BellaOnline Forums Health and Fitness Autism Spectrum Disorders Battling to keep child back a year in school, help

Has anyone else been through something similar? I am trying to put my preschool aged son back 1 year in school. His birthday is late July, so he is one of the youngest in his class. I would rather he be one of the oldest by a few months to 'allow' for his developmental age. He functions enough that he can physically be in a mainstream classroom but he struggles majorly to talk and with other skills, and is one of the most behind in his class, even out of the other special needs kids. The public preschool he's in says they cannot keep him back 1 year because preschool services are only available until the year he is chronologically (NOT DEVELOPMENTALLY) ready for Kindergarten. I asked if I could keep him back after Kindergarten (i.e. repeat kindergarten) if necessary and they said it would all depend on the policy at that particular local school. The school system's attitude is that they would rather put more assistive stuff in the kid's IEP than put them back a year. But I'd rather he be put back a year. AAArrgh! Anyone else have any experience or advice in this area, even if your situation was slightly different? Please help!!

Ask to see the policy. Is it a written policy, or is it a tradition? Also, do your discussion on this subject by letter. Keep a copy of all of the letters.

If you haven't read a copy of your parental rights, do so. Find out what your legal options are.

My best advice to you is to go to wrightslaw.com. They know special ed law and there might be a way that you can ask a question. Perhaps they have an archived article about just this subject.

Find out what the laws are in your state. Some states don't require Kindergarten, so you could put him in a private preschool and have him enter Kindergarten later maybe.

If you have an Individualized Education Program (IEP) for your child for any developmental problems, most states also have laws that allow you to have someone go to meetings with you (another parent advocate). You can usually get a mediator as well.

Are they working on his speech with a therapist? A friend told me that is the most important hurdle.

We didn't have public preschool and I didn't realize our youngest was on the spectrum as much as we did her slightly older sister. Our 8 year old is doing well in school so far, meanwhile the youngest, about to turn 6 had more problems once she started Kindergarten. I immediately thought, maybe she just started school too soon. She is in speech, physical therapy for gross motor skills and is being evaluated for the need of occupational therapy.

They moved her to morning Kindergarten so that she could participate in an afternoon special education program. We just received information on summer school so she doesn't lose learned skills over the summer.

I'm fortunate to have some long-distance support from my mom, who raised my brother who has Aspergers and also from a mom with an Aspergers son whose daughter is a friend with my oldest daughter. She sat me down last week and gave me the low-down on our state and groups to participate in online.

The biggest thing you need is support and as much education about services and the laws in your state.

Hi Connie and Vi, thanks for your responses, they are very helpful. OK that sounds sensible - I will look into the written school policies and the applicable laws. And yes, it is possible for us to put our son in private preschool to give him a 'gap year' between public preschool and public elementary school. At the meeting when I brought up my concerns, the school even said that this would be one way we could get around the issue... but the downside is that we would only be eligible for speech therapy that year, not a resource teacher (which he would be eligible for in the public system). My husband and I are feeling that if it is only for 1 year it might work out well in the long run to give him that 'gap year'. But I will still look into the applicable written policies and laws for our area. The idea of having a parent advocate or mediator present at meetings is a fantastic one, as is making sure I correspond by letter & keep copies of correspondence. If there's any other ideas, feel free to keep them coming... I need as much help as I can get with this!

I held both my sons back. My HFA son in first grade - he did the special day class in K and 1st grade and mainstreamed half the days into gen ed in 1st grade so I felt before he could do all gen ed he needed to do first grade so that is what we did.

My nonverbal son did 3 yrs in preschool since I felt he was not ready for K and they did not agree at first and thought he would be too big among the other kids. So we did that and then at the end of the year and at the IEP they said he was going into First grade and because of that three years they said that was his K. So K was half days at the time and he had feeding issues and school around corner from home so I came and got him out of school everyday at K time so he could eat lunch and kept him home. At the end of the year he had not enough days to graduate so he did the year again, which was like doing K and then first grade. We are in California with LAUSD. They are 17 and 15 now.