Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Twice Exceptional Trying to plan for next homeschool year

We went to a co-op meeting and listened to the co-op leaders talk about the classes and activities that were available and it all sounded good to me but my son still didn't want to take any classes with them. The person in charge of the spelling bee remembered that he had won the year before and asked if he was interested in trying that again. He didn't want to do it. He says he doesn't need any more spelling bee trophies. Later he told me that he just doesn't feel like he fits in with that homeschool group and doesn't want to do anything at all with them. I know that he was self conscious about wearing the old scoliosis brace last year. The kids did look at him because it did kind of make him walk like a robot and none of the kids talked to him. They totally ignored him. He heard them talking about things like hunting and fishing and playing sports, things he couldn't do, and most were not allowed to play video games or read the books he read, so he just didn't have anything in common with them. I can see how it would be hard for a middle school aged kid to deal with that.

So we are trying something else to get him around more people so he doesn't feel so isolated. He is trying a free week of martial arts--BJJ and MMA in a nearby town. He can go five nights a week if he wants to. He has been there twice already and although it really challenges his endurance and strength, he likes it. He is in a 14 to adult class. He says the people that he has talked to there are what he considers normal. They are all respectful and supportive and some of the people we talked to in the class sounded very intelligent when they spoke to us. They introduced us to a sixteen year old in the class who is very bright and plays video games in addition to doing very well at martial arts competitions. They said when he started at age 11 or 12 he was similar to my son in some ways. All we told the instructor about my son's disability was that he has mild weakness in some muscles and scoliosis and that his physical therapist recommended martial arts. I thought they would go easy on him and maybe they did but it didn't look like it to me, but my son loves it. He does not look clumsy or uncoordinated at all. He says he focuses on what he is doing and doesn't feel the pain until he gets home. He is willing to tolerate that pain and still go home and wear a painful scoliosis brace for ten hours every night.

I think the physical therapist who told him that it was okay to have pain and that it was just "in the cards" for him to have this pain actually helped him to see that pain was just going to be a normal part of his life. He knows that he can go back to PT if he hurts his knee, like he did just days before his first performance of his latest play. He was able to do all three performances and even though he didn't get to practice the dances as much as the other kids who don't have disabilities and he supposedly has motor dyspraxia. He did a short, but very fast paced dance well with good timing. He did not look like he had a disability of any kind on stage.

For academics, we decided to use studyisland.com to make sure he is learning what he needs to learn in order to test well and trying to make sure that he has no holes in his learning. He did really well on all of his pretests for language arts, history and science but he hasn't done the one for math yet. He will continue to read classics, keep up with the daily news and look up answers to any questions he has.

We paid for a library membership in another town because we don't have one and that library membership gives us access to Mango, which is a language learning system. He has worked on Japanese but wants to try other languages. There is also a free 24 hour writing lab included in our library membership. Writing experts can grade my son's papers and give him advice.

One of the teachers.net teachers told us an iPod might work for note taking in class since it is not connected to the internet. I think that would work better for my son when he decides to do more than internet classes. When he is older and in college or at work I can't see him carrying around an alphasmart to take notes. He will probably use something like the iPhone or iPod that he will carry in his pocket because it is very easy and convenient. He will use a computer for writing papers and letters and nobody will suspect that he has a disability.

I still think if there is any way my son can hide his disabilities it would be better for him especially since he wants to continue acting. My son and I are currently reading Lucky Man by Michael J Fox. We read about the agent that at first didn't seem to want to represent him. He noticed that she kept staring at his shoes. The agent thought they looked like orthopedic shoes and said she wasn't told that he had a "disability." He had to explain that he did not have a disability (he didn't at that time) and he went out and bought different shoes. He definitely didn't want to look like he had a disability. I wonder if the actor that played Harry Potter would have gotten the part if he had told them at the audition that he had dyspraxia. I once worked with a woman who had cerebral palsy and she told me how she felt when people just assumed she was not very bright because of her disability. It was not her imagination. Restaurant workers would often ask the person she was with what she would like to order as if she were not smart enough to do it herself. I was with her when it happened once. I guess she just needed psychological help and to learn to cope with her feelings of difference. As part of my job at the time I sometimes took people with developmental disabilities, some who walked a little differently, to the bus station. I felt people staring when we walked into the bus station together. Maybe I was prejudging the people who stared at us, but I thought those people were either ignorant or just plain rude. I also listened to stories from parents of kids with disabilities whose kids were in public school who had to deal with bullies who picked on them and teachers who ignored the situation.

My son continually improves in his ability to deal with physical challenges. He was able to do well in a lead role in his musical theater group without any help from me. He even worked on his lines and songs when there new online games that he wanted to try out. This would have been a problem a few years ago. Time management skills are improving and I think will continue to improve before he goes to college.