Another meeting with Caden's teachers

I met with Caden's teacher, the autism teacher, and the director of the school this afternoon. We were meeting to talk about Caden's transition to kindergarten. They had previously told me that Caden would be getting an aide for 1/2 day, every day next year. Not so much anymore. His academics are too high for him to qualify. They can put him in an inclusion class that has a special needs aide in the classroom, but she will be working with all the kids, not just Caden.



They also told me that they don't think he will qualify for speech therapy anymore. These were my fears when we had PT conferences, but I thought they were resolved. Again, not so much. The speech therapist was supposed to be at the meeting, too, but was sick or something. So the ST is still on the fence. He does still need ST and I have a feeling that it is going to be a battle to get it for him. He is NOT meeting the goals on his IEP in the speech area, so I'm not sure how they can decide that he doesn't need it anymore. I guess I will have to take his IEP in and fight them about it. I feel like they don't have a whole lot of experience with high functioning autism. They are great with severely autistic kids, but I'm not sure they really understand Asperger Syndrome.

Again, let me stress that I am thrilled that Caden is doing so well. He knows most of the alphabet, he can almost count to twenty, and he knows shapes and colors. He does really well with concrete information. But abstract information goes completely over his head. It's not even on his radar. For example: I had a rough day the other day about all the things that are going on with Tyler and I was sitting on the couch talking to Erick and crying about all of it. Caden was on the floor playing. After a few minutes, he climbed in my lap and I thought he was being so sweet, but he pulled my eyelids open and informed me that he was hungry. He didn't have a clue that I was crying. And if he did notice, it didn't occur to him that I might be upset. Emotions are abstract and confusing and Caden doesn't really understand them at all. We are working on it though and many other issues, but I need the help and cooperation of the school to make sure that Caden reaches his fullest potential. Next year he will be at school 7 hours a day, 5 days week and they need to be aware and understanding of the areas that he needs help with.

So next week I will be evaluating kindergarten classes at ECEC and at JMA and hopefully be able to make a prayerful decision about where to send Caden next year. Wish me luck.

In the mean time, enjoy some pictures of my cute boys :)