Writing a Family Report to Take to School Planning Meetings

Spring is the time of year when lots of school planning meetings are going on. The anxiety for parents goes up before any planning meeting but trying to imagine your child in another classroom with a different teacher is really stressful for many. I am reprinting this blog post because this little exercise will often help parents get through the planning easier.



For many families, preparing a written report for a school-planning meeting will help the parents communicate more effectively. They feel that having a written report puts them on “equal footing”. Many parents find it easier to think about their own priorities before the meeting and so find it easier to make their own priorities understood. Parents report that they are less likely to leave a meeting feeling that their child was not fully understood—with the school-only perspective either giving too optimistic a picture or too negative a picture of their child. In any case, a written report will help school staff see the child as a whole person and remember the parent’s priorities as they finalize and implement a new educational plan. School professional have reported that they feel more able to meet the needs of the child after hearing about the child from the parents perspective in this way. Here are some ideas for topics that might be included:

1. The child’s progress since last year, written from the family perspective and related to the home and community experience (e.g. “My son can tell me what he did at school, now”, “My daughter is potty trained”, “ My child has started to enjoy family gatherings”)

2. The progress that has been made since last year, written from the family perspective and related to school or academics (e.g. “My daughter is starting to read”, “My son loves to ride the bus this year”, “My son is counting everything!”)

3. The effective strategies used during the last year by the family and/or by the school (e.g. “Carol Gray’s Social Stories helped my son with many new situations”, “When we all started using shorter sentences, and singing more, my daughter started paying attention to what we told her”, “We took milk out of our son’s diet and he stopped having digestion problems”.)

4. The strategies tried but found to be less than effective over the last year (e.g. “We found that using time out for behavior problems caused the behaviors to increase”, “We noticed that if we use hand-over-hand to help our son play with toys causes him to avoid the toys that he used to enjoy”, “Our son had no interest when we tried Carol Gray’s Social Stories”.)


5. The significant problems that still exist related to the child’s learning differences as experienced by the family (e.g. “Our son runs into the street if we don’t hold his hand”, “Our son won’t go to bed—it takes us two hours or more to settle him down and then he gets up early.”)

6. The special interests or special events in a child’s life over the last year (e.g. “Our son has developed an interest in horses since starting a riding program”, “Our daughter loves to draw now”, “We have a new dog in the family and our son loves him”)

7. The goals that a parent has for themselves for the next year, (e.g. “ I want to learn more about sensory integration.”, “ I want to be able to explain what PDD-NOS is to my parents”, “I want to learn how to deal more effectively with problem behaviors.”

8. Hopes and Dreams (e.g. “I hope my child will be able to talk to my mother over the phone this next year.” “I hope to be able to have a babysitter stay occasionally next year”, “I hope my child will be able to go to elementary school without a one-on-one classroom aid.”, “I hope my child will be able to drive a car.”)

9. Concerns (e.g. “I am scared that my child will be teased next year in 2nd grade because he is still in diapers”, “I worry that they will hire a one-on-one classroom aid that is not really trained to teach a child like my son”, “I worry that school is just too loud and busy to be an appropriate educational place for my child.”)

Back To School Support

Guest Post by Dr. Susan Larson Kidd

Although this is a very exciting time of year, it also causes anxiety levels to sky rocket. Kids on the spectrum especially have a difficult time going back to school after summer, going to a new school, going to school for the first time, or riding the school bus.
Here are some tips that we have found to be helpful to families for kids on the spectrum during back-to-school time:

Create a social story—use photos of the school, hallway, school bathroom, school playground, lunchroom, gym, classroom and teachers if possible. This will visually help the child to know what to expect in his/her school surroundings. For help with social stories, go to Carol Gray's website for ideas.

Visit the school a few times when it isn’t full of people. Take your child and walk the pathways he/she may use during the day. This is a good time to take the photos you need for your social story, and for your child to experience some of the sounds and smells of the environment a little bit at a time.

