It never ceases to amaze me, the horror stories I get from parents who approach me for input and advice on their situations. It also never ceases to amaze me, the level of warped ideas an entire community or group can get when it comes to children and their upbringing.
I recently had a parent come to me and tell me about her son's problems in school. He's acting out and refusing to comply with instructions in class. On it's own, that brings about judgments of and assumptions of brathood, but get this.
First, the school and teacher herself are disregarding the 9 year olds medical diagnosis of autism or any other disorder. They dismiss it as him "just" being difficult.
Second, the teacher has literally stated to parent and child alike that she's "sick of wasting her time" on this child.
Third, the child has been labelled by the school staff as a "menace to society" since either during or just after Kindergarten!
People, please hear me on this, when you constantly deliver a message to a child of what a failure or waste of time they are, sooner or later they are going to BELIEVE YOU!
This child has been ABUSED by the very people who are supposed to be educating and working with him. Not the parent, but a whole school! Abuse in schools must stop!
Current report from the boy's mother states that this child hates himself. Let's note those two words again... HATES HIMSELF. Now why in the world does a 9 year old child hate himself? Well, refer to the above because I just gave three really solid reasons! Because of the message this boy now believes, he needs therapy, he needs lots of therapy. He needs all that he has been taught about himself undone and retaught. THAT should be at the expense of the school district.
And if they are facing layoffs, teachers and staff who humiliate grade school children and destroy their self esteem should be the first jobs on the chopping block. It's child abuse!
I'm sorry, but these stories just infuriate me. Some get into media, like a little girl a few states away whose teacher wrote the word LOSER on all her homework assignments. He needs to be fired, I hope he was. That guy is a direct threat to the children in his class.
Our schools need to get with the times. These, our special needs kids, are increasing in number and science and current counts prove that it's going to keep doing that. They can either adjust for this change in students, or be overwhelmed and see a marked increase in homeschooling and lawsuits. It's your choice, educators of America, which way will you choose?
Friday, May 14, 2010
Wednesday, May 12, 2010
Change is a tough word in autism
That's especially if changes or suggestions come up without warning. If we have our minds set to some task, we may find it annoying to have them interrupted. We don't take interruptions to our routine our thoughts well. Changes in other ways can be tough or even traumatic too. On one such change a reader asked me about preparing her child for a school change.
Change is a part of life and some changes are set in stone. It's best we know they are coming far far ahead of time. In this case the change can be addressed like a graduation. It should be celebrated and congratulated. If she misses the teacher, you might explain that lots of other kids need her and it's going to be their turn next year. Reinforce that it will be fun to see a new classroom and may even see some familiar faces there.
One thing is for sure. Change should be taught for what it is, a fact of life. It needs to be taught more directly with our spectrum kids than a typical child. Changing grades in school, for example, will mean changing classrooms every year. I have found that it can be shown and taught as a long term routine and thus accepted. Yes, there will be some balking at first, but it will pass.
You can soften the effect of "sudden" changes with timely warnings that they are coming. I do this with time to leave for school in the morning. If I don't, it may take me an extra fifteen minutes to get out the door because he didn't feel prepared for the transition from what ever he was doing.
One might suggest acting excited for good changes, but we on the spectrum don't always recognize your emotions so well. So use direct facts. Is it a good change? Tell us why and how. Tell us that you went through it yourself. Take time to show your child the meaning of change in lifes everyday circumstances. Make it a part of their vocabulary. The earlier that they learn about how things don't always go as planned, the better toward adult life.
Change is a part of life and some changes are set in stone. It's best we know they are coming far far ahead of time. In this case the change can be addressed like a graduation. It should be celebrated and congratulated. If she misses the teacher, you might explain that lots of other kids need her and it's going to be their turn next year. Reinforce that it will be fun to see a new classroom and may even see some familiar faces there.
One thing is for sure. Change should be taught for what it is, a fact of life. It needs to be taught more directly with our spectrum kids than a typical child. Changing grades in school, for example, will mean changing classrooms every year. I have found that it can be shown and taught as a long term routine and thus accepted. Yes, there will be some balking at first, but it will pass.
You can soften the effect of "sudden" changes with timely warnings that they are coming. I do this with time to leave for school in the morning. If I don't, it may take me an extra fifteen minutes to get out the door because he didn't feel prepared for the transition from what ever he was doing.
One might suggest acting excited for good changes, but we on the spectrum don't always recognize your emotions so well. So use direct facts. Is it a good change? Tell us why and how. Tell us that you went through it yourself. Take time to show your child the meaning of change in lifes everyday circumstances. Make it a part of their vocabulary. The earlier that they learn about how things don't always go as planned, the better toward adult life.
Thursday, May 6, 2010
Contacting departments of ed part 2
I recently sent out part two of my volunteer effort to spread extra autism education to departments of education in our country. Below is what I sent them:
PROBLEM AREAS OF AUTISTIC STUDENTS
As I’ve pointed out, being a student is an extra challenge for a child with autism. Not only do they need to learn a school curriculum but they are behind on social development and have to learn control of co morbid conditions like sensory issues. I have outlined some of these difficulties here.
Distractibility: Because of the lack of breakers that help us filter out information we take in around us, every little detail in the room can demand our attention like a hot strobe light. We can get distracted by a breeze, an odor, the color of someone’s shirt or pencil, the ticking of a clock or worse. We are even distracted by things across the street outside and that’s even from the far side of the room away from the windows! Add that to anything that itches or feels weird, maybe the angle of our seat that’s off a half inch today? It’s hard to pay attention to just one subject when small distractions pull at us like a tow chain on a Mack truck. It’s a flood of impulses every day and all day. Add that to Attention Deficit with racing thoughts and floods of ideas and this kid has a tough time in class.
Social Interactions: People with autism have profound difficulty with socializing. Development of social skills is impaired and we don’t recognize social cues without intense practice. It’s like learning a new language and it’s harder with the older we get. Consider it like a form of blindness, only it applies to emotions and social behaviors of others. We just don’t know them, so they may as well be invisible. This creates misunderstandings with not only other students but staff as well. Things like context in spoken words can be lost because we can be so literal that we get stuck on one way that a word can be used. That makes it difficult to view a word from it’s other uses and perspectives. Slang and sarcasm can be especially hard to understand and take extra years to learn for many of us. This can also and especially affect interactions with lessons in class.
Bullying magnets: Children with autism are highly susceptible to bullies. Because of the literal nature they are easily tricked into problem spots. Eventually, though, they start to lose trust for peers, always on the lookout for being tricked into something unpleasant. Bullies find the odd reactions of our autistic kids to be quite funny and it’s hard to just ignore it like most average children can. The experience is just too intense to ignore. Like the distractions above, only worse. If not stopped you wind up with a traumatized child, trapped in their own mind, set even further back on social development than before. It can shape the rest of their lives. Unchecked, bullying can get extremely cruel. I personally walked home from Jr High more than once a week with my face bloody. And bullying isn’t limited to the behaviors of students. Teachers bully as well. Consider the story of Alex Barton who’s teacher made him stand before his class while she had students stand up and say things they didn’t like about him. You can find his story in another section of this packet.
