friendships among special kids

pamam

My son has never made any real friends before, but recently he seems to get on very well with other special kids in his school(I guess they are closer because they have to do all these therapies together), I am happy about this but some moms(special kids) think it may not be a good idea since it wouldn't improve their social skills, they want their kids to play more with the normal kids.

I just think any socializations are better than no socializations at all. Can anyone share your thoughts about this? Do your kids mix more with special kids or normal kids in school?

Pamam

mrsphcheung

This is the same situation that I am facing.  My son has a friend at Heep Hong.  They have played together for a long time.  The mom of this boy seems not so happy with this as she wants her boy to mix with other normal kids for the sake of social skill enhancement.  The fact is 你嫌棄我時，別人也會嫌棄你。I adopt an open  attitude towards my son's choice of friends.  I don't mind whether his friends are special or normal; my only requirements are: his friends must have good nature and the parents are considerate enough.      

My son's current situation:
He has a regular friend (normal kid, the same age) in the playground of our estate.  Having a sociable and caring personality, this boy is willing to 'tolerate' my son's rigid social skills.  My son also gets a few regular friends (all are boys) in his class.  My son can't play with many kids at the same time, but can play with one or two kids.  He is happy to be the follower all the time.

pamam 寫道:
My son has never made any real friends before, but recently he seems to get on very well with other special kids ...... I am happy about this but some moms(special kids) think it may not be a good idea since it wouldn't improve their social skills, they want their kids to play more with the normal kids.

pamam

mrsphcheung,

Thanks for your sharing!

Does your son play with girls too, I feel most girls don't like to play with my son. He can get on well with people who is at least 3 to 4 years older than him, but not peers.

pamam

mrsphcheung

My son played with girls in his class last year.  But he does not play with them now as my boy complains that girls are narrow-minded & troublesome, he likes boys more and says that he wants to marry a boy some day.    My son can play with boys older than him or at his age; he is often the follower.

pamam 寫道:
Does your son play with girls too, I feel most girls don't like to play with my son. He can get on well with people who is at least 3 to 4 years older than him, but not peers.

jj06mum

extract from internet: http://www.hyperlexia.org/sp1.html

"... lack of social "nous" makes it difficult for the affected kids to make friends of own age and they tend to gravitate towards younger or much older kids unless there are other kids of similar functioning in the  class – when they seem to attract to each other like magnets. ... affected children need to spend time together so they can feel on a par with each other and not constantly at the mercy of more sophisticated peers.

... affected kids often do well if they spend time with kids who are equally or less socially sophisticated than themselves. They need social peers as well as intellectual ones, those who will encourage or insist on interaction rather than those who ignore."

When my son was first diagnosed, one thing i would always check with the professionals was if he can attend normal school. But now what worries me more is if he will be able to have friends.  despite all the professionals said i should put my boy in a normal kindie so that he can learn appropriate behaviour from typical peers and avoid bad influence from kids with behavior problems (because of his poor judgement of appropriateness), i think he can also benefit from being together with kids alike because he should be able to feel better about himself and that his company being appreciated by others and that he is not the only one being a bit odd one out.  Friendship is also more likely to happen. I think this is equally if not more important than just being appropriate, at least at this stage. I put him in a sensory intergration playgroup and he plays nicely kids there. He has great fun and really loves going there.

pamam

jj06mum,

Thanks for your sharing too.
Are you planning to send your son to international or local primary school?

Pamam

cwong140

jj06mum

Which sensory intergration playgroup your son attending now?  Can you tell?

many thanks.

jj06mum

he goes to kindyroo in universal trade centre in central(above lan kwai fong). tel: 2457 1510. ask for their website. they do one free trial session. one hr per session with 1/2 directed group activities (mainly body movements/actions) under the instructor and then 1/2 free play in their gym. kids really have fun there. but the drawback based on my experience is its quite expensive(at least for us) and not enough kids(often less than 5 esp for kids above 3y).  

at this stage i think i have no choice but international school because the professionals said my son needs a consistent monolingual enviroment for better cognitive development. we can not change home enviroment so... he used to go to a local kindie though and his cantonese improved a lot.   

Ryanma

jj06mum
Can you tell me what is the name of the playgroup & how much? Do they have ST as well?

Ryanma

jj06mum 寫道:
he goes to kindyroo in universal trade centre in central(above lan kwai fong). tel: 2457 1510. ask for their website. they do one free trial session. one hr per session with 1/2 directed group activities (mainly body movements/actions) under the instructor and then 1/2 free play in their gym. kids really have fun there. but the drawback based on my experience is its quite expensive(at least for us) and not enough kids(often less than 5 esp for kids above 3y).  

at this stage i think i have no choice but international school because the professionals said my son needs a consistent monolingual enviroment for better cognitive development. we can not change home enviroment so... he used to go to a local kindie though and his cantonese improved a lot.