If the child is terrified of school, work at going to school little-by-little, step-by-step. For example: Get ready routine, walk to bus stop, ride the bus to school, get off the bus, find classroom, put belongings in cubby, enter classroom and greet teacher, etc. Make a visual checklist for the child and add one more small step each day. Also, ride the bus or ask an OT or teacher to do so to experience what your child will experience. It might be important to help your child cope with some of the sensory aspects of his or her bus ride if this is hard.

Understanding Sam and Asperger Syndrome

Guest Post

by Liezl Venter MA CCC

Speech Language Pathologist

Co-author of new children’s book

Sam is not my son but as a speech pathologist I definitely work with a lot of “Sams” and thought that their story was important to tell as school can be extra tough for kids who have Aspergers or who are diagnosed with Autistic Spectrum Disorders.

Understanding Sam was specifically written for little ones and can be used by teachers or counselors as a resource with mainstream students to help children understand their little friend with ASD or Aspergers and for them to also practice being a good friend.

We hear a lot about bullying in general but what about kids with Autism who already have significant difficulty with social skills and who generally have a much more difficult time negotiating their way out of being bullied at school? Let’s talk about it and educate kids about Autism. I co-authored the book with Clarabelle van Niekerk (my Mom) who also works with children with Autism and fully integrates the arts (painting, music, dance and theater) in her workshops to improve social skills and the use of language. I think she captured Sam beautifully as she also did the illustrations. We hope our book will resonate with parents and little ones:-)

Thank you for this wonderful site Tahirih!

Can This Child Participate In a Bear Hunt?

Here is a question that I was recently asked:

Tahirih, I have a question please. I am working at a clinic and we have a classroom that has several autistic children in it and once a week we try and take a group of around 10 children and we have several adults (2 teachers, 3 SLPs, 1 PT). When you have an autistic child (who is typically a roamer) should you insist he/she participate in group activity? For example today we read the “going on a bear hunt” story in their classroom, sang songs and did finger plays and then brought the children into the motor room where we acted out the story. We walked over the mountain, through the forest, under the bridge. You get the idea. Well the 2 “roamers” had a very difficult time w/ this and we need to know if we are correct in insisting they participate (w/ our help of course). Thanks for your input.

Hi B,

It is truly not possible to answer a question like this about specific children that one has never met doing specific things in an environment that one has never seen with people who have or don't have skills that would be important in determining the likely success. But I don't want to turn down what is a good question so I will answer generally and not for your little roamers in particular. The ideas that I will talk about are elaborated in the SCERTS manuals under the headings that they discuss as Emotional Supports and Transactional Supports. I refer you to these books for more information and your team will, no doubt, come away with many new strategies and ways of understanding group intervention if you can spend time studying SCERTS.

In my practice, I prioritize emotional regulation for children with ASD meaning that I don't want a child with ASD feeling highly anxious or stressed for long periods of time or at regular times every day or every week so I don't continue, unaltered, anything that proves to be highly upsetting or causes children to "leave" physically or cognitively. That said, I also want kids with ASD to experience as many social environments as possible and enjoy time with peers in different settings, doing different things. So I don't believe it is a good idea to isolate children with ASD from peers until they are "ready" as there are no readiness skills that are an absolute barrier to social inclusion except maybe danger to self or others.


There are many ways to help a child with ASD feel safe and not confused in activities such as you describe but some reluctant participators may respond to an additional element of support in one day and others might need to be taught how to use a learning support over a period of weeks or months. For example, some children might participate in the Bear Hunt activity easily with just the addition of a visual schedule. Some might enjoy being physically supported and physically moved from one place to another and find it easier to listen and learn if taken by hand or placed in a lap. Some children might enjoy this activity if the Bear Hunt was pre-taught by going on the hunt the day before with just one person or by showing the child a video model of this story or the activity before participating in the group event. One of those relatively simple learning supports might just do it assuming the child enjoys and understands something about what is going on in the activity. This is a big assumption, by-the-way. Other children might not respond to one or another of these supports, period. For example, a child might be so upset about being touched and restrained that the activity becomes nothing but a wrestling match and as a learning activity it fails entirely. Some children might be able to use one of these or a different learning support in order to stay emotionally regulated during the activity and learn but not until the learning support is taught in a much simpler context. If a child has never used a visual schedule, for example, the child might need to learn how to follow a visual schedule first. It might be wise to teach the schedule in a context where all the activities on the schedule are understood and enjoyed. Yesterday, I started a child on learning visual schedules by making a picture list of:

