Homeschooling with ASD

[brat]

Foster son can do better with his hand writing IF he has a Star Wars sticker on

I am looking to see if I can find a Star Wars pencil topper to see if that helps him want to write more.For school he is allowed to keyboard(I still want him to be able to write a note that others can read without tech)so we work on it at home.

 

[lovethattink]

Foster son can do better with his hand writing IF he has a Star Wars sticker on

I am looking to see if I can find a Star Wars pencil topper to see if that helps him want to write more.For school he is allowed to keyboard(I still want him to be able to write a note that others can read without tech)so we work on it at home.

Sticker on himself or his paper? Star Wars is definately a motivator for my son too.

 

[sl_underwood]

Star wars is a huge motivator here to. Part of our ABA has been earning time for Lego star wars ds game. It has helped immensely with behavioral issues.

 

[disneymom3]

Hi guys. Good to find this thread. I have been homeschooling for 9 years now but only recentlly got an ASD diagnosis for DS. He is in 5th grade. For a very long time I just figured "well this is the way we have to do things" but didn't get why. Now that I get why, not much has changed but at least I can explain it to others a little better. I get to add to the mix that he has ADHD, SPD and dysgraphia. What fun.

We do a lot of active learning and take many breaks for sensory activities. . I used HWOT for a long time but was not able to get the transition to lowercase letters. So, we are working very slowly on getting those letter formations down. Unfortunately the ideas we have been given like writing in shaving cream, using playdough etc, don't work because he won't touch that stuffl. I had given him a break from the eliptical letter practice as he was getting really irritated with it, so I have to get back to it.

For math, he seems to be clicking this year. He is still a couple of years behind because his recall used to be nil and building on a shaky foundation was not working. He is moving at a more typical rate this year so that is encouraging. I use Christian Light publications math books and then play LOTS of games for retention. I have a math games packet I got from Heppner's Legacy Homeschool that has tons of games that can be adapted to almost any level. Basically we do lots and lots of repetition and I try to do a majority that is easy for him and then a little bit of challenge. It makes for very slow progress but I need him to feel successful in it or he will just shut down on me.

I can throw just about any science or history at him and he just eats it up. I pretty much put together my own stuff there because I end of feeling guilty when I don't do so much of the packaged curriculums. I just don't feel like I need 12 books about oceans or Lewis and Clark to get the ideas across.

I am gonig to a homeschool convention next week and am a little baffled because I really haven't decided what I am doing for next year yet. I have a feeling I won't be buying much.

 

[lovethattink]

Welcome Disneymom3.

I'm sure you'll glean alot of good info from the homeschool convention, even if you don't buy anything, maybe you'll get some great ideas!

Handwriting is always a battle for me and my son. Unless, I am sitting with him and telling him step by step what to do. When we do that, his writing is beautiful.

 

[brat]

For Foster son he does better with the sticker on the paper.

We are in the middle of travel by RV to WDW so he is not in public school right now.He is homeschooling with my other kids.

I made him up a handwritting workbook for the trip.I printed Star Wars chractors on each page.He loves it, he is willingly working on his writting.

 

[lovethattink]

For Foster son he does better with the sticker on the paper.

We are in the middle of travel by RV to WDW so he is not in public school right now.He is homeschooling with my other kids.

I made him up a handwritting workbook for the trip.I printed Star Wars chractors on each page.He loves it, he is willingly working on his writting.

That's great! Anyway you can show what the paper looks like?

 

[brat]

I will scan a page, either when we get home from our trip to WDW or when I get to Orlando.Boss has a scanner I can use at her Orlando office.

but I can describe it better

__________________________________________________

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__________________________________________________
__________________________________________________

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On some of the pages I put a lightsaber pointing to light grey traceable letters

 

[sl_underwood]

That looks awesome. Luke would love something like this!

 

[ElizabethG]

I thought I would post some links that have been helpful for me. I don't homeschool my son, but I think all ASD moms have to 'supplement' their childrens education. I serve on our school districts special education parent advisory council and maintain the website. Here are some things I have found (and use).

http://www.dotolearn.com/
http://www.modelmekids.com/
http://www.autismshop.com/

For reading, my son responded really well to the LeapFrog videos 'Letter Factory', 'Talking Word Factory', and 'Code Word Factory'. He learns best with visual and auditory learning. It helped him learn some of the phonics rules through song. "When two vowels go walking, the first one does the talking. O + A says O like in BOAT" (etc).