Meltdowns or Sensory Overloads: Sensory overload isn’t just a matter of your senses overloading you, but stress. Our autistic children cannot handle stress well. The more that stress is compounded the more likely you will have an outburst or meltdown on your hands. A lot of times this can and will cause self damaging behavior. This self damaging rage happens because everything feels so intense and causes such a flood of adrenalin that the victim literally has no idea where to put it all. The result is a flurry of raging activity that holds its victim at its mercy until there’s no energy left. It leaves a person drained and exhausted, and often injured. These episodes (compared with seizure activity) can be avoided if caught in time. They can be prevented by using calm tones and not getting forceful with the student. Most importantly, punishment adds more stress. Punishing this condition is wrong. It’s a medical condition, not fun to live with, and very hard to control. While there are ways to avoid and episode, once it has you, you are at its mercy. I have permanent nerve damage and possibly brain damage from thirty years of these episodes before my own condition was diagnosed. Now I am on medication to help keeping such stress levels and overloads from occurring. I also have a “safety zone” that I can retreat to in my home for “cool down”. Having a “cool down” place that’s friendly and clearly not a punishment could be beneficial to these students.
An important article “Calm down or else”
This is an article written for the New York Times by Benedict Carey. I believe it’s message should be taken into consideration by us all. If the rights of the student are not enough to convince us that changes must be made and we must adapt for this increasing number of students, then self preservation is the next item of evidence. Perhaps the liabilities of failing to adapt can motivate change? The cost of failure is far too high and this article proves that. Please give it your full consideration.
Calm down or else, by Benedict Carey
The children return from school confused, scared and sometimes with bruises on their wrists, arms or face. Many won’t talk about what happened, or simply can’t, because they are unable to communicate easily, if at all.
“What Tim eventually said,” said John Miller, a podiatrist in Allegany, N.Y., about his son, then 12, “was that he didn’t want to go to school because he thought the school was trying to kill him.”
Dr. Miller learned that Tim, who has Asperger‘s syndrome, was being unusually confrontational in class, and that more than once teachers had held him down on the floor to “calm him down,” according to logs teachers kept to track his behavior; on at least one occasion, adults held Tim prone for 20 minutes until he stopped struggling.
The Millers are suing the district, in part for costs of therapy for their son as a result of the restraints. The district did not dispute the logs but denied that teachers behaved improperly.
For more than a decade, parents of children with developmental and psychiatric problems have pushed to gain more access to mainstream schools and classrooms for their sons and daughters. One unfortunate result, some experts say, is schools’ increasing use of precisely the sort of practices families hoped to avoid by steering clear of institutionalized settings: takedowns, isolation rooms, restraining chairs with straps, and worse.
No one keeps careful track of how often school staff members use such maneuvers. But last year the public system served 600,000 more special education students than it did a decade ago, many at least part time in regular classrooms. Many staff members are not adequately trained to handle severe behavior problems, researchers say.
In April, a 9-year-old Montreal boy with autism died of suffocation when a special education teacher wrapped him in a weighted blanket to calm him, according to the coroner’s report. Two Michigan public school students with autism have died while being held on the ground in so-called prone restraint.
Michigan, Pennsylvania and Tennessee have recently tightened regulations governing the use of restraints and seclusion in schools. California, Iowa and New York are among states considering stronger prohibitions, and reports have appeared on blogs and in newspapers across the country, from The Orange County Register to The Wall Street Journal.
“Behavior problems in school are way up, and there’s good reason to believe that the use of these procedures is up, too,” said Reece L. Peterson, a professor of special education at the University of Nebraska. “It’s an awful combination, because many parents expect restraints to be used — as long as it’s not their kid.”
Federal law leaves it to states and school districts to decide when physical restraints and seclusion are appropriate, and standards vary widely. Oversight is virtually nonexistent in most states, despite the potential for harm and scant evidence of benefit, Dr. Peterson said. Psychiatric facilities and nursing homes are generally far more accountable to report on such incidents than schools, experts say.
In dozens of interviews, parents, special education experts and lawyers who work to protect disabled people said they now regularly heard of cases of abuse in public schools — up to one or two a week surface on some parent e-mail lists — much more often than a decade ago. “In all the years I went to school, I never, ever saw or heard of anything like the horrific stories about restraint that we see just about every day now,” said Alison Tepper Singer, executive vice president of Autism Speaks, a charity dedicated to curing the disorder.
The issue is politically sensitive at a time when schools have done a lot to accommodate students with special needs, and some have questioned whether mainstreaming has gone too far. “Some parent organizations, they’re so grateful to the schools that their kids have been mainstreamed that they don’t want to risk really pushing for change,” said Dee Alpert, an advocate in New York who reports on the issue in the online journal, specialeducationmuckraker.com.
For teachers, who have many other responsibilities — not least, to teach — managing even one child with a disability can add a wild card to the day. “In a class of 30 to 35 children, there’s a huge question of how much safety or teaching a teacher can provide if he or she is being called on to calm or contain a student on a regular basis,” said Patti Ralabate, a special education expert at the National Education Association. “The teacher is responsible for the safety of all the children in the classroom.”
The line between skillful conflict resolution and abuse is slipperier than many assume. Federal law requires that schools develop a behavioral plan for every student with a disability, which may include techniques to defuse the child’s frustration: a break from the class, for instance, or time out to listen to an iPod.
But in a hectic classroom, children with diagnoses like attention deficit disorder,anxiety or autism can seemingly become defiant, edgy or aggressive on a dime — and the plan, if one exists, can go straight out the window, investigations have found. Even defying a teacher’s instructions — “noncompliance” — can invite a takedown or time alone in a locked room, they found.
In an extensive report published last year, investigators in California documented cases of abuse from districts in the San Francisco Bay Area, the suburbs of Los Angeles and in the rural northeastern part of the state. During the 2005-6 school year, an 8-year-old with a diagnosis of attention deficit disorder and mild mental retardation was repeatedly locked in a “seclusion room” alone, adjacent to the classroom — at least 31 times in a single year. His parents heard about it from another parent, who saw the boy trying in vain to escape.
In another school, a teacher held a 12-year-old with a diagnosis of attention deficit disorder “face down on the floor, straddling him at his hips, and holding his hands behind his back,” according to the investigation, which was done by California’s office of protection and advocacy. Congress established such offices in each state in the 1970s to protect the rights of the disabled.
Leslie Morrison, director of investigations at the California office, said parents often complained about such episodes but were usually reluctant to cooperate with an investigation. “They’re afraid the school will retaliate,” she said.
And the children, who have an array of psychiatric diagnoses, from attention deficit to autism, often do not understand what is happening or why. “They just think they did something wrong and are being punished,” Ms. Morrison said. “Many of them are not verbal at all and can’t even tell their parents.”
In Tim Miller’s case, school logs obtained by his father illustrate how quickly a situation can escalate, regardless of behavior plans. In one entry, dated March 18, 2005, a teacher wrote: “Tim was screaming down the hall. He ran past me and began to double his fist to punch the locker. At this point I scooped my arm underneath his and directed him into my room.”
After the boy continued to struggle, this teacher and another “laid him onto the mat, where he was held approximately 20 minutes,” the log said.
Tim, now 15, graduated from the school last year and in June completed his first year of high school, excelling in a variety of mainstream classes without incident. In a telephone interview, he said he no longer thought much about the takedowns. “I just think now that they were idiots to do that,” he said. “I remember telling my mom to pray to God that they wouldn’t keep doing it, and wishing the other kids would see what was happening.”
When a school has a so-called zero tolerance approach to bad behavior, it often does makes a public spectacle of controlling a child’s behavior, said several parents interviewed for this article.
