Posted on 09/23/2007 7:43:27 PM PDT by Graybeard58
A six-year-old autistic boy has been charged criminally after an incident inside his school where he allegedly assaulted a teacher's aide.
It's a story you saw first on 9News.
The incident happened earlier this month at Taylor Elementary School in Brooksville, Ky., located in Bracken County.
He is in kindergarten at Taylor Elementary, but 9News was told that due to his autism and other conditions, his mental capacity is the equivalent to a child half his age.
But despite that condition and his age, it still hasn't stopped a school employee there from holding him accountable: criminally.
Whether it's playing outside with his parents, or coloring SpongeBob Squarepants pictures, Nathan Darnell isn't much different than other kids his age.
But two things that do make him different from many other six-year-olds is his autism – and his criminal rap sheet.
"We are not denying that he did what they are saying, but we are denying he is culpable," said Tony Darnell, Nathan's father.
It was just last week when Nathan's teacher's aide, Glenda Schiltz, filed a juvenile fourth degree misdemeanor assault charge against him.
"What human being with a heart would do that to a six-year old?, asked Cathy Darnell, Nathan's mother. "Seriously, who would do that? I know I wouldn't."
According to the affidavit which 9News obtained, Schiltz alleges that on September 5, Nathan grabbed her by the shirt, pulled her backwards and began punching and kicking her.
"He admits to shoving her down, but he says he didn't pull her backwards," said Tony Darnell.
"She is no small person, she can defend herself," said Cathy Darnell.
So what does the school have to say about the matter?
Superintendent of Bracken County Schools Tony Johnson would not appear on camera but did say in a statement, "I believe we followed proper procedures and I have full faith in my staff".
Despite being autistic, Nathan is integrated with all kindergartners at Taylor Elementary.
His parents believe Schiltz and other teachers there are ill-prepared to handle special needs students.
His mother openly questions Schiltz's credentials.
"[She believes] you need to take him behind the woodshed and teach him something," Cathy Darnell, said. "That is her mentality, beat it out of him."
"Most of the time it [Nathan's behavior] is whining and screaming. I am sure that is hard on teachers and stuff, but we find a way to deal with it," said Tony Darnell.
On Wednesday the family went to the county courthouse, where an inquiry was held and it was decided the criminal case against Nathan will indeed move forward.
It's likely then that Schiltz will have to be there.
But until they get a chance to tell her personally, Nathan's family, in the meantime, does have something they want to say to her.
"She is a cold-hearted woman, that she has made every teacher look bad," said Cathy Darnell.
Repeated attempts to contact Glenda Schiltz were unsuccessful.
9News also was in communication with several school board members and none wanted to comment on the matter.
This is all heading to a proceeding scheduled for next week in which six-year-old Nathan will appear in juvenile court as a defendant.
Of dear Lord, the ignorance on this thread is just embarrassing to read.
Especially when,
1) you have yeachers such as yourself teaching them;
2) the child has no supports to speak of;
3) there are no clear and consistent behavior modifications being utilized by any and all professional and paraprofessionals who work with him.
Your comments “and it is ridiculous” really sicken me to the core. I guess when you got the calling to teach children your calling was limited to typical children.
Your school district is failing this student. You as his teacher and IEP team member should be fighting to get the services he so critically needs.
But poor dear you have enough difficulty just teaching the “normal” kids, so I don’t hold out much hope you actually do the job you were contracted to do and by law are mandated to do for this child.
My son is severely autistic, and I have him in the best private school in the country for autism.
Our school districts fail our special needs children daily. The disgusting attitude of some teachers towards special needs children makes me wonder about the quality of education they provide typical children.
It’s Free Appropriate Public Education only for the neurotypical children. I am sure those here with the loudest voice against special education bless themselves twice in Church every Sunday, the compassionate souls they are.
Sorry for the typos — not enough coffee yet.
He should have a full day 1:1 with him, no question.
School Districts don’t provide supports and expect what exactly to happen when they place these children in inclusion settings?
Really makes me want to pull my hair out.
