Homeschool and Autism 1

One of many challenges that we face as autism parents is schooling.  Over the course of several years, we have had many trying circumstances when dealing with the school system itself, it's rules and regulations and of the behaviors caused by J's condition

During the first few years of school, J still had problems in class and several meltdowns if something didn't quite fit into his idea of the way things should be. The symptoms seem to fit into the Asperger diagnosis.https://www.autismspeaks.org/what-autism/asperger-syndrome.  We had several IEP meetings on that and other matters and the school did provide some motor skill therapies and he seemed to be okay in 4th grade.  

The biggest change came during 5th grade, at which point, the school starts the transition to a middle school environment which includes changing classes.   When this started, there were days that he was so scared that he didn't want to go into the building.  He even told us that he was scared of changing classes.  For someone on the Autism Spectrum, this feels like having the ground drop away while walking.  We attempted in vain to explain this to the school system, but they continued to push him into going to the school.  We continued this "exercise" until his sophomore year in high school at which point, we decided that we had had enough. 

Now we are homeschooling him instead of sending him to school which presents other challenges and benefits.  Here's a breakdown

The Pros

• He is in a familiar environment so he feels safe enough to learn
• The homeschooling allows us to see what other challenges he faces in the learning experience
• It takes the public school out of the equation. This sounds more like a con than a pro, but when the support we receive is lacking... taking him out is a definite plus.

The Cons:

• Time management.  Both of us are working full time, so we have to take turns working with J on school work when we get home
• Learning what is being taught:  Some of the subjects that are taught, we weren't very good at in school to begin with, so we are attempting to learn as much as we can to teach it to him as well. 

We are just about to finish the school year out and I think we are going to change the curriculum to something more old school and try to supplement the learning with Khan Academy as well

I will keep everyone posted.