Kathy Sexton, who lives near Dallas, had to pick up her 11-year-old son, Anthony, who has a diagnosis of attention deficit disorder, at the police station, after school staff members had the boy hauled away in handcuffs for cursing at a teacher.
“I didn’t hear about it for hours and had to go get him at jail,” Ms. Sexton said in a phone interview. “He was hysterical, obviously, and he’s had his ups and downs since then. It’s hard to know what a thing like that does to a child that age.”
Several companies offer programs to teach so-called de-escalation techniques to school staff, and a scattering of schools have developed model programs to pre-empt confrontations, and defuse them when they happen. But experts say that until policymakers and schools adopt standards, on exactly which techniques are allowed and when, children with behavior problems will in many districts run the risk of being forcibly brought into line.
Dr. Peterson, the Nebraska professor, illustrates the challenges by citing two recent cases in Iowa. In one, the parents of an 11-year-old who died while being held down called for a ban on restraints; in the other, parents charged that a school failed their son by not restraining him. The boy ran away and drowned.
“It’s damned if you do, damned if you don’t,” Dr. Peterson said, “and it reflects the level of confusion there is about this whole issue.”
End of article
I hope that you can see just how serious education for staff can be. Lack of knowledge for proper handling leads to desperation to make a child comply. That leads to dangerous practices. Practices that put your districts at risk. It’s far less expensive, especially in the long haul, to make sure that all staff are knowledgeable and sensitive to these special needs kids. Granted laws were recently passed on the federal level against restraint and seclusion but we all have an important part to play. We all must do our part to make sure the proverbial ball doesn’t get dropped anywhere for the sake of all our children. The answer is education.
PROBLEM AREAS OF AUTISTIC STUDENTS
As I’ve pointed out, being a student is an extra challenge for a child with autism. Not only do they need to learn a school curriculum but they are behind on social development and have to learn control of co morbid conditions like sensory issues. I have outlined some of these difficulties here.
Distractibility: Because of the lack of breakers that help us filter out information we take in around us, every little detail in the room can demand our attention like a hot strobe light. We can get distracted by a breeze, an odor, the color of someone’s shirt or pencil, the ticking of a clock or worse. We are even distracted by things across the street outside and that’s even from the far side of the room away from the windows! Add that to anything that itches or feels weird, maybe the angle of our seat that’s off a half inch today? It’s hard to pay attention to just one subject when small distractions pull at us like a tow chain on a Mack truck. It’s a flood of impulses every day and all day. Add that to Attention Deficit with racing thoughts and floods of ideas and this kid has a tough time in class.
Social Interactions: People with autism have profound difficulty with socializing. Development of social skills is impaired and we don’t recognize social cues without intense practice. It’s like learning a new language and it’s harder with the older we get. Consider it like a form of blindness, only it applies to emotions and social behaviors of others. We just don’t know them, so they may as well be invisible. This creates misunderstandings with not only other students but staff as well. Things like context in spoken words can be lost because we can be so literal that we get stuck on one way that a word can be used. That makes it difficult to view a word from it’s other uses and perspectives. Slang and sarcasm can be especially hard to understand and take extra years to learn for many of us. This can also and especially affect interactions with lessons in class.
Bullying magnets: Children with autism are highly susceptible to bullies. Because of the literal nature they are easily tricked into problem spots. Eventually, though, they start to lose trust for peers, always on the lookout for being tricked into something unpleasant. Bullies find the odd reactions of our autistic kids to be quite funny and it’s hard to just ignore it like most average children can. The experience is just too intense to ignore. Like the distractions above, only worse. If not stopped you wind up with a traumatized child, trapped in their own mind, set even further back on social development than before. It can shape the rest of their lives. Unchecked, bullying can get extremely cruel. I personally walked home from Jr High more than once a week with my face bloody. And bullying isn’t limited to the behaviors of students. Teachers bully as well. Consider the story of Alex Barton who’s teacher made him stand before his class while she had students stand up and say things they didn’t like about him. You can find his story in another section of this packet.
Meltdowns or Sensory Overloads: Sensory overload isn’t just a matter of your senses overloading you, but stress. Our autistic children cannot handle stress well. The more that stress is compounded the more likely you will have an outburst or meltdown on your hands. A lot of times this can and will cause self damaging behavior. This self damaging rage happens because everything feels so intense and causes such a flood of adrenalin that the victim literally has no idea where to put it all. The result is a flurry of raging activity that holds its victim at its mercy until there’s no energy left. It leaves a person drained and exhausted, and often injured. These episodes (compared with seizure activity) can be avoided if caught in time. They can be prevented by using calm tones and not getting forceful with the student. Most importantly, punishment adds more stress. Punishing this condition is wrong. It’s a medical condition, not fun to live with, and very hard to control. While there are ways to avoid and episode, once it has you, you are at its mercy. I have permanent nerve damage and possibly brain damage from thirty years of these episodes before my own condition was diagnosed. Now I am on medication to help keeping such stress levels and overloads from occurring. I also have a “safety zone” that I can retreat to in my home for “cool down”. Having a “cool down” place that’s friendly and clearly not a punishment could be beneficial to these students.
An important article “Calm down or else”
This is an article written for the New York Times by Benedict Carey. I believe it’s message should be taken into consideration by us all. If the rights of the student are not enough to convince us that changes must be made and we must adapt for this increasing number of students, then self preservation is the next item of evidence. Perhaps the liabilities of failing to adapt can motivate change? The cost of failure is far too high and this article proves that. Please give it your full consideration.
Calm down or else, by Benedict Carey
The children return from school confused, scared and sometimes with bruises on their wrists, arms or face. Many won’t talk about what happened, or simply can’t, because they are unable to communicate easily, if at all.
“What Tim eventually said,” said John Miller, a podiatrist in Allegany, N.Y., about his son, then 12, “was that he didn’t want to go to school because he thought the school was trying to kill him.”
Dr. Miller learned that Tim, who has Asperger‘s syndrome, was being unusually confrontational in class, and that more than once teachers had held him down on the floor to “calm him down,” according to logs teachers kept to track his behavior; on at least one occasion, adults held Tim prone for 20 minutes until he stopped struggling.
The Millers are suing the district, in part for costs of therapy for their son as a result of the restraints. The district did not dispute the logs but denied that teachers behaved improperly.
For more than a decade, parents of children with developmental and psychiatric problems have pushed to gain more access to mainstream schools and classrooms for their sons and daughters. One unfortunate result, some experts say, is schools’ increasing use of precisely the sort of practices families hoped to avoid by steering clear of institutionalized settings: takedowns, isolation rooms, restraining chairs with straps, and worse.
No one keeps careful track of how often school staff members use such maneuvers. But last year the public system served 600,000 more special education students than it did a decade ago, many at least part time in regular classrooms. Many staff members are not adequately trained to handle severe behavior problems, researchers say.
In April, a 9-year-old Montreal boy with autism died of suffocation when a special education teacher wrapped him in a weighted blanket to calm him, according to the coroner’s report. Two Michigan public school students with autism have died while being held on the ground in so-called prone restraint.
Michigan, Pennsylvania and Tennessee have recently tightened regulations governing the use of restraints and seclusion in schools. California, Iowa and New York are among states considering stronger prohibitions, and reports have appeared on blogs and in newspapers across the country, from The Orange County Register to The Wall Street Journal.
“Behavior problems in school are way up, and there’s good reason to believe that the use of these procedures is up, too,” said Reece L. Peterson, a professor of special education at the University of Nebraska. “It’s an awful combination, because many parents expect restraints to be used — as long as it’s not their kid.”
