Well, today we had staffing for our son. As I have posted before he is in a residential facility right now learning behavior management among other things. The staffing includes such people as myself, the mentor coordinator, the program coordinator, the therapist, psychologist, nurse, partnerships care coordinator, family inclusion therapist, our son, and today we included the principal from he school. We also invited our advocate from Protection and Advocacy.
Surprisingly our son and the principal didn't have any issues. Which is good. During the course of the staffing, which lasts about an hour, everyone present gets input into our sons care. Including our son. He didn't say a whole lot. He talked about responsibility, not pushing or provoking others, and being respectful.
Our son recognizes and indicates that he is frustrated with himself when he misbehaves. He apparently doesn't like the person he becomes when he is having a bad day, but is at odds about how to control it. The psychologist reported that he evaluated our son and determined that he doesn't have OCD, but has very severe ADHD. His recommendation is to continue the medication, implement a new one, which I can't spell.. and work on some other things.
Our son spends at least 15 minutes before school running and jumping on a trampoline. The purpose of this exercise is to burn off a bunch of his excess energy. If our son needs to be redirected, he goes willingly. There are times when he has to be removed from the class and go on time out, he goes willingly.
I heard a lot of positive things about our son today.
I mentioned that I thought we should have the classroom teacher come to the next staffing for our son. I also said that we should have the special education strategist come to that staffing. The principal promptly said that would entail an IEP meeting that would need to be scheduled. I agreed with that, and said that I also thought that it would be beneficial for the teacher and strategist to hear some positive things about our son before he gets back to school so that they aren't just hearing negative things all the time.
The principal did what I called the Bobblehead during the whole meeting. She had a grin on her face and her head bobbed up and down during the whole meeting.
The rep from the regional special services asked if the facility was just going to discharge our son or if he had to meet certain standards before he was discharged... The case manager said that our son had to meet specific criteria prior to discharge.
Discharge has been pushed back to mid-December as the staff doesn't think our son is ready to come home.
On the way out of the meeting the rep from Protection and Advocacy asked me what I thought about certain things from the meeting. I said that I didn't think that the principal was willing to accept our son back in the school. I explained my reasons. One - past behavior from the staff at school. Two - body language. I didn't get any indication from the principal that told me that she was willing to work with us and our son to have positive outcomes. Ever get that feeling about someone? Yes, I did. I thought that she was telling the people things she thought that they wanted to hear.
The strategist from regional special services asked about services in the school. Our son will get help transitioning back to the public setting. He will have a mentor who will work with him in our community, there will be a staff member from the facility that comes to the school to help our son transition. In the IEP session they will make more specific recommendations regarding classroom time.
Our son is on a sensory diet so we will be learning about that too. He uses a weighted vest during the day, as welll as stress balls. The stress balls give him something to focus on to keep his attention so he pays attention in school.
That is all for now. Our next staffing is roughly a month from now. We have family therapy and inclusion seminar prior to that. We are also planning some home visits for our son. It was very good to see him today.
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