 

[wide awake]

I am a teacher for a home based charter school, and my son, 20, is autistic, so have a few things to add here. Our enrollment of kids on the sprectrum is growing leaps and bounds...the home schooling is just much easier for many of the families, particularly when the kids get out of the K-1 stage where it is easier to be socially accepted. Curriculum that has been successful w/ some of my students...SRA decoding program, teaching textbooks, hands on science and social studies projects. American Science Kids is a vendor I've bought quite a few things from this year. I don't understand the time and effort that parents use for handwriting...not a hill I'd pick to die on. Most of the kids are much happier typing...given that, why push something that isn't really necessary in adult life. If your kid can sign their name fine, go on to something they really need to learn. My own son refuses to do any academic work whatsoever, and he goes to a special day program. He likes the social and does well w/ the vocational aspects of the program. As you can guess this is frustrating for me. I know DS, he'll wait till he ages out of the district program THAN decide it is time to learn the academics. Good thing he is very loveable.

 

[disneymom3]

I thought I would post some links that have been helpful for me. I don't homeschool my son, but I think all ASD moms have to 'supplement' their childrens education. I serve on our school districts special education parent advisory council and maintain the website. Here are some things I have found (and use).

http://www.dotolearn.com/
http://www.modelmekids.com/
http://www.autismshop.com/

For reading, my son responded really well to the LeapFrog videos 'Letter Factory', 'Talking Word Factory', and 'Code Word Factory'. He learns best with visual and auditory learning. It helped him learn some of the phonics rules through song. "When two vowels go walking, the first one does the talking. O + A says O like in BOAT" (etc).

One more vote for Leap Frog. I was convinced my son would never learn to blend the sounds together for like a year but once he got the Word Factory game it just clicked and he took off. My son's spelling has also been growing by leaps and bounds watching electric company on PBS.

Another thing I thought of to share is that we also use the "Scribe" work books from www.currclick.com Watch for a sale and you can get them for very cheap. It's nice because it gives them a sentence that they trace, next line down they write it on their own, then dots for them to follow and then they write it again on their own. For DS it helps to have that correct formation in the middle. Plus it is short so he doesn't mind doing it and they have TONS of topics like dogs, pets, Proverbs, Psalms, eras in history etc.

I don't die on that handwriting hill but I do need him to be at least sort of legible. He loves boy scouts and there are things in their book they have to write. You have to write job applications etc. I am not hoping for neat, just so someone other than me can read it.

 

[lovethattink]

I will scan a page, either when we get home from our trip to WDW or when I get to Orlando.Boss has a scanner I can use at her Orlando office.

but I can describe it better

__________________________________________________

---------------------------------------------------------
__________________________________________________
__________________________________________________

---------------------------------------------------------
__________________________________________________

On some of the pages I put a lightsaber pointing to light grey traceable letters

I love it!!

I thought I would post some links that have been helpful for me. I don't homeschool my son, but I think all ASD moms have to 'supplement' their childrens education. I serve on our school districts special education parent advisory council and maintain the website. Here are some things I have found (and use).

http://www.dotolearn.com/
http://www.modelmekids.com/
http://www.autismshop.com/

For reading, my son responded really well to the LeapFrog videos 'Letter Factory', 'Talking Word Factory', and 'Code Word Factory'. He learns best with visual and auditory learning. It helped him learn some of the phonics rules through song. "When two vowels go walking, the first one does the talking. O + A says O like in BOAT" (etc).

Thanks so much for the ideas! Will check out those links! And the leap frog. He has a leap frog video game thing. Are these on that or are they dvds?

I am a teacher for a home based charter school, and my son, 20, is autistic, so have a few things to add here. Our enrollment of kids on the sprectrum is growing leaps and bounds...the home schooling is just much easier for many of the families, particularly when the kids get out of the K-1 stage where it is easier to be socially accepted. Curriculum that has been successful w/ some of my students...SRA decoding program, teaching textbooks, hands on science and social studies projects. American Science Kids is a vendor I've bought quite a few things from this year. I don't understand the time and effort that parents use for handwriting...not a hill I'd pick to die on. Most of the kids are much happier typing...given that, why push something that isn't really necessary in adult life. If your kid can sign their name fine, go on to something they really need to learn. My own son refuses to do any academic work whatsoever, and he goes to a special day program. He likes the social and does well w/ the vocational aspects of the program. As you can guess this is frustrating for me. I know DS, he'll wait till he ages out of the district program THAN decide it is time to learn the academics. Good thing he is very loveable.

I'm not dying on the hill, handwriting is part of my son's OT. I want him to enjoy writing, not have it be something he dreads. They make is so much fun at OT, and the Abeka DVD stresses precision and accuracy. For me it's finding a happy balance between. DS seems to forget which direction to make the pencil, crayon, pen go. So handwriting practice also helps with memory practice. He is also challenged with diagonals, and Abeka's cursive handwriting helps with the diagonals since writing on a slant is required in cursive.