Federal law leaves it to states and school districts to decide when physical restraints and seclusion are appropriate, and standards vary widely. Oversight is virtually nonexistent in most states, despite the potential for harm and scant evidence of benefit, Dr. Peterson said. Psychiatric facilities and nursing homes are generally far more accountable to report on such incidents than schools, experts say.
In dozens of interviews, parents, special education experts and lawyers who work to protect disabled people said they now regularly heard of cases of abuse in public schools — up to one or two a week surface on some parent e-mail lists — much more often than a decade ago. “In all the years I went to school, I never, ever saw or heard of anything like the horrific stories about restraint that we see just about every day now,” said Alison Tepper Singer, executive vice president of Autism Speaks, a charity dedicated to curing the disorder.
The issue is politically sensitive at a time when schools have done a lot to accommodate students with special needs, and some have questioned whether mainstreaming has gone too far. “Some parent organizations, they’re so grateful to the schools that their kids have been mainstreamed that they don’t want to risk really pushing for change,” said Dee Alpert, an advocate in New York who reports on the issue in the online journal, specialeducationmuckraker.com.
For teachers, who have many other responsibilities — not least, to teach — managing even one child with a disability can add a wild card to the day. “In a class of 30 to 35 children, there’s a huge question of how much safety or teaching a teacher can provide if he or she is being called on to calm or contain a student on a regular basis,” said Patti Ralabate, a special education expert at the National Education Association. “The teacher is responsible for the safety of all the children in the classroom.”
The line between skillful conflict resolution and abuse is slipperier than many assume. Federal law requires that schools develop a behavioral plan for every student with a disability, which may include techniques to defuse the child’s frustration: a break from the class, for instance, or time out to listen to an iPod.
But in a hectic classroom, children with diagnoses like attention deficit disorder,anxiety or autism can seemingly become defiant, edgy or aggressive on a dime — and the plan, if one exists, can go straight out the window, investigations have found. Even defying a teacher’s instructions — “noncompliance” — can invite a takedown or time alone in a locked room, they found.
In an extensive report published last year, investigators in California documented cases of abuse from districts in the San Francisco Bay Area, the suburbs of Los Angeles and in the rural northeastern part of the state. During the 2005-6 school year, an 8-year-old with a diagnosis of attention deficit disorder and mild mental retardation was repeatedly locked in a “seclusion room” alone, adjacent to the classroom — at least 31 times in a single year. His parents heard about it from another parent, who saw the boy trying in vain to escape.
In another school, a teacher held a 12-year-old with a diagnosis of attention deficit disorder “face down on the floor, straddling him at his hips, and holding his hands behind his back,” according to the investigation, which was done by California’s office of protection and advocacy. Congress established such offices in each state in the 1970s to protect the rights of the disabled.
Leslie Morrison, director of investigations at the California office, said parents often complained about such episodes but were usually reluctant to cooperate with an investigation. “They’re afraid the school will retaliate,” she said.
And the children, who have an array of psychiatric diagnoses, from attention deficit to autism, often do not understand what is happening or why. “They just think they did something wrong and are being punished,” Ms. Morrison said. “Many of them are not verbal at all and can’t even tell their parents.”
In Tim Miller’s case, school logs obtained by his father illustrate how quickly a situation can escalate, regardless of behavior plans. In one entry, dated March 18, 2005, a teacher wrote: “Tim was screaming down the hall. He ran past me and began to double his fist to punch the locker. At this point I scooped my arm underneath his and directed him into my room.”
After the boy continued to struggle, this teacher and another “laid him onto the mat, where he was held approximately 20 minutes,” the log said.
Tim, now 15, graduated from the school last year and in June completed his first year of high school, excelling in a variety of mainstream classes without incident. In a telephone interview, he said he no longer thought much about the takedowns. “I just think now that they were idiots to do that,” he said. “I remember telling my mom to pray to God that they wouldn’t keep doing it, and wishing the other kids would see what was happening.”
When a school has a so-called zero tolerance approach to bad behavior, it often does makes a public spectacle of controlling a child’s behavior, said several parents interviewed for this article.
Kathy Sexton, who lives near Dallas, had to pick up her 11-year-old son, Anthony, who has a diagnosis of attention deficit disorder, at the police station, after school staff members had the boy hauled away in handcuffs for cursing at a teacher.
“I didn’t hear about it for hours and had to go get him at jail,” Ms. Sexton said in a phone interview. “He was hysterical, obviously, and he’s had his ups and downs since then. It’s hard to know what a thing like that does to a child that age.”
Several companies offer programs to teach so-called de-escalation techniques to school staff, and a scattering of schools have developed model programs to pre-empt confrontations, and defuse them when they happen. But experts say that until policymakers and schools adopt standards, on exactly which techniques are allowed and when, children with behavior problems will in many districts run the risk of being forcibly brought into line.
Dr. Peterson, the Nebraska professor, illustrates the challenges by citing two recent cases in Iowa. In one, the parents of an 11-year-old who died while being held down called for a ban on restraints; in the other, parents charged that a school failed their son by not restraining him. The boy ran away and drowned.
“It’s damned if you do, damned if you don’t,” Dr. Peterson said, “and it reflects the level of confusion there is about this whole issue.”
End of article
I hope that you can see just how serious education for staff can be. Lack of knowledge for proper handling leads to desperation to make a child comply. That leads to dangerous practices. Practices that put your districts at risk. It’s far less expensive, especially in the long haul, to make sure that all staff are knowledgeable and sensitive to these special needs kids. Granted laws were recently passed on the federal level against restraint and seclusion but we all have an important part to play. We all must do our part to make sure the proverbial ball doesn’t get dropped anywhere for the sake of all our children. The answer is education.
A cruel reminder
It's been over a year since I came so close to one of my overloads. This one came as a cruel reminder of why I'm on disability. The labels are autism, bipolar, and a permanent head injury. The head injury is at the least contused and damaged nerves in the right side of my forehead and at most a permanent brain injury that messes up my sensory input just that much more from my autism. I take a great risk in writing about them because of all the judgment and stigma. I also live in a small community where becoming an outcast is too easy. People fear what they don't understand.
But that's not what I'm here to talk about. I'm here to talk about that cruel reminder I got yesterday. Recently I had to give up my van for multiple reasons that I'm not going into here. Suffice to say it is dead and gone. I have to seek new transportation. In the mean time, I still have to get around. I thought, why not get a bicycle and one of those trailers for my son to sit in? Seemed like a good idea. I can't afford constant taxi fares, I have to make payments to anyone I buy a car from (not too many like that idea), and apparently I don't qualify for low income bus pass (borderline). A monthly bus pass in this little town is 48 bucks per person (regardless of age from five on up). That's 96 a month taken away from me saving up for a vehicle. So, I got a good deal on a bike and trailer for 180. Not bad.
It was hard to get started riding. I hadn't been on a bike in twenty years. But I surprised myself and made it. I was worried because one of the triggers for my overloads is over-exertion. But it didn't happen, not right away. On my fourth back and forth trip, each direction worth about forty minutes the wind was horrible on the way home. That's home from picking up my son at school. No, no bus available, I got shut down cold on that one. And I won't change schools on my son for just the last month of school. He has autism as well and it could damage all the good work done so far. Anyway, the wind yesterday was so hard it actually stopped me in mid-peddle and I had to try and push through it walking in several areas. Having that trailer on the back is like having an open parachute for the wind to just grab and yank around. By the time I got home, I was going into overload, I was ready to scream.
