I appreciate your response. Part of the problem with public education is the variety of abilities that end up in our special education classes. (I feel this is a big reason for my anxiety with this issue. It's hard to do best with each child when there are a number of very different needs.)
I was just curious as to which resources were most important for parents that do not wish to explore outside placements. Knowing that public ed. just can't specialize as much as some other placements, is it more beneficial for a student to be in a placement with a full time aide and more behavioral interventions or a placement that is designed to be more academic yet still has small class sizes?
There is NO reason that a public school cannot completely individualize for a student. Of course, this would require a lot of supports. There shouldn't have to be a choice between academic level and supports for the particular disability. However, that may take a huge cultural change as well as a LOT of advocacy work on the part of the parents. I have yet to see a Middle School, in particular, that "gets" it. My son went to a publicly funded Middle School for higher functioning kids on the Spectrum. The classes had only 6 kids each with one teacher and one aide (in addition to any one-on-ones a particular child might have on his IEP). The classes were all grade level, college-bound academics. There was a school-wide BIP. Being there for ONE year totally turned around my son's behavior. HOwever, the academic work was too hard for him. He is definitely not college material. He is currently in a county-run special ed HS class in a learning center. There are 13 in his class. He is at the TOP of the academic pile but the range of ability in that class is SO wide, each child gets his OWN academic work. We just have arranged of our District to purchase a Lindamood-Bell classroom version of Visualizing and Verbalizing for use only with him. That has been OUR experience. I have yet to find a placement with good supports AND totally appropriate academic work in a building that is not too big and busy for a child with sensory issues. HE's now almost 16 and doing well.Tzoya, wher was the school you had your son in. I was wondering if I could find a similar situation in our area. What kind of school was it and did you get it paid for. I'm in Southern California, the nearest school that specializes in these disabilities is in Sherman Oaks, which would be a nightmare of a drive for us.Teacher 78: The most support we've ever needed for our son, who is high-functioning was a smaller classroom environment with least distraction possible and someone to help with social interaction on the school grounds. The school like to criminalize our children's behavior but, that behavior is only a result of their frustration of having to learn in a very threatening environment.The problem is that many, many schools cannot truly provide the high academic standards some Aspies need in classes that are small enough to help an Aspie. The school my son went to is in N.Y. In our state we have something called the BOCES system. It's a system of publicly funded schools that are regional. They are administered differently in each area of the state, but on Long Island, they tend to have separate campuses of their own. They provide for all kinds of specialized in struction, both special ed and vocational. The school my son went to was a separate school within this system. So, basically, it was like a private Aspie school but run publicly. It's the only one of its kind and it's only for 6th, 7th and 8th grade. Many states have separate schools that are run outside of school districts. There are also state-approved private school that are, legally, private but are paid for fully by the state (no private pay clients) and are subject to all the state rules. I, frankly, see no reason why high academic, small size classes for certain types of kids who need this sort of environment can't be offered in regular public schools, but they are not. Our school district has to kick in TONS of tuition for every single BOCES student, no matter what BOCES school the student goes to. I believe that one year in that one school cost our District about 0,000. More than a private autism school. It was TOTALLY worth it. FOr them and for us.teacher78, I am also a special education teacher and I agree totally with your last post. I am glad to see you trying to get info to either advance your stance on the topic or just be enlightened some. I have learned so much here, please stick around!!I work for BOCES in NY and for a student to be in my autism class it is between 0-140,000 a year. Every district says it is well worth the cost. As for the middle school issue. Before I taught where I am now I taught middle school special ed with full inclusion.....which was a huge joke!!!!!! With the range of kids and expectations (you are included in middle school....you do all middle school academics)........I had enough after 4 years and resigned. I couldn't tolerate the injustice the kids were being given. It was just wrong!Thank you!!! I feel like someone understands my frustrations!! My district WILL NOT place a student into a alternative placement unless the parents push for it. Unfortunately, many of the parents that I work with either do not have enough involvement or do not want to face the reality that their child is not meant for the middle school scene. These students end up passed around the special ed. classes, which aren't appropriate for them either, then targeted outside of class because middle school kids are incredibly mean!! The frustration is unbelievable for those of us that would love to see a proper placement for these children, but have no say!!
