely clueless. How can I help my son to stop with the pervasive stimming so that he can function at school?
Any advice would be very appreciated!
Laura