I did manage to avoid the full seizure like state by getting to my meds and getting into my "quiet spot" where I can cool down. My upper legs are bruised from the effort of just trying to get home. So that kind of kills the idea that I can keep riding a bike for taking my son to school. Short rides after my legs heal are a possibility but I do have avoid overheating as well.
For more about Sensory Overload I have a good report I wrote at http://hubpages.com/hub/Autistic-Sensory-Overload
Please feel free to take a look and read up on it. It's not an easy or fun condition to live with and a lot of autistics do live with it.
But that's not what I'm here to talk about. I'm here to talk about that cruel reminder I got yesterday. Recently I had to give up my van for multiple reasons that I'm not going into here. Suffice to say it is dead and gone. I have to seek new transportation. In the mean time, I still have to get around. I thought, why not get a bicycle and one of those trailers for my son to sit in? Seemed like a good idea. I can't afford constant taxi fares, I have to make payments to anyone I buy a car from (not too many like that idea), and apparently I don't qualify for low income bus pass (borderline). A monthly bus pass in this little town is 48 bucks per person (regardless of age from five on up). That's 96 a month taken away from me saving up for a vehicle. So, I got a good deal on a bike and trailer for 180. Not bad.
It was hard to get started riding. I hadn't been on a bike in twenty years. But I surprised myself and made it. I was worried because one of the triggers for my overloads is over-exertion. But it didn't happen, not right away. On my fourth back and forth trip, each direction worth about forty minutes the wind was horrible on the way home. That's home from picking up my son at school. No, no bus available, I got shut down cold on that one. And I won't change schools on my son for just the last month of school. He has autism as well and it could damage all the good work done so far. Anyway, the wind yesterday was so hard it actually stopped me in mid-peddle and I had to try and push through it walking in several areas. Having that trailer on the back is like having an open parachute for the wind to just grab and yank around. By the time I got home, I was going into overload, I was ready to scream.
I did manage to avoid the full seizure like state by getting to my meds and getting into my "quiet spot" where I can cool down. My upper legs are bruised from the effort of just trying to get home. So that kind of kills the idea that I can keep riding a bike for taking my son to school. Short rides after my legs heal are a possibility but I do have avoid overheating as well.
For more about Sensory Overload I have a good report I wrote at http://hubpages.com/hub/Autistic-Sensory-Overload
Please feel free to take a look and read up on it. It's not an easy or fun condition to live with and a lot of autistics do live with it.
Saturday, May 1, 2010
Contacting Education Departments
I've sent out my first email to all but one State level Department of Education throughout our country of the US. I originally planned to do a packet by US post to them all, but the costs just became impossible. Between having the packet copied fifty-one times (with one sent to the White House) and paying postage that many times over (a minimum of a hundred dollars) it's just not possible on my income. So I have to split the project into parts and email it.
There is one state that hasn't responded to me with an email that I can send to and doesn't have it listed on their site. You can only contact them through a general message point on their site. That would be New Jersey. The White House has the same general form to use and they haven't responded to me either.
Idaho responded to my sending of part one and favorably too. No one else has responded.
This was part one of my information on autism as sent through email. Feel free to print this and share it with anyone you feel would benefit. Just remember I put the man hours into compiling it for credit purposes.
Dear Educational Departments of America,
I write to you today as a concerned American citizen who lives with autism. I also write to you as a friend of the educational system in our country. I am not a doctor, lawyer or professor. I carry no special certifications. What I have is my raw life experiences and research. Through this I have been helping families learn about and cope with autism for about three years. I have put together this information to assist you in understanding autism, perhaps in ways you have not considered yet. It is to show you an alarming trend that has swept over the face of our country and suggestions to correct it.
My name is David Wilde, I am 39 years old and was diagnosed with autism in 2005, right after my son. Since then I have been on a journey of new self learning. Through my own school years, I never understood why I had such a hard time of it. I suffered physical and mental bullying and was even labeled as retarded by the school district I attended.
Yes, this was a long time ago and there have been improvements in our schools. However, there are still serious problems for us to correct that echo the same even today.
It is my hope and prayer that you will not cast this aside. That you will read it and share it with your colleagues. That all of you will gain knowledge from it that will help you and all our school districts in our great nation, understand autism even a little bit better.
Please know that you have my permission to duplicate this information as many times as you wish in order to send it to the rest of your districts and any other offices that you work with who may benefit from this information.
As this is being sent via email, if there is a better email in your department to send to, please respond with that information and I will make a correction immediately. Be sure to clearly indicate which state you represent.
I am not charging anything for this information or my hours in putting it together. I am volunteering for the sake of our educational system and children everywhere.
You may contact me at anytime via this email or write to:
Copies of this work have been sent to:
State level Departments of Education in ALL fifty states.
The President of the United States of America
1: Adapting to the new trend of student:
Adapting is what makes us successful as a species. As our world changes, we adapt or even evolve and move along with those changes. For example, in recent news, basic training in our armed forces announced the drop of bayonet training for soldiers. They dropped it because it does not meet the needs of our soldiers in combat environments of today. For that matter, they realized that they haven’t even been using bayonets on weapons in close to twenty years. Training has adapted now to fit the needs of our soldiers because the environment they fight in has changed.
How we handle students with special needs must also adapt because the very definition of those special needs and the number of students with them has changed.
This year the CDC announced that the number of children with autism moved from 1 in 150 to 1 in 110. The numbers of students with special needs behaviors have increased in classrooms as well. This demands a certain level of changes in handling the classroom and these students. By the current trend, numbers are going to increase, not decrease.
Because of this, not only are more teachers likely to be needed, but more in class aides and greater understanding of conditions being dealt with. Smaller classes for control aspects will also make it easier for teachers and aides to work with students. A ratio of 15 students per classroom is suggested at maximum. Some districts have already put this ratio to use.
Arranging autism seminars for school staff would help immensely in understanding of these students as well as other disorders. Resources to consider for such work would be state chapters of the Autism Society of America and Autism resource centers established across the country. They exist to help families find resources. It makes sense that they could help schools too.
So how did restraint and seclusion get so out of control? In a word, desperation. Our classrooms have been flooded with excess of special needs students without additional training to prepare. Staff have found themselves desperate to try and get these kids to “calm down” and “behave” in class. Sadly, human nature through society has been prone to use force when no other avenues seem available. This does not excuse the tragedies that have happened, but does explain a little of why. That is why we must make adjustments, we must adapt in our educational system. We can help educational staff work easier with these special needs students, and stem the tragedies, misunderstandings, due process hearings, and even lawsuits occurring around the country.
2: Autism Misconcepts
It’s as important to know the myths and misconceptions of autism as it is the facts and realities. What I will share with you here are comments made by school staff from actual experiences of parents I have interviewed around the country.
-This child can’t learn the material or is incapable of learning the material. Children with autism don’t react to or relate with the world around them the same as other children. This makes it too easy to underestimate their learning capabilities and for educators to just give up on them. My own son was accused of this because of his outbursts and behavior that made it seem like he wasn’t paying attention. Later in the year he showed them all that he not only absorbed the material and heard what was said, he understood it perfectly. Erratic behavior is not proof of inability to learn. For that matter, autistics are well known for absorbing everything around them. But they can’t sort it as fast as others because they literally take in too much at a time to do so. This factor of autism is murder on their attention span because literally every single thing in the room is demanding their attention at the level of a fire alarm. If all your teachers could be armed with this information, we can give these kids a better chance to make it through school.
