If your child has special needs, you have landed in foreign territory. What you need to know is, despite its sun-shiny cheeriness, despite the perfect bulletin boards and the smiley face posters, and despite the multitude of activities organized by a PTA, school is going to be somewhat hostile territory for you and your child. I do not say this to scare or even to criticize. It is what it is. It does not mean people will be mean to you or your child. It does not mean you have to be fearful. What it means is, as a parent, you MUST be your child's advocate. No one else has YOUR child's best interest at heart. The law pretends to. A law comes to life only in the hands of those who follow it. Public districts have mountains of laws, especially in the field of children who struggle, under which they must not suffocate. Bottom line: districts will set things up to do the minimum of what the law requires. However, what every parent of children with special needs should know is that the law requires that they do EVERYTHING they can do for your child. Here are a few sites that are helpful for parents to know their rights under the law. 
Thursday, April 5, 2012
Autism Awareness Tidbit #5
As parents, we have all dreamed our dreams of what our child's lives will be. Most of us think back to our own childhood and life in school and presume that our child's life will follow in a similar fashion. If you have a neurotypical child, that will probably be the case, with the exception of the explosion of technology that somewhat alters his/her experiences from our own.
If your child has special needs, you have landed in foreign territory. What you need to know is, despite its sun-shiny cheeriness, despite the perfect bulletin boards and the smiley face posters, and despite the multitude of activities organized by a PTA, school is going to be somewhat hostile territory for you and your child. I do not say this to scare or even to criticize. It is what it is. It does not mean people will be mean to you or your child. It does not mean you have to be fearful. What it means is, as a parent, you MUST be your child's advocate. No one else has YOUR child's best interest at heart. The law pretends to. A law comes to life only in the hands of those who follow it. Public districts have mountains of laws, especially in the field of children who struggle, under which they must not suffocate. Bottom line: districts will set things up to do the minimum of what the law requires. However, what every parent of children with special needs should know is that the law requires that they do EVERYTHING they can do for your child. Here are a few sites that are helpful for parents to know their rights under the law.
If your child has special needs, you have landed in foreign territory. What you need to know is, despite its sun-shiny cheeriness, despite the perfect bulletin boards and the smiley face posters, and despite the multitude of activities organized by a PTA, school is going to be somewhat hostile territory for you and your child. I do not say this to scare or even to criticize. It is what it is. It does not mean people will be mean to you or your child. It does not mean you have to be fearful. What it means is, as a parent, you MUST be your child's advocate. No one else has YOUR child's best interest at heart. The law pretends to. A law comes to life only in the hands of those who follow it. Public districts have mountains of laws, especially in the field of children who struggle, under which they must not suffocate. Bottom line: districts will set things up to do the minimum of what the law requires. However, what every parent of children with special needs should know is that the law requires that they do EVERYTHING they can do for your child. Here are a few sites that are helpful for parents to know their rights under the law. 
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