1) Kiss mom
2) Eat chips
3) Hug dad
4) Eat French Fries

For this child, kissing, hugging, eating chips and French Fries are all really good things so the child will just be learning that lists have numbers, go down the page, and whatever is in the picture represents what will happen in the real world in a certain order. I want to use visual schedules to teach some other much more challenging skills, like participating in activities with others, but we will scaffhold one skill on another until the child learns and uses visual schedules to understand group activities. Learning supports might eventually work well but may need to be taught incrementally.

The other issue, hinted at above, is whether the child understands the activity in any meaningful way. Going on a Bear Hunt is not something that a young child has ever experienced so he or she can only grasp the idea of it through imagining what it might mean. This is developmentally a very advanced skill for many young children with ASD. I often ask myself some specific developmental questions when I consider an unsuccessful therapy activity like this. Are this child's language skills such that he or she could understand the words? Does this child have any pretend play skills? Are this child's pretend play skills such that he or she could pretend something he or she has never seen? Does this child have the ability to engage in brief social interactions of this kind? If the child lives entirely in the present moment moving from one sensory experience to another, does not show evidence of comprehending narrative language, cannot engage in brief social interaction activities and is made highly anxious in busy changing social environments, then the Bear Hunt activity is developmentally way above the child's comprehension and ability. The experience still might be pleasurable and an opportunity for social learning if it were presented to this child so that every part was really a sensory experience with elements of chant or music, exaggerated facial expressions, stomping, running, and so on but this would require more preteaching because the thing that holds all those sensory elements together for most children is the story. One has to imagine the whole experience with no story and see if it works as a sensory routine. In the You Tube clip that I have embedded above, the story teller is using sensory elements well enough that it might be captivating to a child regardless of the incomprehensible story content and/or an inability to comprehend the language. The goal for the child with ASD might be to increase his or her attention to faces, move together with others, or stay longer in a group of children. Pre-teaching elements of the activity might make this possible and even engaging for the child. The child might be given homework the week before of watching this and some of the other great You Tube videos of The Bear Hunt story prior to the activity in a group. Perhaps the child would not make it through the entire group activity but still use the Bear Hunt materials with parents and a single therapist in the same week as the other children are doing it and just watch the other children from a distance on the day of the event.

The learning goal for the particular child would determine whether or not it was appropriate to ask the child to participate in the group activity and to what extent. The outcome of each session would determine what happens the next week. If the child becomes increasingly skilled at tuning out the teachers, escaping the group activity or disrupting the group activity then rethink your learning goal and learning strategy. If the child becomes increasingly willing to participate and learns more and more while participating then you're on the right track.

The fun for me as a therapist is trying to find a way to make things work regardless of how many steps it takes. There is no single solution for all kids with ASD but instead there are many great solutions that make social interaction and communication possible. You must Go On A Solution Hunt and come back with a good one.

Taking Stress Down a Notch

Here is a story I want to share because it highlights how important it is for parents of children with ASD to cultivate mental flexibility, emotional regulation (staying relaxed and happy) and to model these qualities of being for their child.

The mother of a child with Asperger Syndrome told me how she took the stress down a notch for herself and her son recently by deciding that she did not need to keep doing things the same stressful way day after day. Both she and her eight year old son are a little more focussed on the clock than she'd like or feels is healthy. Having a bit of a thing about time herself, she has clocks literally all over her small apartment. Time became more and more the source of anxiety for both her and her son each morning before school. He wanted to play in the morning and yet knew exactly what time it was at all times and how much time was left before he needed to leave for school. She reminded him frequently how much time was left (even though he was as aware of time as she). At school, being late was counted against a record of perfect attendance and her son wanted perfect attendance in the worst way so he worried about being tardy all morning while also trying to get in a little play time and the press of both needs made him very anxious. She did not want him late either and so she was also very anxious. They did not enjoy the morning most days.