-I just don’t see autism in your child. This is one that has frustrated many struggling parents and seems dismissive to them. You may see a hundred children with autism and not even know it. First of all, it’s not the school staff’s place to judge medical diagnosis. Every child with autism is different and there’s often other co morbid conditions that take affect on the child’s behavior. It’s a spectrum and behaviors can be affected all across it. I’ve had teachers suggest that my son is too social to have autism. What is missed with that statement is that our autism kids will be an extreme of either direction. Those that are in the extreme of social attempts still have trouble with social boundaries and cues. They want to be social but try too hard and wind up forcing people away as a result. It’s important that staff not worry about judging diagnosis (especially when they aren’t doctors) and concentrate on what will help the child learn.
-This child is a brat or a nuisance. If staff understand how our kids are affected by their conditions at all, they won’t dismiss them as just brats. Our kids aren’t just trying to learn a curriculum but how to live through a medical condition as well. Imagine trying to learn how to juggle and ride a bike at the same time. Separately you can expect success in a given period of time, but if your body and mind force you to do both at once it will get frustrating in a hurry. That’s life for our kids on the spectrum, constant frustration because things they try to do never come out as intended. Then they get more frustrated because someone is yelling at them or scolding them when it was a struggle in the first place. That’s not to say they should never be scolded but it will take practice to separate the behaviors that require a little healthy scolding and the ones that don’t. A rule of thumb is to apply to behavior that directly affects others. Hitting another child or acting out against another child is inappropriate and should still be dealt with immediately. Getting frustrated over a spelling paper is inappropriate but not hurting anyone. It doesn’t require the same amount of discipline or handling. It is where understanding and some sensitivity to the child’s struggles can go a long way.
-This child needs to be institutionalized. If ever a phrase should be banned from escaping a teachers lips to our autism families, it’s that one. This is a medical decision and should be made with extreme care. Autism kids don’t need to be locked in a cell, they already are inside of their own poor heads. Why would we want to compound that pain? In my Jr high years in Lincoln, Nebraska I was branded as retarded and made to stay in a hospital for 30 days for evaluations. While they still didn’t diagnose my autism, they did discover I was anything but retarded. It was not my school’s place to judge me medically. In all fairness however, autism can be a masking condition that is good at covering itself up. That’s why we need to apply this new level of understanding for all our teachers and staff.
-It’s just poor parenting. Autism is a proven disorder and has nothing to do with how a child is “parented”. As it is, parenting an autism child is very challenging. School is often far more structured than at home and doesn’t involve the same needs as running a household. Autism parents have to take their child to the store and appointments and be prepared for spontaneous behavior at any waking moment. Embarrassing explosive meltdowns could happen for just about any reason, but mostly reasons “invisible” to the bystander. Daily routines that most take for granted can be long drawn out episodes and require vigilance and patience to get through. Staff need to consider that they do not see but a fraction of these children’s lives. They also need to remember that these are special needs children and parenting is more of a challenge than with an average child.
-This child is unhealthy or diseased. Autism is a disorder, not a disease. It is not communicable though known to be hereditary. High functioning autism children can run and play just as well as any child. They can grow and mature, though maturity takes longer. Calling them unhealthy or diseased is inappropriate and hurtful to the relations with the child’s family.
-This child is supposed to have genius ability. Not all autism children have a savant ability, while such is popular in the movies. What is common is for them to become so enthralled with a given subject that they can’t let go of it. They may become “little professors” on that subject. They may be able to tell you trivial information that almost no one would even notice on the subject. They may even try to apply that subject to everything they say or do (whether it fits or not). However, that does not constitute genius, just intense interest that gets them “stuck in a rut”. People with autism are extremely diverse, though there are mannerisms that are common amongst them.
-This child will never leave home or be able to do anything on his own. This is an impossible forecast. It’s also highly inappropriate. It suggests that a child with autism will never mature or grow. It’s true that low functioning autism children may need care for their entire lives, but it’s not true for every child and certainly cannot be forecast based on the child’s condition in elementary school (for the high functioning). Children with autism go through phases of maturity and growth. They just take longer and have more difficulty. Not only is it wrong to say this to parents (refer to idea of not judging or diagnosing above), but the children can pick up on it as well. I remember being labeled as ‘retarded’ and I remember teachers in more than one state or district who told me point blank that I would never amount to anything. Remember that these children pick up more than they show. It’s psychologically damaging and hinders self esteem which does hinder their personal growth. With proper support and care, many of our children will grow, mature, and be able to lead lives on their own. It’s important for this to take place in our schools.
So, from this we can take that high function children with autism:
-CAN learn the material, even if they don’t show it right away.
-are diverse and will show symptoms differently in their behaviors.
-is NOT just a brat or spoiled child, rather at the mercy of their conditions.
-does not require being locked up just because they have autism.
-is not the result of bad parenting.
-is not diseased or unhealthy just because they have autism.
-is not always a genius.
-may mature and grow, even if it doesn’t look like it at the time.
There is more to come in part 2.
There is one state that hasn't responded to me with an email that I can send to and doesn't have it listed on their site. You can only contact them through a general message point on their site. That would be New Jersey. The White House has the same general form to use and they haven't responded to me either.
Idaho responded to my sending of part one and favorably too. No one else has responded.
This was part one of my information on autism as sent through email. Feel free to print this and share it with anyone you feel would benefit. Just remember I put the man hours into compiling it for credit purposes.
Dear Educational Departments of America,
I write to you today as a concerned American citizen who lives with autism. I also write to you as a friend of the educational system in our country. I am not a doctor, lawyer or professor. I carry no special certifications. What I have is my raw life experiences and research. Through this I have been helping families learn about and cope with autism for about three years. I have put together this information to assist you in understanding autism, perhaps in ways you have not considered yet. It is to show you an alarming trend that has swept over the face of our country and suggestions to correct it.
My name is David Wilde, I am 39 years old and was diagnosed with autism in 2005, right after my son. Since then I have been on a journey of new self learning. Through my own school years, I never understood why I had such a hard time of it. I suffered physical and mental bullying and was even labeled as retarded by the school district I attended.
Yes, this was a long time ago and there have been improvements in our schools. However, there are still serious problems for us to correct that echo the same even today.
It is my hope and prayer that you will not cast this aside. That you will read it and share it with your colleagues. That all of you will gain knowledge from it that will help you and all our school districts in our great nation, understand autism even a little bit better.
Please know that you have my permission to duplicate this information as many times as you wish in order to send it to the rest of your districts and any other offices that you work with who may benefit from this information.
As this is being sent via email, if there is a better email in your department to send to, please respond with that information and I will make a correction immediately. Be sure to clearly indicate which state you represent.
I am not charging anything for this information or my hours in putting it together. I am volunteering for the sake of our educational system and children everywhere.
You may contact me at anytime via this email or write to:
Copies of this work have been sent to:
State level Departments of Education in ALL fifty states.
The President of the United States of America
1: Adapting to the new trend of student:
Adapting is what makes us successful as a species. As our world changes, we adapt or even evolve and move along with those changes. For example, in recent news, basic training in our armed forces announced the drop of bayonet training for soldiers. They dropped it because it does not meet the needs of our soldiers in combat environments of today. For that matter, they realized that they haven’t even been using bayonets on weapons in close to twenty years. Training has adapted now to fit the needs of our soldiers because the environment they fight in has changed.
