Education, education....

Education is immensly important for all
children, however those on the autistic spectrum
do need more help and different aproach to teaching.
Many autistic people are intelligent on the average
level or higher.

Those high functioning children with autistic spectrum
usually receive the Special Education Statement from
British Local Education Authority. This involves 2 years
of working to IEP - Individual Education Plan, psychological
assessment, educational psychologist's assessment, and
pediatrician's diagnosis. In Britain, children are diagnosed
rather late. Very rarely high functioning autism is recognised
in children below the age of three. Therefore, the statementing
process, starts usually in the nursery or reception class.

Cirwen started to see the pediatrician at the age of four and
the diagnosis of Autistic Spectrum Disorder was given at the
age of four and a half. This was half way through the reception
class term, so only then the EIP could be started.

At the time the focus was put on her speech development,
social skills, numeracy and literacy. Due to the fact that
she could put three words together as a sentence, it was
a challenge. By this time I gave up speaking Polish as her
autistic mind needed things to be called always by the same
word (even now when she goes to her Nanny who refers
to the piece of the bedding as "duvet" Cirwen doesn't know
what she's talking about as at home we call it a "quilt").
The targets were mostly met, and as long as there was a
progress the school was happy.

Cirwen has made contact with children and even made
a friend. The girl lived in the same building as us and
we walked to and from school together, which made it
even easier to tighten their friendship.

After a year of exercising the IEPs, speech therapy
and occupational therapy, The school SEN-Co (Special
Education Needs Coordinator) announced to me, that
Cirwen is doing very well and because her social skills
are almost typical, she still is not three years
behind her peers in literacy (she learned to read very
quickly), and there are no behavioural problems -
the school will be refused the SEN Statement from
LEA. However, Cirwen was still kept on school
records as a special needs child and benefited from
extra numeracy, literacy lessons, speech and
occupational therapy.

Some time later, I made an appointment with SEN-Co
again. Cirwen always failed on her spelling tests. Not
even one word out of ten was right. Until I had a good
look at one of the sheets she brought from school...
There were ten words, spelled perfectly but.. all of
them were written backwards! god instead of dog,
even esuoh instead of house! I asked if Cirwen might
be also dyslexic, but again without further tests, I was
told "noo, it's just a fase..! If it is it's a long one, as
Cirwen still writes a lot of letters backwards!

And so, we help her at home as much we can, as much
she can take. There are days when she comes back home
at four o'clock in the afternoon and doesn't even want
to talk about anything. Just wants to eat and relax with
her games or music. You can see she needs to be alone.

Now we are facing transition to a secondary school.
She is positive about it, although I silently am scared
for her. Will she fit in, will she adjust to new building,
people and routines? Will the kids eat her alive on
the very first day? I shall write more in my next post
what was said on my meeting with the new SEN-Co.

Exams - all over

Three days of exams are over. Cirwen took science
and two papers in English. She was very worried as
she could not ask any questions if she could not
understand the task. Although she managed not to
panic and cry in class.

The first day she left school very tired. She was
rather withdrawn with this "I'm not exactly sure
where I am" look on her face. Cirwen was not
able to recall how many questions were in the test,
what questions she did not answer, or what they
actually were...

The same happened on the day two and three.
Cirwen likes English so she wasn't as worried about
these tests as about science , although again she
could not tell me what she wrote in the essay, or
she could only remember one topic from the reading
exercise. In the end, she said, that she is happy
with what she did.

What struck me, is that Cirwen said, she run out
of time each day, therefore she could not finish
any of the papers. Because she has difficulty to
understand the written questions or directions
it takes her longer to digest them and proceed
to the answer. Children with dyslexia have the
right to extension in time for their exams, pretty
much "by law". For some reason LEA and Special
Needs Coordinators do not think that this would
be beneficial for autistic children as well. WHY?

Anyway, it's all over and for the rest of the week
Cirwen will be in a small group of children and
the school Learning Mentor, while the rest will
sit math exam.

We felt we had to help Cirwen to come back to
the world each day and treat her a little. We
played numerous Warhammer (Cirwen's latest
obsession) battles in the evening. Her goblin army
beat the dwarfs mercilessly twice in a row!
Painting these little figures is very relaxing and
rewarding, so she quickly brightened up. A big
dollop of ice-cream and her favourite lychee fizzy
drink also did the trick.

On top of that, today she's off to the fun fair
and a sleep-over at her best friend's to celebrate
the end of the SATs.