One day her son asked if she would set the alarm clock for 5:30 am so that he would have time to play in the morning and still not be late for school. The stress of time was clearly on his mind. So, this mom went to school that day and got her son's Individual Education Plan changed such that a tardy would not be recorded on her son's attendance record. The possibility of a tardy was causing him too much anxiety, she explained. That night, she told him there was a change in the rules for him and he would not get a tardy as long as he came to school sometime each day--therefore, he was allowed to play each morning and get ready after he'd had some playtime. The next morning, she did not mention the time even once. She encouraged him to play until he was ready to get ready for school. She did not mention time any morning after that. They got up at the regular time and ate and played and got dressed. So far, her son has never been late to school. She is learning to stop worrying so much about time, herself. The mornings are much happier and the teacher noticed right away how much more relaxed her son was each day at school. If they are ever late because they are too busy playing, so be it.

Family Report

A few months back, I posted a suggestion that parents might want to compose and take a written report with them to school planning meetings. I provided some suggestions about what that report might include. Your may want to refer back to that post called Writing a Family Report to take to Planning Meetings
after you read this excellent example of a Family Report--particularly if you decide to write one for your child.

This report was sent to me by a mom who has been using suggestions from Autism Games Web site and found several games that have worked for her daughter. She was also getting Birth-to-Three home based services for several months before this report was written. She wrote a Family Report for the school meeting held before her daughter moved from home based services to classroom services. She felt that the report helped her feel prepared for the meeting and reported that the school professionals appreciated learning about her daughter in this way. At the top of the report was a photograph of her daughter, Anna:

Anna– Age 2 ½

Parent Report – 2008

Progress of Intervention Since Summer of 2007

1. Strategies that have worked well in teaching Anna:

1. Showing pictures to explain new ideas or situations.

This can be in several forms: repetitive viewing of a video (especially with music), board books (especially interactive ones with flaps or sounds), photos of actual items, places or activities arranged into a schedule or social story that is repeated many times before the situation occurs. A couple of examples include some books I read to her often to familiarize her with words/concepts dealing with school (such as school classroom, teacher, bus, friends, backpack) and a book my mother made her to let her know what to expect at an upcoming visit they were planning because there was going to be a lot happening.

2. Drawing pictures to explain things.

Watching people draw focuses her attention. I have recently used this method of drawing faces to help explain emotions.

3. Family Dolls.

These are paper dolls made with photos of each family member on Popsicle sticks. These can be used to help her recognize/name people (she just recently learned to say ‘mama’ using this method) and to help her visualize herself doing things she may find undesirable or that she doesn’t understand. For example, at the zoo this summer she loved to ride the train. However, she would only ride the green car. She would have horrible fits about it. I was able to get her to voluntarily choose the yellow car instead using these dolls. These dolls could be made to help her relate to any important people.

4. Singing songs to accompany an activity to get her to participate.

Some places we use songs are for cleaning up, washing hands and sitting on the potty.

5. Physical activity immediately before a ‘learning’ or ‘educational’ experience.

She loves slides and chasing games. Swings are ok, but difficult as her balance is not very good. Baby swings help her have more of a sense of security. She doesn’t like to go very high or for very long at once; however, she may not tell you to stop or ‘done’ because she may want to sign it and can’t let go to use her hands.

6. Key phrases

The key phrase I use to help her calm down when she is sad, angry, or hurt is ‘You’re OK.’ Or “Anna is OK.’ It helps to sign the letters O K also, as she focuses on your voice and actions distracting her from what has upset her. She usually repeats and signs OK when she feels better.

*Note: The picture and song methods take a long time to take effect if it is in reference to something new. It usually takes 2-3 weeks of use for her to learn the concept.

2. Strategies that have not yet worked well in teaching Anna:

1. Hand-over-hand or guiding her by touching her back or head

To get her to come with you, ask her to help you or ask her to ‘hold hands’.

2. Drill repetition without visual or hands-on examples

3. Having too many choices

She gets over-stimulated and cannot focus.

4. Some sensory issues

She may pull all Velcro-backed choices off at once – she likes to pull apart Velcro things.