I have some questions for you, I am not being facetious, as I said I have an autistic niece. Is there a standard to teaching and disciplining autistic children? We can find one extreme to the other from experts telling us what is the best way to handle all children. With the rise of an autism diagnosis, I wonder if at this stage most things are in a trial and error phase. From reading your posts I get the feeling that as a parent you need to spend a lot of time redirecting behaviors and basically giving in to inappropriate behaviors, although curbing them, instead of being firm in what is right and wrong. All children, autistic or not will act out and push limits, that is why we need to teach them self control. From an outsiders view, I have to wonder how catering to the behaviors such as chew toys and trampolines in your house, help down the road. I understand that they help at the moment but when does it end? With my niece, she knows what is going on around her, she is extremely intelligent and listens and understands directions, it seems her problem is she cannot be proactive in getting her emotions and words out. I just pray that we find out what causes it because I think that will go a long way in treating it. My heart goes out to you and your family. I have not walked in your shoes so I am not being critical, but, having children 17-10, I am amazed at the way most “experts” in child behaviors have just about erased responsibility in many areas. Personally, I think the mindset is to coddle all children. I know I would jump through hoops to do what I could to help my child just as you are. Raising children is hard enough and autism and all that it emcompasses is such a gray area. I hope the experts are doing right by these children.
Inclusion for the most part has worked well in our schools. For some of the kids it is only a class or two others more. However, I will tell you this, our particular area has tons of money and the schools are very small. Two of the people I know, both married to Drs, have full time help with their kids. They are specialists that work with the kids from the minute they wakeup until they go to bed. One of the moms has 4 kids, 3 boys and a girl. Two of the boys are autistic, one is high functioning but the other is profound. Each goes to a different public school in the area because of the varying programs. My niece who lives in NY, is 4. She was diagnosed early. From that moment, she has been in school and has teachers come every day, 7 days a week to work with her. Personally, I think there is a lot of waste and nonsense that schools spend money on, I would rather see it go to helping these children adapt and learn.
“Inclusion for the most part has worked well in our schools.”
Below is a link. Near the middle of the page under the heading RESEARCH it gives the conclusions of several different studies, that seem to refute you statement. I didn’t cut and paste because it’s rather long.
Did you have data that supports your above statement, or did you just parrot something you heard someone else say?
http://www.weac.org/resource/june96/speced.htm
oops my bad. I misread your post.
I sent you an e-mail
That is correct. They will, however, be living in a society filled with the products of the schools they will not be attending.
And I must apologize for saying “your” when I am generalizing. I don’t mean your children specifically.
It’s all to easy in this medium to forget that there is flesh and blood and often pain on the other end of the wire.
My comments regarding sociobiology were intended to point out that the human condition can often be better understood by understanding the behavior of other species.
You should have seen the unintended reaction I got when I explained to a Palestinian that his people and the Israelis were acting on an animal-instinctive level instead of using their cerebral cortex and knowledge to override instinct. I mentioned having observed monkeys. He took it to mean I was calling him a monkey. No amount of explanation could convince him otherwise, even when it was explained by a mutual Jewish friend.
I suppose we could stop talking to each other altogether, but I don’t think any of us would like the end results.
So, I choose to interact in the hope that we may learn enough about each other to establish a common ground. On this board, that common ground is the desire for a Free Republic. I love the Republic for which the Stars and Stripes stand. I pledge my allegiance to it. Far to much has been sacrificed by others for me to do otherwise.
That's just awful. Skepticism has no place at a Christmas pageant. I guess you can blame the ACLU for that.
From your link:
The following is a brief review of a number of studies of various inclusive strategies. There are a number of reviews and meta-analyses that consistently report little or no benefit for students when they are placed in special education settings (Kavale, K.A., Glass, G.V., 1982; Madden and Slavin, 1983). However, in 50 studies comparing the academic performance of mainstreamed and segregated students with mild handicapping conditions, THE MEAN ACADEMIC PERFORMANCE OF THE INTEGRATED GROUP WAS IN THE 80TH PERCENTILE, WHILE THE SEGREGATED STUDENTS SCORE WAS IN THE 50TH PERCENTILE (Weiner R., 1985).
Using this evidence, inclusion proponents claim that segregated programs are detrimental to students and do not meet the original goals for special education. Recent meta-analyses confirm a small to moderate beneficial effect of inclusion education on the academic and social outcome of special needs students. (Carlberg, C. and Kavale, K. 1980; Baker, E.T., and Wang, M.C., and Walberg, H.J., 1994-95).
