How much do you push??? | Autism PDD

[QUOTE=Linda11567]I would have let him isolate himself from the other child at least in the begining but I would have made sure the child was doing an activity he absolutely loved and couldn't resist. And I would have said every few minutes do you want to come here and play?[/QUOTE]

This is exactly what we did and he still was horrible.  We kept letting him take breaks, played his favorite activities, etc... he still was a pistol!!  The kicker is he was an ANGEL after they left... like he won or something

Yes, he is in preschool... two actually... one integrated through the school district and another typical church based preschool.  He does GREAT at both (no aides or anything)... follows along, does all the activities, transitions well, etc... BUT really only wants to interact with the teachers.  He's also in a NT gymnastics class and its the same way.  He LOVES attention from adults and interacting with them. '

I honestly think that one on one playdate was more demanding to him than going to school.  At least in a school/class setting theres so much going on that he isn't "forced" to be the only one interacting with the other child.  If that makes sense anyway.   I just really want to get him better at interacting with his peers... all that time in school is essentially worthless if he doesn't know how to and won't interact with his peers... he doesn't need tolearn to interact with adults and he's very academically advanced and has no delays so the ONLY reason to have him there is to interact with peers.  I just don't know how else to work on this?????

I wouldn't give up on the play dates, and I wouldn't push him, but keep thinking creatively to find a solution.

My son really resists being forced to do anything, so we work hard at motivating him. 

Also, in 2nd grade, when we pushed him to do homework in the same frequency and difficulty as the rest of his class, he ended up on the verge of a nervous breakdown.  It's so important to adjust demands and expectations to a manageable level.

Good luck with everything.

Sarah.  I don't have an answer for you.  We have been working on this since Adam was 3 and he wasn't even dx'd until 7.  He is now almost 13 and he speaks to NO ONE at school.  Last school year for the very first time he actually worked in a small group on a project.  That was a big deal for us. 

Good luck.  I hope you find something that works.   

 

I think it depends on your child. Our son was pushed by a speech therapist for 2 sessions about a month and a half ago and he still does not go near the toys that she used. Our playtherapist pushed him to point to songs that we could all sing and it took weeks for him to want to sing them without banging his head.

He is 2 years and 4 months and things seem to get worse as the days go on. I would recommend not to push. Good Luck!

I do not push under any circumstances, but only because the harder I push the more they resist. When they started EI we all pushed, the therapists presented it as the way to do it, the ESE teacher pushed. And the harder we pushed the more Nikolas screamed, cried, tantrumed, ran and hid. the new ST therapist does not push at all, and he now performs for her like a champ, after only 1 hour a week for about a month. she gets more results from him in 4 weeks then we did in months. So now I present, and I back off. I let him walk away. He looks at us, tests to see if we are going to push, and when we don't then he gets curious and comes back and does it himself. He is now like this with everything. I think it depends on the child. Some children react very well to being pushed through a task, mine though resist more and fight it more and then they panic and you can literally see the stress level rise in them and then they totally fall apart. I would have let him isolate himself from the other child at least in the begining but I would have made sure the child was doing an activity he absolutely loved and couldn't resist. And I would have said every few minutes do you want to come here and play? I would not force him to though.Does your son go to preschool? We did the asd playgroup first and
transitioned to a nt/preschool with a shadow aide to facilitate transitions
and play. Playing with peers is a tough thing to teach. We had a better luck
with outside playdates at the beginning. (playing tag, hide and seek, riding
trikes and such. It did not require as much verbal interaction. I also tried to
find a child 1 yr older (who was great at modeling) that seemed to help. I
would keep at it.hmmm, well its tough, i never had any theripy the school put me in speial ed and my parents fought to put me in normal classes. When i was little i hated interacting, and back then their was no theripy to help. As i got older tho i realized myself i need to interact and make friends, or at least allies to be with when the bullies came, heh.   Typically i made friends with the new kids at school, they knew nobody and it was easier to make friends with them because they wanted to be friends with someone nobody would talk to them.

I think the theripes are great, and i think over time your son will get better. Some kids just wont like to interact, like the 13 year old previously discribed. I needed to interact b4 that age, more to survive being picked on. Some kids just wont, no amount of therpy will fix that i think, they r just not social, and your son is pretty young, needs time to grow up and realize that eather he needs or wants friends so hes not different, or would rather face the school bullies alone. Thatll be a part of his personality. At least the theripies teach him how to interact i had to learn through trial and error on my own, and did ok.

Push a little, and if he does not wanna, lay off a bit, hell have to wanna interact in order to succeed.

With therapies and such like... how far do you push them??

Jason is high functioning and is doing well... he can "fool" any adult but really seems to just freeze up around peers.  We've really been trying to work on interacting with peers lately.   We have him in 2 social skills groups (one speech based led by an ST and the other we JUST started is led by a pyschologist) and then we've been doing facilitated playdates with just one other child with our developmental specialist.   He seems to do well in both groups BUT the facilitated playdates are a MASSIVE flop.  Last week he just fell apart and wanted NOTHING to do with it.  He balked, screamed, whined, and flat out refused to do anything remotely close to interacting with this other little boy. UGGGG!!!

It really seemed like we were asking too much of him the way he fell apart.  Like it really was too hard for him to interact.  So do you push??  Do I force him to keep trying and hope eventually he'll learn or do we back off for a while?  I am confused??

I would push him though this rough part..he will eventually calm down..I would increase the reinforcers big time to motivate him to want to stay~ours did stickers that led to a prize out of treasure box at end of play group...ALL the kids wanted a prize so it was a big motivator:) The screaming, whining and tantrums are totally normal at first but over time it fades out..it may take a week or a month but it will go away:) Be strong and look at the big picture of why he is in this group..it is the hardest thing for them to learn in life:) Better to work on it now!
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