teacher78 you are so right!!! Middle schoolers are incredibly cruel and the situation just made me sick......I just had to leave!!!!!!!!Mary Beth, for what it's worth, I have toured Village Glen, and even with their PACE program for more academically advanced children, I don't think it is a good fit for Aspies. I know my son would have been miserable there, even if the learning environment was more suitable. I have found the term "High Functioning Autism" to be a very wide spectrum in and of itself, and the children that I know that go to Village Glen are not nearly as high functioning as the Aspies I know.Lucky!It depends. My son fits EXACTLY into that category. When he entered Middle School, he was in a class that kept up with the typical curriculum. HOwever, the whole MIddle School environment was not something he could tolerate. We ended up having him finish Middle School in a special school for higher functioning autistic kids. A public school. In New YOrk State, things are somewhat different than in other states. We've had two types of diplomas forever. Diplomas given by each individual H.S. and also state academic diplomas that required that students pass a series of academic, state-wide tests. In my day, the Regents Diploma, as it was called, was mostly for college-bound students. But NCLB has caused NYS to decide that EVERYONE must get a Regents diploma. Only a small percentage of spec. ed. kids are allowed to opt for alternate assessment. Our local diplomas are still given out, but only to kids who passed the courses but failed the Regents exams. By 2013, no local diplomas will be given out and ALL students will have to qualify for a highly academic diploma in order to graduate in NYS. This means that everyone takes Earth Science and Biology, no more "General Science" courses. Everyone takes Algebra -- no more practical math courses. Everyone takes a foreign language. ETC., ETC. What happened in the special ed. school for my son was that he was studying subjects that he would NEVER use in his whole lifetime. He was reading HOLES when he had no clue about a newspaper. His reading level was OK for HOLES, but also for the newspaper, which he needs to learn to read and get something out of. The ONLY way I was able to get him more appropriate lifeskills was to put him in alternate assessment. I have to say that the teachers in his new county school differentiate a lot. He's at the top of that class and had very different academic needs, but they adjust the work for each individual child. He is about to start a reading program put out by Lindamood Bell. He's at about the 3rd grade reading level, with comprehension (decoding is higher) and that is far above the reading level of the rest of his class.
Your question about which works best for a child, of course, depends. My son has an average IQ but lots of processing problems. He won't have an independent job or live and independent life. Practical skills are much more important for him. But I make sure those practical skills are on HIS level, not some canned version that suits kids whose functioning is far lower. I couldn't see wasting my son's time on academic pursuits that won't push HIS personal ball forward. I want everything to have some practical use for him. But that doesn't mean the level of the work has to be low. For example, some day he may have to figure out how many square feet of carpeting needs to be bought or how many cans of paint he'll need for a room. Therefore, practical geometry is important for him. He can do lots of math without a calculator because we made sure all the math he did made sense to him and had some practical application. I don't think lifeskills HAS to be low level. Call it functional academics, if you will. But schools like to have molds to put kids in. Fortunately, Federal law says they can't do that and must figure out what is good for an INDIVIDUAL child. If I were going to change the world, I'd start more HIGH FUNCTIONING lifeskills programs. Heck, most of us who took advanced math an 4 years of foreign languages in HS could probably have used more common sense learning.
I teach at a public middle school where we have around a dozen students that fall into the pdd/autism/aspergers categories. They are all middle functioning - they need more academics than life skills offers, yet are considerably below the majority of other special ed. students. We only offer learning support and emotional support services in our buildings (of course other options are available on an individual basis outside of our school setting).
I am wondering if anyone can give me input on which placement is more appropriate.
Thanks!
Karen -- I don't know what you saw at Village Glen, but at the Jefferson School, which is the Aspie middle school I mentioned, the material is all college-bound work. In NY, we have Regents exams and all the kids at Jefferson were on the Regents track. I WISH there were a less demanding school (like Village Glen) for higher functioning, but not HIGH functioning ASD kids. That is where my son would fit. I still have not found a program that can meet his develomental needs and still have high enough academic expectations for him. Just because a child won't go to college or might not even have an independent life doesn't mean his academic work shouldn't be at HIS level, but the system is not set up to be that individualized. What I've found in searching all over this county for a good class for my son (and this includes a well-known private autism school) is that there is NOWHERE where the academics are above grade 2 (this is at middle school age or above) but also lower than grade level. It's been a nightmare for us. What we've found what works at all is to put him in the lower functioning group but have an aide who can work separately on higher level academic work (3rd thru 5th grade level). He is on alternate assessment and last year when the tutor who was working with him at the time did the alternate assessment for the first time (he was on home instruction while we continued to look for an appropriate placement), the school district nearly CHOKED when the saw his work. They said, "we can't send this to the State. They'll wonder WHY he's on alternate assessment." They wanted us to dumb down his work so that he appeared to fit appropriately with the other alternate assessment kids. Now THERE'S bureaucracy at it's finest!We are frankly counting the days until we can move out of here!
Mary
Too bad, IBGECKO, Jamie's TERRIFIED of dogs. How do you feel about a guinea pig?[QUOTE=tzoya]Too bad, IBGECKO, Jamie's TERRIFIED of dogs. How do you feel about a guinea pig?[/QUOTE]
Well, we could live with the guinea pig - dd would love it, as a matter of fact - but the dog is a deal breaker. Too bad. Guess we'll stick to our respective coasts
Here's a link to The Help Group schools, in case you're curious http://www.thehelpgroup.org/programs.htm#villageglen Village Glen or Bridgeport sound like they would fit your bill. Like I said before, I toured Village Glen, and greatly admire their program, though it wasn't what Connor needed. And then of course, there is the pricetag: ,000 a year not including any extra services, i.e. speech, transportation, ect. These types of schools are really only an option if you a) qualify for non-public school funding, or b) you are stinking rich. We don't fall into either category
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