One more vote for Leap Frog. I was convinced my son would never learn to blend the sounds together for like a year but once he got the Word Factory game it just clicked and he took off. My son's spelling has also been growing by leaps and bounds watching electric company on PBS.

Another thing I thought of to share is that we also use the "Scribe" work books from www.currclick.com Watch for a sale and you can get them for very cheap. It's nice because it gives them a sentence that they trace, next line down they write it on their own, then dots for them to follow and then they write it again on their own. For DS it helps to have that correct formation in the middle. Plus it is short so he doesn't mind doing it and they have TONS of topics like dogs, pets, Proverbs, Psalms, eras in history etc.

I don't die on that handwriting hill but I do need him to be at least sort of legible. He loves boy scouts and there are things in their book they have to write. You have to write job applications etc. I am not hoping for neat, just so someone other than me can read it.

Will check those out too! My son really likes Electric Company, Word Girl, and the one that says, it's time to build a word (can't think of the name of that show?)

 

[sl_underwood]

Handwriting is also part of Luke's OT. He does do some writing with me but it is very little. Like writing his name at the top of the page. He does do alot of sensory stuff with me though. We do writing in sand where he can easily shake the box and start over or writing with playdoh or shaving cream. He tends to like these activities but they are just extras. Give Luke too much free time and he will find trouble, if you know what I mean, so I use these activities for times when I need 5-10 minutes to get somethng done.

 

[sl_underwood]

Any suggestions to help us with reading? Luke is working on kindergarten phonics and reading. He uses both Abeka K, bob books and Headsprout phonics computer program. I am noticing that he can read words in certain situations but not in others. For example, the first headsprout lesson is learning the sounds for s and ee and then putting together the word see. He whizzed through the lesson and seemed to get it but when I show him the sight word card, he could not read it. He does this with his word wall too. He can read on the word wall but not in any other context. Any ideas for helping him get this?

 

[brat]

Another vote for leapfrog, we like the DVDs mentioned.

I got "Your Baby can read" for youngest and Foster son loves watching them with her.I do not know what it is about them but they can calm a meltdown. Since watching them his reading is more consistant and he loves reading more.They were his choice of DVD to bring with into Disney to calm him during waits.We just attached the player to younest chair which allowed everyone around us to think it was just for youngest.

 

[SmallWorld71]

Can anyone share with me any tricks, hints or suggestions for teaching my ds12 PPD/MR to learn to read? He is currently in the Sixth grade, but "reading" at a Grade 1 level (on a good day).

I don't know how this would translate to your DS's disabilities, but I just wanted to say that at our school we have had very good success using the Wilson reading system with our students. (Primarily dyslexic children, also lots with communication disabilities.) It is designed primarily for older kids (9 and up) and adults who have not learned to read through other methods. There is also FUNdations which is similar, but designed for younger ones (so simpler vocabulary). To become certified is an intense process, but to learn the program is not too hard.

Someone mentioned Explode the Code. I have used Explode the Code with first graders as a classroom teacher and found it helpful for those reading just a little below grade level, but not so much for those with the more severe reading disabilities.

Just my two cents.

 

[Piper]

Here is something I used to do with my students. Take blank paper and put a consonant at the top of each page. Then take a letter a day (any letter) and let him cut words that begin with that sound from magazines. Glue the pictures in the book. My students loved doing this and they would look at the books in the reading center and say, "Bb--banana Bb--baby, etc."

You can then do this with sight words. Write "see" on a card and give it to him. He goes through books and magazines and highlights the word when he finds it. This helps kids recognize the word in different texts. And, it is a fun and practically free activity!

 

[disneymom3]

Any suggestions to help us with reading? Luke is working on kindergarten phonics and reading. He uses both Abeka K, bob books and Headsprout phonics computer program. I am noticing that he can read words in certain situations but not in others. For example, the first headsprout lesson is learning the sounds for s and ee and then putting together the word see. He whizzed through the lesson and seemed to get it but when I show him the sight word card, he could not read it. He does this with his word wall too. He can read on the word wall but not in any other context. Any ideas for helping him get this?

I have had a lot of success with Happy Phonics. The kit is about $50 and worth every penny IMO. I forget where I bought it but if you google Happy Phonics it will show up. It's basically a set of games that work their way up to more complicated letter blends. Don't know what it is about it but the way it's presented reallly has helped my boys with retention and transferrring the words to other situations. The Letter House or something like that (one of the activities) just really makes it click for blending sounds and then remembering and applying it when they are reading.