So last week, I shared with you that my littlest sweet boy, the one on the autism spectrum, had decided that it might be a good idea to kick one of his teachers while in a fit of rage. Or at least that was my interpretation of the situation. Wow. For the kid who has never had bad behaviors, I honestly had mixed emotions about the email I received from his teacher. A part of me was appalled that he would do that, but part of me was excited that he was standing up for himself. Although, you should know that in our house it is not okay for children, spectrum or neuro-typical, to be disrespectful to adults.

So as you can imagine, a meeting was called. Of course, my response was 'whenever you can meet, I will make myself available,' and I did.

The team met in the classroom and I sat down with my big green binder. It holds every bit of documentation with regard to that sweet boy and I don't go to any of his meetings without it. I pulled out his latest report card (which was excellent) and his latest Individualized Education Plan updates. Deep breath in. Deep breath out.

Let me pause for a minute in my story to share with you the "snakes in my head.” I walked into that meeting feeling defeated. My biggest fear was that the team would decide that sweet boy needed to be in the self-contained classroom after all. I was trying my best to remain open and positive, but that was not going well. It is difficult to walk into that situation and not feel attacked, but I was determined to figure out what was going on and make it a safe environment for sweet boy and his teacher.

I let them tell me the events as they recalled them. It happened in the classroom library. The teacher was trying to encourage sweet boy to join the rest of the class on the carpet and he became frustrated and not willing to comply. It was at that point things became a little cloudy. They seem to think that he began "stemming" (or "he just got flappy") and the effort to expel the energy met the teacher's body. The long or the short of it is that he didn't just "drop back and punt", so that is a good thing.

Another issue that I discovered during the meeting was he liked to stem (or flap) on the large vent on the wall. No doubt, it makes an amazing sound, but during instruction time stemming on the vent is a "no go." Taped to the vent was a red sheet of paper that reads, DO NOT TOUCH. Now, sweet boy has some developmental delays, but reading and colors do not fall into that category! He knows that red means stop and he can read the words. He was angry that they took away his cool place to stem and he needed to express his anger.

After they told me about several rounds of fits and sit-ins by sweet boy, I finally told the team that I really was worried that they were going to remove him from the classroom.

And then, they dropped a bomb. I was told, "We know this is the right classroom for him.  We just need your help in dealing with these behaviors that we have not seen in him before."

I was stunned. Really? Are you kidding?

We discussed some behavior modification techniques that I have used and the entrance and exit of our sweet soldier maybe playing a role in the behavior. We also discussed the fact that sweet boy has outgrown his IEP. (They are already working on new IEP for him. Wow!)

This is why I love our team, because we actually work as a team. And best of all, not only do they believe in my sweet boy, they believe in me. I walked out of that meeting feeling empowered and even gladder for this supportive group!

Strength and Courage ... sby