How we handle students with special needs must also adapt because the very definition of those special needs and the number of students with them has changed.
This year the CDC announced that the number of children with autism moved from 1 in 150 to 1 in 110. The numbers of students with special needs behaviors have increased in classrooms as well. This demands a certain level of changes in handling the classroom and these students. By the current trend, numbers are going to increase, not decrease.
Because of this, not only are more teachers likely to be needed, but more in class aides and greater understanding of conditions being dealt with. Smaller classes for control aspects will also make it easier for teachers and aides to work with students. A ratio of 15 students per classroom is suggested at maximum. Some districts have already put this ratio to use.
Arranging autism seminars for school staff would help immensely in understanding of these students as well as other disorders. Resources to consider for such work would be state chapters of the Autism Society of America and Autism resource centers established across the country. They exist to help families find resources. It makes sense that they could help schools too.
So how did restraint and seclusion get so out of control? In a word, desperation. Our classrooms have been flooded with excess of special needs students without additional training to prepare. Staff have found themselves desperate to try and get these kids to “calm down” and “behave” in class. Sadly, human nature through society has been prone to use force when no other avenues seem available. This does not excuse the tragedies that have happened, but does explain a little of why. That is why we must make adjustments, we must adapt in our educational system. We can help educational staff work easier with these special needs students, and stem the tragedies, misunderstandings, due process hearings, and even lawsuits occurring around the country.
2: Autism Misconcepts
It’s as important to know the myths and misconceptions of autism as it is the facts and realities. What I will share with you here are comments made by school staff from actual experiences of parents I have interviewed around the country.
-This child can’t learn the material or is incapable of learning the material. Children with autism don’t react to or relate with the world around them the same as other children. This makes it too easy to underestimate their learning capabilities and for educators to just give up on them. My own son was accused of this because of his outbursts and behavior that made it seem like he wasn’t paying attention. Later in the year he showed them all that he not only absorbed the material and heard what was said, he understood it perfectly. Erratic behavior is not proof of inability to learn. For that matter, autistics are well known for absorbing everything around them. But they can’t sort it as fast as others because they literally take in too much at a time to do so. This factor of autism is murder on their attention span because literally every single thing in the room is demanding their attention at the level of a fire alarm. If all your teachers could be armed with this information, we can give these kids a better chance to make it through school.
-I just don’t see autism in your child. This is one that has frustrated many struggling parents and seems dismissive to them. You may see a hundred children with autism and not even know it. First of all, it’s not the school staff’s place to judge medical diagnosis. Every child with autism is different and there’s often other co morbid conditions that take affect on the child’s behavior. It’s a spectrum and behaviors can be affected all across it. I’ve had teachers suggest that my son is too social to have autism. What is missed with that statement is that our autism kids will be an extreme of either direction. Those that are in the extreme of social attempts still have trouble with social boundaries and cues. They want to be social but try too hard and wind up forcing people away as a result. It’s important that staff not worry about judging diagnosis (especially when they aren’t doctors) and concentrate on what will help the child learn.
-This child is a brat or a nuisance. If staff understand how our kids are affected by their conditions at all, they won’t dismiss them as just brats. Our kids aren’t just trying to learn a curriculum but how to live through a medical condition as well. Imagine trying to learn how to juggle and ride a bike at the same time. Separately you can expect success in a given period of time, but if your body and mind force you to do both at once it will get frustrating in a hurry. That’s life for our kids on the spectrum, constant frustration because things they try to do never come out as intended. Then they get more frustrated because someone is yelling at them or scolding them when it was a struggle in the first place. That’s not to say they should never be scolded but it will take practice to separate the behaviors that require a little healthy scolding and the ones that don’t. A rule of thumb is to apply to behavior that directly affects others. Hitting another child or acting out against another child is inappropriate and should still be dealt with immediately. Getting frustrated over a spelling paper is inappropriate but not hurting anyone. It doesn’t require the same amount of discipline or handling. It is where understanding and some sensitivity to the child’s struggles can go a long way.
-This child needs to be institutionalized. If ever a phrase should be banned from escaping a teachers lips to our autism families, it’s that one. This is a medical decision and should be made with extreme care. Autism kids don’t need to be locked in a cell, they already are inside of their own poor heads. Why would we want to compound that pain? In my Jr high years in Lincoln, Nebraska I was branded as retarded and made to stay in a hospital for 30 days for evaluations. While they still didn’t diagnose my autism, they did discover I was anything but retarded. It was not my school’s place to judge me medically. In all fairness however, autism can be a masking condition that is good at covering itself up. That’s why we need to apply this new level of understanding for all our teachers and staff.
-It’s just poor parenting. Autism is a proven disorder and has nothing to do with how a child is “parented”. As it is, parenting an autism child is very challenging. School is often far more structured than at home and doesn’t involve the same needs as running a household. Autism parents have to take their child to the store and appointments and be prepared for spontaneous behavior at any waking moment. Embarrassing explosive meltdowns could happen for just about any reason, but mostly reasons “invisible” to the bystander. Daily routines that most take for granted can be long drawn out episodes and require vigilance and patience to get through. Staff need to consider that they do not see but a fraction of these children’s lives. They also need to remember that these are special needs children and parenting is more of a challenge than with an average child.
-This child is unhealthy or diseased. Autism is a disorder, not a disease. It is not communicable though known to be hereditary. High functioning autism children can run and play just as well as any child. They can grow and mature, though maturity takes longer. Calling them unhealthy or diseased is inappropriate and hurtful to the relations with the child’s family.
-This child is supposed to have genius ability. Not all autism children have a savant ability, while such is popular in the movies. What is common is for them to become so enthralled with a given subject that they can’t let go of it. They may become “little professors” on that subject. They may be able to tell you trivial information that almost no one would even notice on the subject. They may even try to apply that subject to everything they say or do (whether it fits or not). However, that does not constitute genius, just intense interest that gets them “stuck in a rut”. People with autism are extremely diverse, though there are mannerisms that are common amongst them.
-This child will never leave home or be able to do anything on his own. This is an impossible forecast. It’s also highly inappropriate. It suggests that a child with autism will never mature or grow. It’s true that low functioning autism children may need care for their entire lives, but it’s not true for every child and certainly cannot be forecast based on the child’s condition in elementary school (for the high functioning). Children with autism go through phases of maturity and growth. They just take longer and have more difficulty. Not only is it wrong to say this to parents (refer to idea of not judging or diagnosing above), but the children can pick up on it as well. I remember being labeled as ‘retarded’ and I remember teachers in more than one state or district who told me point blank that I would never amount to anything. Remember that these children pick up more than they show. It’s psychologically damaging and hinders self esteem which does hinder their personal growth. With proper support and care, many of our children will grow, mature, and be able to lead lives on their own. It’s important for this to take place in our schools.
So, from this we can take that high function children with autism:
-CAN learn the material, even if they don’t show it right away.
-are diverse and will show symptoms differently in their behaviors.
-is NOT just a brat or spoiled child, rather at the mercy of their conditions.
-does not require being locked up just because they have autism.
-is not the result of bad parenting.
-is not diseased or unhealthy just because they have autism.
-is not always a genius.
-may mature and grow, even if it doesn’t look like it at the time.
There is more to come in part 2.
Tuesday, April 27, 2010
They just walked past him as he died
I can't think of how many times I've been asked what the world is coming to. But I can sure tell you where it's headed!