Another study assessing the effectiveness of inclusion was done at Johns Hopkins University. In a school-wide restructuring program called Success For All, student achievement was measured. The program itself is a comprehensive effort that involves family support teams, professional development for teachers, reading, tutoring, special reading programs, eight-week reading assessments, and expanded opportunities for pre-school and kindergarten children.
In assessing effectiveness, a control group was compared with the students in Success For All programs. Comparative measures included:
Woodcock Language Proficiency Battery (1984)
Durrell Analysis of Reading Difficulty (1980)
Student retention and attendance.
Comparisons were made at first, second, and third grades. Students identified with exceptional education needs were included in all comparisons. While assessments showed improved reading performance for all students, THE MOST DRAMATIC IMPROVEMENTS OCCURRED AMONG THE LOWEST ACHIEVERS. In spite of the fact that these inner city schools have normally high retention problems, only 4% of the fourth graders in the experimental group had ever been held back one or more grades, while the five control schools had 31% who had failed at least one year.
There was a similar finding in the comparison of attendance rates. The research also found the best results occurred in schools with the highest level of funding. They concluded that when resources are available to provide supplementary aids, all children do better.
The primary importance of research on Success For All is that it demonstrates that with early and continuing intervention nearly all children can be successful in reading. Common practice in compensatory and special education is to identify children who have already fallen behind and provide remediation services that last for years (Allington and McGill-Frazen, 1990). Research on Success For All and other intensive early intervention programs such as Reading Recovery (Pinnell, 1991) and Prevention of Learning Disabilities (Silver and Hagen, 1989) suggests that there are effective alternatives to remedial approaches.
While researchers are cautious in their conclusions, there are some positive signs. In particular, students in special education and regular education showed several positive changes, including:
A reduced fear of human differences accompanied by increased comfort and awareness (Peck et al., 1992);
Growth in social cognition (Murray-Seegert,1989);
Improvement in self-concept of non-disabled students (Peck et. al., 1992);
Development of personal principles and ability to assume an advocacy role toward their peers and friends with disabilities; Warm and caring friendships (Bogdan and Taylor, 1989).
The final issue shared by proponents of inclusion relates to cost-effectiveness. A 1989 study found that over a fifteen year period, THE EMPLOYMENT RATE FOR HIGH SCHOOL GRADUATES WITH SPECIAL NEEDS WHO HAD BEEN IN SEGREGATED PROGRAMS WAS 53%. BUT FOR SPECIAL NEEDS GRADUATES FROM INTEGRATED PROGRAMS THE EMPLOYMENT RATE WAS 73%.
Furthermore, the cost of educating students in segregated programs was double that for educating them in integrated programs (Piuma, 1989).
[the ignorance on this thread is just embarrassing to read.]
Don’t be embarrassed, Be a teacher and correct ignorance where you perceive it.
The principles of applied behaviorial anaylsis (which is the only proven evidence based treatment for autism) certainly do not employ the theory of “giving in” to a child. Quite the contrary.
The use of trampolines and chew toys are for sensory based issues.
Sure it does:
“While researchers are cautious in their conclusions, there are some positive signs. In particular, students in special education and regular education showed several positive changes, including:
A reduced fear of human differences accompanied by increased comfort and awareness (Peck et al., 1992);
Growth in social cognition (Murray-Seegert,1989);
Improvement in self-concept of non-disabled students (Peck et. al., 1992);
Development of personal principles and ability to assume an advocacy role toward their peers and friends with disabilities;
Warm and caring friendships (Bogdan and Taylor, 1989).”
“””In many cases, if the prospective parents that produced the child had exercised willpower and discipline with regard to their consumption of drugs, alcohol etc. the problem wouldn’t exist in the first place.
Bottom line: It’s the parent’s responsibility.”””
Autism is not resultant of lack of “willpower” on the parents.
Oops! spectacle! :)
I know it’s not sensitive of politically correct to ask, but why is she getting such consistent results?
What are their ages?
What they need to do is sit the child down and say "I want you to stop being autistic right now, mister, or you're gonna get it!".
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