Back-to-School

In early September, prior to the start of the new school year. My husband and I, along with our almost 6 year old son visited with his new grade 1 teacher and the school learning support teacher. My son was diagnosed with autism almost a year ago and it has been a year of ups-and-downs, challenges, and stresses related to school in terms of finding the supports he needs to learn basic literacy and numeracy, as well as communicating effectively with others. I am quite optimistic that my son will do well in his new classroom. He had a wonderful attachment to his kindergarten teacher and would ask throughout the summer if he would see her again. Unfortunately she is teaching grade 1 across the hall this year from my sons classroom but he is not in her room. I am ok with this since it is a good way to learn how to cope with change by having a new teacher each school year. My husband and I have been learning as much as possible about the best ways to support children with autism, and through workshops I have attended it appears that moving towards declarative language strategies which focus on commenting and describing to facilitate conversations rather than relying on using questions and commands that definitely helped with improving my sons ability to continue conversations with us as well as others.

When we met with grade 1 teacher and the learning support teacher briefly ( 30mins) a few days before the first day of school. I was quite happy that they were receptive to learning about declarative language. I brought along a print out of some ways to start conversations with my son and shared some ideas on declarative language that they can use with him. Unfortunately, it appears that not many teachers as aware of declarative language and how to use it with children with communication challenges. My son seemed quite comfortable in his new room with his new teacher so I am hopeful that he will be able to achieve some of the goals we have for him (learning to write his letters/numbers, recognizing letters and numbers, learning to read, and learning to communicate more effectively with others). I will check in with his teacher by email to see how he is doing and to remind her to use declarative language as much as possible.

I have learned that navigating a new way of communicating (using declarative versus imperative language) is extremely hard to get used to, but it is a valuable tool to help children with gestalt language processing communicate their understanding of the world around them. The benefits I have seen by changing my way of communicating with my son by avoiding questions and commands have been worth it. I am still learning but by saying "I think, I feel, I hear, I don't know, or I wonder" rather than asking a question has allowed by son and I to have brief conversations back and forth which did not happen in the past if I said "How was your day? What is your favourite.....? Many teachers are not aware of gestalt language and the importance of using declarative language strategies, therefore I have learned that it is important to advocate on behalf of my son and share the importance of having them (since they are interacting with my son for the majority of his day) learn to use declarative language with my son to help him become easier to understand and to help with social communication as much as possible.