3. Some things Anna has already learned from intervention:

(Most of these are still developing)

Taking turns, requesting a turn, waiting for a short time for a turn, requesting help, pretending using baby dolls and dishes/food, matching items by shape and color, vocabulary has increased using speech and sign language

4. Things we hope she will learn from going to school:

Daily living skills appropriate for her age (using utensils better, drinking from an open cup, using the potty, putting on her own jacket and shoes, etc), social skills - interacting appropriately with other children and adults, and increased communication skills using speech, sign language, and pictures.

5. Things we are concerned about:

We are concerned about three main things. First, Anna learns well by imitation. I am afraid she will copy undesirable ‘autistic’-type behaviors from other children. Second, I am worried she may not get to spend enough time interacting with typically developing peers. Finally, since her speech is not very clear and she signs a lot (also not always very clearly) I am afraid people, especially teachers/aides, may not understand her or even know that she is trying to communicate which may cause her to get frustrated and go back to throwing a lot of tantrums or just shut down and stop trying to communicate with anyone.

Your Rose and Your Thorn Journal

We sometimes play a conversation game at our house called What was your rose and what was your thorn? where each family member will say what they enjoyed most about the day and what they enjoyed least. This format is based upon an understanding that conversation is usually about events that evoke strong feelings.

My last post was about creating a daily Calendar Time to help your child learn how to think and talk about things that happened in the past and plan things that may happen in the future. The Rose/Thorn activity is an extension on the skills that will be learned doing a Calendar together and it is meant for children who can tell you a sentence or two about what happened in the past but who lack the narrative skills to say more than a sentence or two. You need not call this the Rose/Thorn activity, but remember that you want to capture something about the emotions and not just the events of the day. The idea is that you will write or your child will dictate, with your help, a paragraph about what happened today. Let me give you an example:

Here is what Andy said when asked by his father about what he did today:
Shadow was gone. (Who is Shadow? Andy's dad asks) Tahirih's cat. (Did you go see Tahirih today? Andy's dad asks.) Yes. Shadow was hiding.

Andy's mom turned the events of the day into this written story. She has created a private blog for him (meaning that only those invited to do so can get on his blog).

Andy visited Tahirih's house today. She was so surprised to see him! Andy likes Shadow, the cat that lives at Tahirih's house. Tahirih looked and looked for that darn cat! Shadow disappeared. Andy was sooo disappointed. Tahirih tried to make Andy feel better with cookies but Andy was still sad not to see Shadow. Maybe next time Andy will see Shadow. We hope so! The end.

Andy is a verbal seven year old who can hold a conversation on a few topics but freezes up when asked to tell about something that happened to him recently and even if he does tell a bit about what happened, he does not include much information and rarely uses feeling words such as those in red above. He is at risk for being the kind of conversationalist who lists facts but does not translate the events of his life into a story. The strategy of a private blog will model for Andy how to turn the events of his life into a story. When I read the blog (I subscribe so I know when he posts a new one), I sent him back a picture of Shadow by email.

The advent of private blogs is a good one for the purpose of teaching children how to tell a story. I had already been using this strategy for years, with families using a notebook, a blank book, a diary with a key. In the past few years, I have also used the wonderful word processing program called Writing With Symbols. All of these writing mediums work well and for various reasons, I may choose any of them for a particular family. The blog is particularly good if your child has family or friends (or a Speech Therapist) who will respond. It is fun to get a comment when you write a blog. Writing with Symbols is motivating because this program says out loud whatever is typed and will read the whole story out loud. In addition, for children who are just learning to read, the word processors adds an icon (little picture) on top of every word that is typed so the child can more easily "read" the story him or herself. I love technology and so do most my young friends, so I use it and encourage families to use it if this fits their lifestyle. But I really do see just about the same success when I just hand parents a cute blank book and ask them to help their child keep a journal. This strategy is most successful when parents are involved. Parents know the meaningful stories in a child's life. No one but a parent pays such close attention to the details of a child's daily rose and thorn.

Calendar Time

Parents often do not realize that they can do activities at home which will, absolutely, help their child learn language more effectively than anything a Speech/Language Pathologist could do in a session once a week. One of those activities is a Calendar Time. If your child is developmentally ready to understand a Calendar and you spend a few minutes having an interesting Calendar Time most days for the next year, your child will learn a tremendous amount of language.

