"It is confusing for families to have a diagnosis in their hands and come to the school and have the school do a little bit of a different process," said Dr. Julene Robbins, the district's lead child psychologist. "We want to try to verify that diagnosis is true, but also, we have to measure by state law and federal law how that (disability) impacts their education."
That requires a series of tests and observations, she said.
Arizona special-education law says that to be diagnosed with autism, the child's disorder must "adversely affect educational performance."
Children with mild disorders may have great test scores but struggle socially.
"Academics are just part of education," [child psychologist Joseph] Gentry said. "Social skills, self esteem - all of those things are part of what education is all about."
[Dr. Daniel] Kessler said children with autism need special therapy to learn social behaviors.
"Many schools seem to think that if we integrate a child with autism into a mainstream . . . classroom and present them with models of mainstream behavior, that the child with autism will learn those through osmosis," Kessler said.
"That doesn't happen. You have to have role play, you have repetition, you have practice."
Sunday, June 6, 2010
One IEP Struggle
The Arizona Republic reports on one family in Gilbert. Experts said that the boy had high-functioning autism but the school's position was different.
