Jingsamichty

This has been one of the most educational threads I've ever read on BE. For the first time ever, I'm going to 'rate' a thread, and give it an 'Excellent'.

mandymoochops

I know Jings - reading some of the things people go through on a day to day basis - behind the scenes without complaing makes me feel quite humble really.

I didn't know even a small percentage of the trials and tribulations parents of autistic children face.

LinsyPinsy

For those with non-verbal children can I suggest you try 'Makaton' Its a form of sign lanuage and symbols and really helped our wee guy with communication in the early days.

http://www.makaton.org/about/parents.htm

lns

Rubie

This thread has brought me to tears and has made me see my kids in a totally different light.

I can't believe that families that have to cope with these extraordinary challenges every day are being turned away by canadian immigration, especially after reading through these accounts. I understand they have legislation to stick to, and I understand the logic behind the legislation but there doesn't seem to be an ounce of compassion for families trying to do the best for their children. I'm not sure I could do their job

Fatcat, I sincerely wish you the absolute best for you and your family for your future lives back in the UK.

nikki dreaming

As a general question for those who have experienced this, what are people's views/experiences on mainstream schooling and special needs education schools both here in Canada and the UK?

I am on the fence, on one hand, I want my daughter to live a normal a life as possible, but when she has no concept of real life, would her needs be better suited by an environment that is fully able to provide time to her needs and adapt her education accordingly?

stepnek

Our lad has been attending the local elementary school since September 2009. The first year was three and two days a week but since last September he has been attending full time.

He has definitely made progress since starting school although his time spent in a regular classroom is very limited. He drops in and out during the day accompanied by his educational assistant. Outside of the classroom she works with him in what is called Homebase which is the base for all of the special needs children that attend the school.

His EA is a wonderful caring lady and we feel that his progress has been made more significant by her involvement with him. We have been most fortunate in this because I believe that it's really the luck of the draw as to who gets assigned to who. Just like there are good teachers and not so good teachers.

The one Special School that we have in this town is closing this year as the School Boards policy is to integrate all special needs children into regular schools. It's partly cost cutting as the population of school children is shrinking.

I don't know if it's the best thing for our son but it does seem to work so far. The downside is that the school is effectively closed for a third of the year with holidays (as with all schools of course) and then he completely loses his routine.

nikki dreaming

Hi,

I agree its very much down to the luck of the draw of the e/a , here in ns they are very much programmed to inclusion policy, but as you say the reality of actually being in the classroom engaging with the rest of the class is likely to be v minimal in our case, heck if she doesnt get the seat in the classroom she decides that she wants it will all kick off lol!

Whilst she is due to start in Sept we are v flexible with this as we simply dont know at this point how much she we be able to cope with it, she may be fine or she wont, we will see.

In NS you have the option of being able to use the $ per yr spent on education per child to put towards private schooling/special schooling and there are 3 very good schools that we could apply to.

Its hard to know, her older brother will be at the main school and for now this is what we are going to go with, he is her rock in her life and she dotes on him as he does her and its nice to know that at least she has a sibling that is there to look out for her and to be available to comfort her if needed.

Dorothy

Should have known, yes. Would have known? Not necessarily. My son was not diagnosed until he was 13.

stepnek

While we still have lots of challenges and difficulties the most pleasant thing for us was to find that our little boy settled in school so quickly. I couldn't see ahead of time how he would cope with it but he did so much more than I thought possible.

We also held off from using the bus service because we couldn't see how he would be with that but eventually when we did he handled it so well.

My first post on this thread was a general rant of just how difficult it all can be with an autistic child but as I look back on what has been accomplished and what progress has been made, well it brings a smile to my face. It's easy to see all the negatives that still exist and forget some of the positive changes that have taken place.

mandymoochops

Everyone needs a rant - you wouldn't be human.

And neither would you be human if at least some of the time you didn't just wanna yell "this f*****g sucks - i'm running away on my own and never coming back"

Thats why people love DBD's opinions on this - because he gives it just like it is - no sugar coating and is not afraid to say it in black and white.

It doesn't make you a bad person for telling the truth

mancunian.com

One picks up info in the most unlikely places. My life has largely been guided by stray info I've picked up. Some people have a guiding life plan and follow it. For examples of the two.[a] I reached the Canadian group via noticing autism. No big interest in Canada. Reading about Canada reminded me of a best friend in college, a Canadian Rhodes Scholar. Googled it and found [b] an example of the life-plan man. He followed his life plan and "In April 2008, he was asked by the Prime Minister of Denmark to serve on the Africa Commission, which included the president of Tanzania and the prime minister of Mozambique." Looks like he almost ran the World Bank single-handed for 22 years after a start as Policy Analyst, Department of Finance, Ottawa.
This dedication rather defeats my philosophy that it is pointless having a life plan because one cannot predict the future.
Anyway, what I was wanting to say is that I just wrote to tell him that Canada has a piss-poor system for dealing with ASD; especially as it concerns immigrants. You never know! As he is a compassionate man he might just mention it to some of his pals in government.