Many children come to love calendars. With a digital camera, you can make calendars even more interesting to your child. I start using Calendar Activities with children earlier than their parents ordinarily would because I know the calendar is a rich mine of language and learning that many a child will enjoy. I often create events that will make the Calendar Time more interesting. I might create continuity between clinic visits with children by using the calendar. For example, I might says: Today is Monday. Last Monday, we played Masks. I wrote it on our Calendar. Should we play Masks again or play a different game today? (pointing to the relevant days on the calendar as I talk). When we finish playing the game, I take the child back to the calendar and write what we did on the calendar, so we can remember. If I am organized enough, I might have a photograph ready that the child can paste on the calendar him or herself to represent what we did.

If you are starting a first calendar, this calendar will have big squares where you can draw simple pictures or paste on little photographs or write words for children who read. I often use the big desk calendars. Here is today, the number today is 1. You might say to introduce the calendar. Today, we had pizza for dinner. Daddy will draw a pizza.

On the second day of the month, you might say. Here is today; the number is 2. On 2 we had soup for dinner. Daddy will draw a bowl of soup. Here are the pasta letters in the soup. Yesterday, we had pizza for dinner. Use a digital photo if your drawing skills are not so good or your child does not appear to understand. (My drawing is not so good but when we are discussing today or yesterday, my line drawings seem to be good enough for most kids.)

Stick to talking about today and yesterday for a few days. Then add the idea and word tomorrow.

Tomorrow, we will eat spaghetti. These little lines are spaghetti.

If your child expects to eat spaghetti right then and tantrums because there is no immediate spaghetti meal, you might want to write about something not very important to your child as you introduce the idea of tomorrow.

Every day, for a month or two, talk about today, yesterday, tomorrow. If your child points to something that happened three days ago or last week or two weeks ago, then talk about that and use the appropriate time words but stick to today, yesterday, and tomorrow when you choose the conversational topic—at least for a while.

Gradually, you can start to use words like weekend (Daddy’s home days), last week, two days ago, in two days (two sleeps), next week. Of course, you will have to talk about a new Month when you start a new month. Add the names of the days and the months very gradually and as your child shows an interest. If your child pays close attention to what you are doing and saying, even if he or she is not yet verbal, you know that your child is comprehending or at least interested. If your child was interested for a while but stops paying attention when you have Calendar Time, make sure that 1) you are not adding too many new time words or too much language, period. 2) that you are talking about events that your child understands and cares about. 3) that you are using photographs often enough to make the topic and time being discussed clear. Take plenty of photographs and bring them out to support your child's understanding even if you don't paste them to the calendar.

Topics that might be of interest to your child:

• Food (Daddy cooks dinner today, Mommy cooks dinner tomorrow)
• School/no school (no school for 1,2,3,4,5 more days)
• Who your child will be seeing (Grandma visits on Tuesdays)
• Unusual events in child’s life (We will go to the Water Park Tomorrow)
• When things are purchased (We got a new TV yesterday)
• Accidents or mishaps (Mommy’s car had a flat tire today!)

Create your own novel experiences to support learning during Calendar Time:

• We ate dinner in the living room.
• Daddy and I wore a suit and tie.
• We pretended Birthday Party for Kitty with a real cake.
• Mommy dropped an egg on the floor. Yuck!
• We took a nap in the tent.

With a combination of a digital camera and a calendar, you can help your child learn to talk about the past, talk about the future, use dozens of new time words, use hundreds of new words related to the things you do in life, learn to analyze or think about what has occurred, share emotions and regulate the emotions generated by remembering together, plan future events together, become more flexible as you put a big red circle with a line through it to indicate that plans had to be changed, understand the relationship between events that happen over time. You can send copies of your calendar to school to give teachers and others a means of talking about your child's home life (and they can create a calendar to send back to you). The first calendar that you make with your young child may need to be very simple and concrete but over time or with older children, the calendar can serve as a visual support for increasingly abstract and complex discussions.