Today is my first day back teaching, starting with Elementary Latin at 9am.  Jim starts teaching next week but school does not start for Charlie till September 8th. It’s still primarily Jim and me spending time with Charlie: This is an unusual situation for us at this time of year, as my mom and dad usually come out from California to watch him. Family and health matters have made this not possible, for the time in many years. So Jim and I have been continuing in Camp Charlie mode, though very much with an eye to easing Charlie back to school.

As I’ve written, Charlie’s previous school year ended on a thoroughly uncertain note, with various school personnel in effect saying that he needed to be educated in a placement other than in the public schools and, in particular, in a placement other than the public school classroom he was in last year. During our first week of vacation, we were in busy vacation-mode, but during the second week, it was time to think about the upcoming school year. Jim and I been having an extended on-and-off conversation about Charlie’s school situation. After a tough re-entry, the peaceful easy-feelingness that has been with Charlie since July has returned: Now, Jim and I have been thinking, how can we keep that going, and not only in home/Camp Charlie setting?

At school, Charlie will of course be with teachers, aides, and therapists. And while school is always different from home, how to transmit the good Stimmung (am using that word with a nod to JoyMama, who pointed out another familiar word echoed in Stimmumng)---something of the “climactic conditions” of this summer back to Charlie’s classroom?

Yesterday, the Council for Exceptional Children (CEC), in conjunction with the Autism Society of America (ASA), announced that it is releasing new “competencies” to help teachers of students on the autism spectrum. Along with individuals on the spectrum and their relatives, the  Indiana Institute on Disability also played a role in developing the new standards.  The new competencies will be “incorporated into the CEC's resource on highly qualified teachers titled What Every Special Educator Needs to Know and endorsed by the National Council for Accreditation of Teacher Education (NCATE).” Press releases so far have not specified exactly what will be contained in these competencies for teachers of students on the spectrum. I am certainly curious; the topic has spurred me to think about what competencies teachers of students like Charlie need.

I base my thoughts not only on being Charlie’s mother, but also on my own 17 years of teaching. I’ve taught primarily college students, and also middle and high school students. I taught the middle and high school students after receiving my doctorate: My knowledge of my subject matter (Latin) was extensive but I did not, not, know how to teach when I faced my first room of 7th graders. Teaching them (and the 8th graders, and the 9th and 10th and 11th and 12th graders) helped me to learn what teaching is (and what it isn’t). But it was only after several more years teaching Latin, Greek, and Classics to Midwestern undergraduates (and a few graduate students) and then freshman composition to New Jersey and East Coast students, that I approached something like “honing my craft.” Certainly my knowledge of Latin and ancient Greek grammar (and of ancient Greek and Roman history, mythology, art, literature and law) has deepened from teaching these for years. But what’s really been crucial has been standing up five days a week in front of students and striving not only to teach grammar but also to, how does one put it?, get the learning spark going.

A lot of teachers, aides, and therapists in our school district are studying (for Master’s and other degrees) at a well-regarded program in northern New Jersey. The program puts a great deal of store in Applied Behavior Analysis (ABA), which has been a key part of Charlie’s education for many years. Certainly students of the program are trained to be highly competent in this teaching pedagogy (which, I recognize, is not appropriate for all individuals on the spectrum, and which has a checkered past).

While it’s encouraging to know that specific competencies regarding the teaching of students on the spectrum will be part of What Every Special Educator Needs to Know, I think the discussion and even the debate about what “best practices” are needed may just be getting started. I for one would welcome such discussion and debate even if it gets heated: Education is the cornerstone of Charlie’s progress, though one too often finds that the education of students on the spectrum is pushed aside in favor of arguing about other topics.

Meanwhile, we’re working on putting into words what’s been working for Charlie this summer, from seeing how his communication is evolving to how sensitive and attuned he is to everything around him, and especially when people are angry, anxious, excited, fearful. It’s part of the Camp-Charlie-transitioning-into-Charlie-goes-back-to-school effort Jim and I are full-heartedly engaged in.

One very fine cause, it is.

autism Asperger’s children mother parenting education teacher sudent school