For anyone interested: here
<http://www.medhelp.org/child-health/articles/The-Vaccine-Autism-Hoax-Why-Didnt-We-Know-Sooner/116>
is a link to a recent, interesting, medical article about "The Vaccine-Autism Hoax: Why Didn’t We Know Sooner?" You may have to subscribe to view this site for health pros.

fatcat65

Hi Nikki,
I can only comment on the UK schooling issue at your daughters age and where we lived, the mainstream school didn't work.
My son had been in school 2 weeks and was sent home for a week (5 years old!), this was due to the deputy head taking his dinosaur off him as a punishment for not listening so he hit her! In my opinion she deserved it, not that i condone violence, but come on, an autistic child in school for two weeks and you take away his obsession, i'm afraid she got what she deserved, and i won't go into what i said to her!!
We tried mainstream for a year and it just didn't work, there's not enough support, understanding and i didn't feel it was fair on the other kids either when he was being disruptive. One day i went to the school to volunteer and read with the older kids and found my son wandering around the corridors on his own. I sat and watched for about half an hour and no one came to find him! Another time we got a call to say my son had escaped from school and wandered down the road....school being on a busy main road...needless to say i wasn't very happy (understatement of the year!)
our experience ended very badly and i challenged the head teacher about something one day and she completely lost it and got in my face and threatened me! needless to say she went off on stress leave and never came back!
We then put my son in special school where he did well for a number of years, although we still had problems, the staff there knew what they were doing and worked with me not against me. They knew that the best source of info comes from the parents and they used the same techniques i used so consistency helped him to settle down and he did.
I'm not saying that all mainstreams schools are as bad as my experience, but most do not have the resources to cope with complex needs and as much as they want to help they don't have the time or the specialized knowledge that it takes to work with our kids or the funding to do the training.
I paid for our support assistant to go on pecs courses, autism conferences and i also showed her the TEACCH training that i'd been on with Gary Mesibov. So she was well trained and worked with us. She became a close family friend and also worked at our charity too.
However, since being in Canada, he has been in mainstream high school and has come on in leaps and bounds, its as if he has suddenly woken up, if that makes sense? Difficult to explain but thats the only way i can describe it. I'm not saying he's 'cured', far from it, he still has his problems, but i think mixing with regular kids who took him for who he is and having the support of an excellent resource room made all the difference.
Its a tough decision but as we've all said, their needs are much more when they are younger, but if you get a good resource room over here that is well staffed she should be fine.

Good luck with what you decide and i'd be interested to hear about your experience with schools in future.

nikki dreaming

Yes definitely true, its important to look back over time and see the huge progress that is always being made with our little ones


Agree, we will only really know once she starts school and take it each day, the school she is due to go to is experienced in dealing with autistic children, its a new school and the have a full sensory room available for them at any time of day. We are in the process of working with EIBI for the transition to school and confirmation of an EA etc for her which she will 100% need. This person will be key I believe to her success in settling into school and everything that this brings, fingers x we find an angel

It is also the practical things ie getting the bus, being in the classroom, the rules of recess etc which she is not going to understand so the EA to have 100% eyes and ears on her for her own safety is so important, she would quite happily wonder away from school with no idea of the boundaries etc

It is all going to be very individual to the school and the teachers and the assistants as to how successfully an autistic child can integrate.

Cowgirl

If you're considering mainstream, it probably depends a lot on the school itself and what they offer in terms of support. Just make sure you do loads of research into all the schools around you. Unlike fatcat, we've had a very good experience of mainstream in the UK - but then things have changed a lot no doubt from when his son first went to school.

I was very nervous about my daughter starting school too. She's in her first year now (reception) and doing amazingly well! This time last year her vocabulary was extremely limited - could only speak in 2-3 word sentences, had to have a lot of visual prompts & some makaton, and she showed no interest in her world around her. Now she is able to communicate verbally and understand language better (if it's kept simple) to the point where we are able mostly understand each other - more or less. Her tantrums and frustrations have decreased significantly - and I know this is because she can understand and speak a lot more now! The poor kid - I think she wanted to communicate but just didn't know how to go about it.

Luckily our local school is very clued up about autism and related conditions and she gets one-to-one support for half of her day. She is really thriving! A lot of what she learns is from watching her aide and the other children around her - she copies and imitates the other kids all the time. She has a visual timetable at school too which has helped her no end.

We're really going to miss her school a lot, and we're very anxious about her starting in Calgary in all honesty. I'm very interested about what the support is like in the schools there - are they as clued up about it in that area I wonder? One school in Calgary has already rejected her because they don't feel they'd be able to cope - limited funding or something (fair enough I guess!). We're continuing our search for the right school there and are really hoping we'll find one that will be confident with her and give her the support she needs.

Dave+Jules

Part of the reason I am here slower pace of life, less frenetic and lowers my blood pressure.

Good Luck with your return to UK