I joined this forum a few years ago, when my husband and I began to notice our son was very different than other kids his age. (here is my
original introduction)We decided long ago that he is a very bright little boy and he would always be that way. He is now 4 � years old and we are moving forward on the 2E path. Recently we went through the process of having him evaluated by the school district and have just found out that he is on the autism spectrum.
We walked kind of a strange path to get to the evaluation. He went in for his kindergarten screening last winter and failed the vision portion of the testing. We went back for a re-test and he again failed, however, the tester did not believe that he was having normal sight problems, but was more likely experiencing visual processing issues. From there we went to a pediatric ophthalmologist, as recommended by the screening office, for further testing.
The ophthalmologist we were referred to does a lot of work with kids that have sensory issues as well as working with gifted children and autistic children. She completed her normal vision testing for our son and found that he had astigmatism and a small prescription, but advised that glasses would be more of a pain at his age and small prescription level than a help. She also recommended that, from her observations, she thought is would be good for DS to see an occupational therapist because he seemed to have a very high energy level, a lot of sensory sensitivities as well as a need to engage is sensory seeking behaviors. (we have always known this, but just thought it was more of a gifted "quirk")
He had just recently started in the school readiness preschool offered by our school district, so I thought a good first step would be to talk to his teacher about her observations. She agreed that it would be a good idea to have DS evaluated by the school district. Every person on the evaluation team agreed that it was a tough diagnosis to make for him. He is so bright and extroverted, that a lot of the normal red flags that make diagnosing aspbergers didn't jump out with him. However, after several interviews, observations in the classroom and out of the classroom and many different people giving input, they concluded that he is in fact on the spectrum.
His main "trouble areas" seem to be his social appropriateness and sensory. We had our first IEP meeting last week and we are waiting on the document to be mailed to us for review. I feel like it is going to be very important to make sure they addressed his need for intellectual stimulation (not just what is offered in 4 year old preschool) next year as well as their techniques for dealing with his high energy, sensory seeking needs. Our IEP meeting seemed to be very focused on how they are going to help him learn coping mechanism for his sensory needs and teaching him how to interact more appropriately with his peers. I tried to stress that when he is not stimulated enough physically AND/OR intellectually his autistic behaviors seemed to be intensified.
We are very grateful to have found this out now, so we can start moving forward and get him the help he needs so he can succeed in school. However, this is all so new and it is coming at me all so quickly that I am feeling very overwhelmed with what I need to be doing to assure his success with his IEP next year.
I will cross post this into the 2E section, but I am wondering, how do you address the intellectual needs when people are so focused on the physical needs? What are your suggestions, if any, for including this in his IEP? Any suggestions or feedback are welcome.
