Benefits of Homeschooling Your Special Needs Child

As promised, today I will talk a little bit about the benefits of homeschooling your special needs child.  As a mom whose special needs child attended school for several years and then came home to be with the rest of the family again, I have experienced life both ways.  I can wholeheartedly say that homeschooling your special needs child, if at all possible, is definitely something I recommend!

I explained earlier that I began homeschooling Hannah when she was just 2 or 3 years old.  Then when she was around 6 or 7, I thought it would be better for her to attend school where the "experts" there could teach her better than I thought I could.  So I enrolled Hannah in a special class for children with autism. 

The first couple of years in that class actually went pretty well.  The teacher there discovered that Hannah already knew how to read.  There were other things the teacher discovered as well that I had not yet gotten to in our homeschool program.  Hannah enjoyed school, liked her teacher, and did learn some things.

After that, when Hannah’s teacher moved away and Hannah was placed in a different class, things got worse and worse until my husband and I decided to bring Hannah back home.  There were some problems, though.  During the years that Hannah had been at school, the other two children and I had learned to live life without her here during the day.  We really hadn’t even realized what had happened until she was suddenly back home with us again.

Because of Hannah’s autism, there are certain routines she likes to keep.  There are certain foods she prefers and others that she won’t eat at all.  There are certain songs and tv shows that make her cry, so we can’t watch them when she’s around.  There are times she likes to go outside and certain places she likes to go outside.  There are places she won’t go outside and things she doesn’t like to do outside.  In other words, Hannah is different than the rest of the family members!  While, of course, that is no surprise, I must admit that it caught us off guard. 

Looking back now, it seems so silly for us not to have thought in advance about how bringing Hannah back home would affect our routines and daily activities, but she had been out of the house for the majority of the days for several years, so we just didn’t think about it. 

In fact, one of the reasons I advocate keeping your special needs child at home with the rest of the family is so that the family continues to include everyone!  Without realizing what we were doing, we had formed our own little "family" that included Noah and Mary Grace, but not Hannah.  It’s sad thinking about it now, but, as I said, it was unintentional.

We had gotten used to taking Hannah to school in the mornings, going on about our daily lives, and then picking her up in the afternoons.  Sometimes when we picked her up, she seemed to be an interruption to our day.  If we were in the middle of an activity at home or a field trip or a play date, we had to stop what we were doing to go pick her up from school.  The other two children often got frustrated (and probably a little resentful though I didn’t know it at the time) about having to cut short what we were doing.  Of course it is fine for children to learn that they can’t always do what they want whenever they want to do it, but such a situation that occurs 5 days a week and is because of one other family member can cause lots of resentment.  I certainly don’t want my "neuro-typical" children feeling that way toward their sister!

Also, when Hannah was at home with us in the afternoons, we had to do things differently than we did for the rest of the day.  Because there were certain activities that honestly caused Hannah to become upset (like going to unfamiliar stores or houses or parks or even having a picnic outside since she usually ate inside), we couldn’t do those activities when Hannah was at home.  (Later, we slowly helped Hannah become accustomed to doing some of those activities so that she and the rest of us could enjoy them.  At the time, though, we suddently had to change the ways we did many things.)

Now, though, Hannah is part of our everyday lives, and we are a part of hers.  While there are still times that the rest of us have to go somewhere that she wouldn’t enjoy, we can get a sitter or let her stay with a friend or relative.  That way, she can enjoy some one-on-one time with someone who loves her, and the rest of us can go do something she wouldn’t care to do.  This works much better for all of us!

And this is just ONE little benefit of keeping your special needs child at home with the rest of the family.  I plan to give another reason or two tomorrow.  I hope you will come back then!