Broadfield - Too Advanced

Took Taylor to Nursery today at 1pm then went to our local Special Needs School - Broadfield (in the picture) We met Mel Adams the Special Educational Needs Family Liaison Officer (SENFLO) and another guy (i can't remember his name) and they were both really nice people. Mel had to dash off to another meeting so left us in the hands of the other guy (I'm hopeless with names, i only met the bloke about 2 1/2 hrs ago!!!) and the Head Mistress of the Autism section of the school. The new unit especially designed for ASD Children has been up and running for 6 years now and she helped set it up and runs it. She was very informative and showed us around the building. It was bright, cheery and colourful. The children all seemed like they were loving every minute of being there and looked really eager to learn. She showed us their PECS books which i find is really useful with Taylor, except he doesn't have a book. We have a big piece of hardboard screwed to our dining room wall (wallpapered to blend in with the room) with Velcro strips attached to it and a load of laminated pictures of all Taylor's things and stuff to help him tell us what he wants. We was recommended to do this by his Behavioural Psychologist around 6-9 months ago to help us understand what he wanted/needed when he wasn't speaking so well. Now that he can verbally and almost word perfectly tell us what he wants/needs he uses the board to play with. He gets his pictures off the board and will match them up with the objects on them. For instance the other day i came down and once again as he does frequently now, the picture of the fish was stood up on the unit next to the fish tank. The picture of the table was stood up on the table etc etc so on and so on. So i was pleased to see that they are using them for them to help with communication as he'd take to that very quickly and very well.

The children we saw all varied in different areas of ASD and they only had 1 'savant' boy who is extremely good with numbers and maths etc. I couldn't think of any questions to ask at the end of the viewing but to be honest I'd already made my mind up while we were looking around that i don't want him there. When we'd finished we said our goodbye's and headed off to the car. We stood outside and spoke to the SENFLO man and we talked a few things over with him. He told us the same as everybody else, that it's our decision and they're there to support us in whatever decision we make. He asked me if i would like him to get in touch with SENCO and arrange a meeting at Woodnook (Dana's school where we want Taylor to go) so i said yes and i asked if he would please come along with us for support. He was really nice and i like him. It's unusual to be dealing with a male authority figure as so far they've all been female. He said he'd be there if that's what we wanted. He said he'd go back to the office and go downstairs to the SENCO office and arrange with them to ring Woodnook and sort a viewing out then get back to us in a day or two with times and days to go. I am really very pleased with the way today went and although i wasn't too sure about the viewing of Broadfield i am so glad we went.

He asked us how we felt after we'd looked around and mum said before i did that Taylor is too far advanced in his communication, verbal and social skills (although still lacking in a lot of ways) to be at that school. A lot of them children don't speak as well as he does or don't speak at all. They are very fidgety (very common i know) and flap (which Taylor doesn't - yet) and i don't want him picking them bad habits up unnecessarily. Of course he will pick bad habits up wherever he goes to school but in a mainstream school they will be the typical bad habits, like picking his nose, biting his nails and possibly even name calling. But there all 'normal' (back to the dreaded word) bad habits for kids to pick up and i want that, as sadistic as that sounds. I DON'T want people to treat him like he is Autistic. I want them to treat him like any other child in their class with a few learning disabilities. Since he was diagnosed in October i have not once treat him any differently to how i did before and he's come on in leaps and bounds. YES of course in some areas we're going have to treat him differently at school but that's where his Support Worker comes in and once they Statement him he will have a permanent one, from when school starts to when school finishes and that's what he needs.

I'm back to being torn again and it's not bloody fair. Why do we have to be the ones to make all the decisions. It would be so much easier if they just said "Mainstream" or "Special Needs" and that was that!! I don't think I've ever had to make any decisions that have been this important in my life. MY decision (as it's being left up to me as usual) will affect Taylor throughout the rest of his life. If i make the wrong choice we could risk the chance of a 'regression' then i will feel so guilty. On the other hand if my decision is right he could benefit so much in life. It's times like this that i hate being a mother and I'm sorry if that sounds heartless but it's true. Until you're ever put in this situation i don't expect you to understand, but for those of you who have I'll bet you agree and understand. xXx