There are at least seven people who should be ashamed of themselves in their callousness. Why? Because on April 18th at around 6 am a man was stabbed fatally while attempting to help a woman being attacked. As he lay on the sidewalk near the curb, bleeding to death, that's how many people walked by and let him die. All were caught on a building security camera and some even stopped to gawk and stare. This happened in New York City, but it's not only happening there. Check out the news story here.
One of those people who stopped apparently called 911, but an hour had gone by and the man was dead. Do you know how long it takes to bleed out from serious wounds like that? Less than 12 minutes. From some wounds you can die in as little as 8 minutes from blood loss. I'm sure he landed somewhere in the middle. Let's say it took ten minutes. That means he had enough time to lay there and die SIX TIMES. Considering the report suggests help didn't arrive until 7:20, you can add a couple more times to that.
So, at least six out of those seven who just left him there and couldn't even be bothered to make an anonymous phone call on their cell phone or a pay phone (whatever) FAIL AT HUMANITY! The woman he tried to help, unless she was the one who finally called... FAILS TOO. The guy with the knife needs to go to prison and the woman may as well join him for fleeing the scene of a crime.
This is not an isolated incident. It's happening everywhere. And you should be absolutely horrified. People who don't get out of the way for an ambulance, or ignore someone who's hurt, or put down people for having medical conditions and leaving them to suffer. People who won't help their fellow man any more... one of these days it will be YOU. The new motto these days for America is "Everyone for themselves and to themselves". The response to people in need is a resounding "SHUT UP!"
Don't believe me? Look at how we failed in Hurricane Katrina. People lay on the sidewalks in New Orleans DYING for days, while we all watched on the news and drooled on our shoes. Especially our so-called government. It certainly doesn't stop there. Yeah I'm being harsh, but ya know what?... It's kind of hard to get more harsh than DEAD.
Our country is failing it's poor and huddled masses that it INVITES to it's shores. It's allowing people to become homeless and blaming them for not being able to pay for things so overpriced that there's no hope of paying on three jobs per household. Then we go bail out all the rich idiots! Next we'll be punishing the middle class families because they can't afford the gouging price of medical insurance. Leaving them to die on the sidewalk from unfair fines that they will have no more ability to pay than the insurance companies.
We need to stop letting people suffer and die and finally become the great nation we keep bragging about.
There are at least seven people who should be ashamed of themselves in their callousness. Why? Because on April 18th at around 6 am a man was stabbed fatally while attempting to help a woman being attacked. As he lay on the sidewalk near the curb, bleeding to death, that's how many people walked by and let him die. All were caught on a building security camera and some even stopped to gawk and stare. This happened in New York City, but it's not only happening there. Check out the news story here.
One of those people who stopped apparently called 911, but an hour had gone by and the man was dead. Do you know how long it takes to bleed out from serious wounds like that? Less than 12 minutes. From some wounds you can die in as little as 8 minutes from blood loss. I'm sure he landed somewhere in the middle. Let's say it took ten minutes. That means he had enough time to lay there and die SIX TIMES. Considering the report suggests help didn't arrive until 7:20, you can add a couple more times to that.
So, at least six out of those seven who just left him there and couldn't even be bothered to make an anonymous phone call on their cell phone or a pay phone (whatever) FAIL AT HUMANITY! The woman he tried to help, unless she was the one who finally called... FAILS TOO. The guy with the knife needs to go to prison and the woman may as well join him for fleeing the scene of a crime.
This is not an isolated incident. It's happening everywhere. And you should be absolutely horrified. People who don't get out of the way for an ambulance, or ignore someone who's hurt, or put down people for having medical conditions and leaving them to suffer. People who won't help their fellow man any more... one of these days it will be YOU. The new motto these days for America is "Everyone for themselves and to themselves". The response to people in need is a resounding "SHUT UP!"
Don't believe me? Look at how we failed in Hurricane Katrina. People lay on the sidewalks in New Orleans DYING for days, while we all watched on the news and drooled on our shoes. Especially our so-called government. It certainly doesn't stop there. Yeah I'm being harsh, but ya know what?... It's kind of hard to get more harsh than DEAD.
Our country is failing it's poor and huddled masses that it INVITES to it's shores. It's allowing people to become homeless and blaming them for not being able to pay for things so overpriced that there's no hope of paying on three jobs per household. Then we go bail out all the rich idiots! Next we'll be punishing the middle class families because they can't afford the gouging price of medical insurance. Leaving them to die on the sidewalk from unfair fines that they will have no more ability to pay than the insurance companies.
We need to stop letting people suffer and die and finally become the great nation we keep bragging about.
Man refused hospital treatment because of autism
Stephen Puckett of Oklahoma City, OK was refused treatment at an emergency room for a seizure because he has autism.
As if that weren't enough, his combination of being in a seizure condition with his autism got a security guard kicked and they put him in jail. During his jail time, he had a front tooth knocked out.
You can see the news broadcast on his condition here.
In that broadcast you will see a photo of him with an untreated head wound and foaming spit coming from his mouth because of his seizure. Not only does this mean he was denied proper medical care under any circumstance, but that he was discriminated against only because he has autism. It proves abuse from the system against this man that his family should be suing really hard over.
The hospital's stance, and that of several area hospitals is that they can't treat autism. This is flawed! They aren't treating autism, the man had a seizure! An epileptic type seizure for that matter! They CAN treat that. And they were legally obliged to do so.
The medical board of Oklahoma needs to take immediate and decisive action and correct this or have the autism community all over their case in a picketing stompathon. The entire system owes Mr. Puckett a huge apology and damages. They need to pay for a dentist to fix his mouth because he's not a criminal and was under the thrall of a medical condition. It's not like he was on drugs, carrying weapons, or drunk. Speaking of which, do the hospitals in OK cater to drunks and drugees who come in all bashed up? I bet they do. I bet they stitch up violent criminals too. Why? Because they have to, they are legally obliged to serve anyone who is in NEED of medical care.
I for one, hope that Mr. Puckett's mother, who is his caretaker, sues their pants off all the way around for this horrible and irresponsible treatment. It's called MALPRACTICE.
As if that weren't enough, his combination of being in a seizure condition with his autism got a security guard kicked and they put him in jail. During his jail time, he had a front tooth knocked out.
You can see the news broadcast on his condition here.
In that broadcast you will see a photo of him with an untreated head wound and foaming spit coming from his mouth because of his seizure. Not only does this mean he was denied proper medical care under any circumstance, but that he was discriminated against only because he has autism. It proves abuse from the system against this man that his family should be suing really hard over.
The hospital's stance, and that of several area hospitals is that they can't treat autism. This is flawed! They aren't treating autism, the man had a seizure! An epileptic type seizure for that matter! They CAN treat that. And they were legally obliged to do so.
The medical board of Oklahoma needs to take immediate and decisive action and correct this or have the autism community all over their case in a picketing stompathon. The entire system owes Mr. Puckett a huge apology and damages. They need to pay for a dentist to fix his mouth because he's not a criminal and was under the thrall of a medical condition. It's not like he was on drugs, carrying weapons, or drunk. Speaking of which, do the hospitals in OK cater to drunks and drugees who come in all bashed up? I bet they do. I bet they stitch up violent criminals too. Why? Because they have to, they are legally obliged to serve anyone who is in NEED of medical care.
I for one, hope that Mr. Puckett's mother, who is his caretaker, sues their pants off all the way around for this horrible and irresponsible treatment. It's called MALPRACTICE.
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