Funding declined — kids punished for good behaviour
‘‘Kids on the autism spectrum, pick things up ... Liam’s thing is a leaf. He always has a leaf somewhere.’’ Murray Forster
Well-behaved autistic children are falling through the cracks because they can’t get government funding, according to a Hamilton-based clinical psychologist.
The Ministry of Education received close to 10,000 applications for Ongoing Resourcing Scheme (ORS) funding over the last six years, between July 2011 and September 2017 and one-third of those applications – or 3057 – were declined.
The funding provides support for the 1 per cent of school children who have the highest learning support needs, including those with autism.
In the Waikato, there were 903 OSR applications – 593 were granted and 310 were declined.
In a response to an Official Information Act request, the ministry said applications were declined if they didn’t meet at least one of the nine criteria.
Dr Antony Thomas says unless children present with challenging behaviour they don’t usually get the funding.
And for children on the autism spectrum, it’s social skills that they need help with.
‘‘There are a group of children who may not create major problems but they don’t play like other children, they don’t know how to play.
‘‘They can get into difficulties in middle school or high school.’’
Thomas has been offering his expertise by holding social skills classes for children and their parents. He also trains teachers to identify students who may sit on the spectrum.
The group – Aspergers Connections Waikato – has been running the classes – which last about 10 sessions – for the past four years.
‘‘We train these children about how to approach another child, how to take turns, and how to take the opportunity to say something,’’ Thomas said.
‘‘These are the kinds of difficulties they don’t know how to deal with.
‘‘We don’t get a diagnosis for many of these children because they can speak in the classroom and complete their academic tasks and because of that, teachers may not be aware.’’
Murray Forster’s eight-year-old son Liam attended the social skills programme last year.
From a young age, Liam was fascinated with leaves. He would hold a leaf to his face and follow it around.
‘‘Kids on the autism spectrum, they pick things up that they can spin or play with. Liam’s thing is a leaf. He always has a leaf somewhere,’’ Forster said.
‘‘When the teachers are on tea breaks and kids are left to their own devices, he’ll just wander the field by himself, spinning a leaf and he’s happy. But this is the problem – they don’t show up on the radar because they’re not causing problems as such in school and there’s no help for that or it goes unrecognised.’’
Liam was diagnosed with autism in kindergarten. But before the diagnosis, he had his eyes and ears tested as his parents thought he may have been deaf.
‘‘He’s really easygoing and we’re not trying to change him,’’ Forster said. ‘‘He’s really, really bright – he taught himself the Russian alphabet in 24 hours – how to pronounce it and how to write it. But the work in class – it just goes over his head.
‘‘He’s happy in his own world but we’re trying to equip him with the skills he needs when he does go out into the world and into the workplace.’’
Thomas said there was one family he worked with, a young girl with autism who had never hugged her mum.
‘‘During playtime she’d climb a tree and sit there because she didn’t know how to interact,’’ Thomas said.
‘‘Some are not able to have proper body contact like hugging, and they’re very sensitive. The girl had never hugged her mum – she wouldn’t allow it.
‘‘So we taught her that there may be different ways of hugging, maybe just one arm at first, and after three days she hugged her mum. Her mum was so emotional, she cried.’’