Hi PanzerAxel,
Now, he is 3 (feb b-day) and in the IU getting speech and physical therapy for 30 minutes a week each. They do not have an IU preschool in our area for kids like him (very high functioning) and have recommended we send him to a regular preschool. We are certain he has too many behavior issues to succeed there and are thinking about holding off another year until he is 4.
If you search my earlier posts you'll see that I strongly recommend the special-needs preschool route for even a gifted child with Asperger's. The social delays are best addressed comprehensively and as early as possible. A school setting will acclimate him to "school behavior"-- sitting at circle time, etc.-- all of which is really critical to have in place by kindergarten. IQ is less relevant at this stage-- you will need him to learn to play, wait his turn, cut and color, and participate.
A big concern we currently have is that we have always felt certain he is gifted, but the school district says kids with Asperger's traits often look gifted, but are not. He is too young to test at this point, but we were really annoyed when the school district put an IQ "estimate" on his IEP of 91 without doing any sort of formal assessment.
That was inappropriate; an IEP is supposed to be driven by actual data, not data anyone makes up. It is possible to give an actual IQ test to a 3-year-old, although they tend to be inaccurate at that age, so it may not be worth the time. A person on the autism spectrum may also not test accurately; we have been told that IQ scores as measured tend to go up and become more coherent as autism is remediated over years.
Our main reason for concern is how far he is ahead academically and how far behind socially. He is reading and doing a lot of 1st grade work but does not tend to interact with peers or use social language. I'm no teacher myself, but since no one else was interested in educating him, I bought some work books and he flies through them.
Our 2E DS (gifted/Asperger's) is now 10, and we spent the preschool years (pre-diagnosis) trying to get him to behave, and we thought of the early elementary years as an alternative curriculum. While the other kids were learning to read and do arithmetic, DS urgently needed to learn self-control, social language, and class participation skills. Being academically ahead doesn't mean much until you actually have the capacity to participate in the curriculum, which for us meant putting remediating the autism first, and letting the giftedness sit for a while.
The school identified him and put him in the gifted program in 2nd grade, and he has needed further acceleration since then, which hasn't been that hard to get. Now in 5th, he still gets special education support for social skills and organization.
Is the school right to assume he isn't smart and just has a good memory due to Asperger's?
No, but over time it will be undeniable. For now, I'd work really hard on the deficits, so that when he gets a little further along, he will have the skills in place to shine.
I am sure that when he is 5 he will be years ahead.
Cross that bridge when you come to it. But I would not turn down a special needs preschool spot. If the special needs preschool they have is horribly inappropriate (have you gone to look?), they do owe him FAPE (free appropriate public education) from age 3 because he has an IEP. If they want him in regular preschool, they should be providing special ed support in that environment and whatever else he needs to succeed there, including speech therapy to work on social language and OT if his coloring/cutting skills are weak.
Best,
DeeDee
