Help with PDD

[oneyellowbug]

Hello!
I have a friend whose daughter has a very mild case of PDD. She is in kindergarten and is in the public school system in Santa Rosa, CA. She is excelerates academically. She is in the highest reading level in her class. She actually learned to read when she was either 3 or 4. She knows all her colors, shapes, can sort, knows her numbers, and many other things. She really struggles socially and has a hard time with concepts. EX: Her class is learning how to tell time and her mother was working at home with. She was explaining to DD that the clock has hands. DD kept saying here are my hands, and would hold up her own hands. The concept that a clock had hands was very hard for her to grasp. DD is very word specific. The school is not taking special time with DD, so she is not excelling. Her mom, my friend, is now working with DD at least 2 hours a day just on math so that she won't fall behind in class. So, all that to ask this.
Is there anyone that has worked with a child with PDD and has some advice. Is there some kind of special curriculam? or some kind of technique to help DD grasp "concepts".
I told my friend that I would post here to see if I could find some connections for her. I even suggested having her look into some sort of parent co-op/Charter school. ( my son was in one and I loved it) Any advice would be great.
Thanks:

[alexa07]

Won't fall behind in math??? What kind of math do you have to know in Kindergarten at this school? We go to one of the top (academically) public schools in the country, but in Kindergarten no one is expected to know more than 1+1=2! This sounds really wierd.

[geekmom]

Get her an evaluation and an IEP. I think many, if not most PDD kids are above average intellectually. That doesn't mean she doesn't have PDD. Have the mom contact the special education department and get her services. If she's turned down keep finding people who are experts with PDD and get an evaluation so the child can get services immediately. The school has to pay for the education so don't let your friend change to a private school yet or she'll have to pay.

As for math in kindergarten and younger there are so many things taht are "math" that you might not think of, like doing puzzles, learning how to finish patterns, shapes, etc. i don't know what this mother is doing, but all of that is math and I do it with all my kids as much as possible. It helps them think and problem solve.

[khrisday]

We used to live in the Santa Rosa area- how funny!

I second the suggestion to get this child an IEP if she doesn't already have one. There is no reason that she should be having 2 hours of tutoring every night to keep up with the class. There is a resource room available, where a specially trained teacher can modify assignments and give extra help to kids who need it. If she needs a opne on one aide- that can be provided by the school as well.

As far as curriculum or methods, any way that you can make it visual or allow the kids to touch the concept is helpful. Most kids with PDD's are very visual thinkers- so they need to see it and feel it. Like with the time telling you were talking about, I would get a model clock where she could move the hands around herself, and let her watch me draw a picture of a clock- saying "Here are YOUR hands (touch her hands) and HERE (as you draw them) are the clocks hands" We are using a math program called Miquon Math that uses cuisennairre rods, which really helps my son, but I don;t think they have a K program.

[Leatherette]

I have to agree with the first person who was a little shocked that there could be two hours of things to do for Kindergarten math. It sounds like this little girl needs to spend a lot of time with her typically developing peers and get a digital watch. I wouldn't recommend putting a child who can read in special education classes until they are at least in 2nd grade, as long as there aren't any raging behavioral issues. Best of luck to your friend.

Sometimes it also helps with kids like this to directly teach them about words that mean different things (like hands and hands), and idioms (figures of speech).

[Greaseball]

What about letting the child define her own concepts? Clock hands really don't look like any other kind of hands; she has a point. Maybe she could call them wands, pointers, sticks, or some special made-up word.

The concept of clock hands isn't really necessary. Adults rarely say to anyone "The big hand is on the 5" unless they are teaching a child how to tell time, and probably only because that's how the adult learned it too. Once I learned how to tell time I never said "The little hand" again; I would think it would be the same way with other words, that the child would not have to spend very long talking about "little pointers" to anyone.

[lauren]

Many schools do not know how to properly work with children with PDD and they need to get special training. There are "state of the art" approaches. I am not a specialist in this, but know that it takes a specialist to do the work right. Check out www.autismweb.com and links that go from there. These have been helpful to me in the past.