Back to School Jitters

With the new school year approaching, it is a scary time as a parent, but with kids with special needs, there are so many more issues that can arise. I am so nervous about the new school year, especially after what happened to Margo last year. I won’t go into details because the people involved are no longer there, and I want to put it in the past.

So I refuse to send my kids to school without aides since they are elopers (meaning they run away a lot), and in a school setting where teachers can only do so much, I want my kids safe. They are also not fully potty trained (we are working on it, I promise), and with their age and grade, someone needs to be there to help them with personal care. Again, after last year, I want to make sure someone is there to advocate for my children since I cannot be. We only have an Aide for Margo two days a week, Ella four days, and for LJ, we don’t have anyone available yet. We have a few prospected aides, so fingers crossed they work out.

We are also dealing with a whole new education system. Ellas’ life skills teacher is new this year, and the whole department for Margo’s autism support classroom will be completely different. The school did not renew the contract with the old facility for this class and started working with a new facility, which means that they may have different teaching methods, and I am worried that they might not understand Margo. Then again, maybe they will know and understand her better than the previous staff. The new staff are teachers who specialize in Autism, so that is exciting.

Things that are helping me.

So last year, after I wasn’t getting word of how the girls’ days were going or very minimal, I created my own “Communication Binder” (Example Below). I created a page for the school teachers and therapists that the kids see throughout the day. I also created a page telling them what their night was like. Especially with Ella, telling them if she kept her CPAP on, if she had a nurse, and so on and so forth. It was extremely helpful to get exactly what information we were looking for. It also helped us get information to report to Ellas’ night nurses. Another thing that has helped is creating an IEP binder for all of them. It is just a smorgasbord of things I found online until I can figure out what I want to put in them so I can make my own.

I hope that this year will run smoothly with everything I am preparing, but I always start prepared, and it does not always work. We ended up meeting with the new staff in Margo’s classroom, and it seemed to be a positive experience that will hopefully continue throughout the school year.

I struggle with optimism because things usually go wrong, but this time, I am trying to stay positive.

So, to my fellow parents, let’s try to have a good year. I will be here cheering you on and standing beside you along the way.