Parents of special needs children aged 2 to 10..?

Question

I am a gymnastic coach.. If there were classes held that were disability specific, (eg autism, down syndrome, hearing impared, vision impared, physical disabilities etc) What would you love to be included in the program?? What would you like your kids to learn? I am mum to daughter with ds/autism, and know I would love it if I could take her and it would include: eye contact, basic speech program , social interactions, PECS, Sign lang, song/dance, sensory, etc All to co-incide with her early intervention therapies...Not to mention Gymnastics itself. If you dont mind pls include your childs disability, age and what you would love to have in a program. I found putting my daughter in with typically developing children was too quick paced and not at her level..Also what qualifications would you expect a coach to have? Anything else that may be relevant. Thanks.

Update:

scooter that sounds great, would love any information i can get,,and I agree about coaches having to be more vigilant. The program I would like to run would include parents as helpers for their child. Parents will be coached as well as children and will be able to take the skills home with them aswell.

scooter · Accepted Answer

my 11 yr. old has adhd and a previos stroke victim which she had in 2004. She had the stroke while she was in gym in school. both coachs in there paid no attention to her when she went and laid down on the stage. my husband is the one that discovered her there. I think that instructers should be more aware of the children and listen to them more.most of my help has just been through the internet and searching for different things just as they pop in my head.and sometimes just rewording what you put in will lead you to other areas. I am suppose to be hearing from a company in a couple days that offers a program for children with disabilites/adhd,autsim,etc.on a 30 day trial for just the shipping cost and the gental man tells me that the children for a lot have beengreatly improved.when he calls me back in two days,i can give you that info if you want

phoebe · Answer

I don't have this problem anymore, but I remember when my son with Autism was young, and my husband worked full time and went to school full time at the same time, and was gone from the house for 20 hours a day. It got old. When I was pregnant with my son, I had recently prayed and asked God to give me a breakable heart, because I didn't think I was a very compassionate person, and I remember thinking that this child would be my lesson. I learned compassion by going years without regular sleep, and the constant giving, giving, giving, till I was empty and he still needed more. I raged against it, but still, nothing changed - he was still there, needy. All my hard work paid off - he appears perfectly normal today, is and has been on the regular curriculum for years, no longer receives any therapy, and is one of the nicest people I know. He wants to be married and have lots of children, and be a veterinarian. I don't mean to imply, readers, that I have worked harder than the mother above and therefore my son is now complete - his form of autism was relatively mild, and he did not have any complicating factors like mitochondrial disease. We just needed to get his gut in working order, so we could get his diet right, and we did lots of therapy, including touch-pressure, joint-compression therapy, which was the thing that made the most difference for him. And for me.

Parents of special needs children aged 2 to 10..?

2 Answers