To the parents who are home schooling autistic children?
Thursday, March 11th, 2010 at
6:36 pm
I will start home schooling my 7 year old autistic son next week. There is so much info on the internet, I am overwhelmed. Can someone give me a starting point? I’ve been looking for curriculum kits and trying to figure out a daily schedule. Any ideas?
Tagged with: autistic • Children • Home • parents • schooling
Filed under: Homeschooling
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That is a big task. Is it possible to combine part time home schooling with part time special classes? Why aren’t you having your son attend classes? It may be good for him. And you.
Try a search on Yahoo for Sandra Dodd.
She has so much homeschooling information and there are good Yahoo Groups based on her work, as well.
There are HS Yahoo groups for just about anyone, as a matter of fact.
Good luck!
I went to my local teacher store and bought a year curriculum. Then just start slow and before you know it you will have it down!!
Also, most full curriculum comes with an example of a schedule and teachers books.
We’re homeschooling our autistic children. For those who think public school would be better, it’s a big struggle to fight and get services from a school that would rather not provide the minimum that it takes to get an autistic child to learn. On top of that, the socialization isn’t that great. A lot will depend on how functional your child is, is he verbal? Does he understand basic math and reading? How functional is he behaviorally?
What we did when we started was actually start with the IEP that we had written as a team. Overall it was a good document, just one that the school wasn’t willing/capable of implementing. Secondarily we talked to our psychologist about our children’s learning styles and she had several wonderful suggestions for curricula based on our child’s skills and strengths.
I would also suggest contacting a local homeschool group. They definitely have experience with all kinds of learners, and will understand, if not autism, some of the deficits. You probably will need stuff that is visual or hands-on, right? Math U See is very popular, I don’t really recall any others, we’ve really designed a lot of our own curriculum using concepts that our children enjoy.
With my daughter, who is lower functioning, we are focusing on real life skills, still encouraging reading and basic math in the third grade (she’s nine). With my son, he is much more capable and so the focus is 50/50 on academics and lifeskills. Although we’re not worried about academics with him, he’s (newly 12 and) in sixth grade and has finished algebra. So so much really depends on capability.
On daily schedule, it can be very important for a kid with autism to be able to rely on schedule, but try not to let him get too rigid into that. Take it slowly. We started with a schedule just working on realistic amount of time that it takes for say, grooming and housework, and natural periods of time for those to happen. After that, we started using some of the left over time to evaluate where they were academically, using some online places like saxon math (which has free evaluations that you can download), and some reading sites. We usually purchase individual workbooks based on what their interests are, and those that work with the child’s learning habits. We have left open a lot of free time, to be filled with field trips and extracurricular activities. Also to help learn independent hobbies and such, very difficult for many autistic kids to build on their own.
Good luck, homeschooling our autistic children has been such a lifesaver for us, they are much happier, less stressed and learning more than they ever did in school. I have so many people who have noticed how much better they are doing in the last two years than ever before, friends, family and professionals.
You need to develop your philosophy of education. What are your goals for your son? What are the big ideas you have (goals, hopes, etc.)? What are your son’s needs, academic and social? What are his strengths and his personal passions? Then you can try to figure out what to do to make your philosophy a reality in your household.
If your son has an IEP from your local school district, you might want to start there. If you like the document, continue working on the goals. If you felt the document was lacking in certain areas, rewrite it yourself to reflect what you believe to be important.
Homeschooling will free you to arrange learning experiences for your son based on his strengths. When building your daily schedule, think about the times of day when both you and he are most productive. Unlike a classroom, you have the freedom to build in appropriate time to transition from one activity to another, you may find that exercise and chores are better to do in the morning and save academics for a different time, for instance.