Can you home school a Down syndrome child?

Question

does a child with Down syndrome need special attention when home schooling? Somebody I know is home schooling her children (11, 14 and 16) The little one (4) which has DS needs special care, in my opinion. He needs outside contacts to learn and live a healthy life, The other kids don't have ANY outside contacts, no friends no playmates. What does the law say on that? In the state of New Jersey, New York and Washington? Thanks for your input!

Answer 1

Yes you can with lots of patience and hard work. It is legal. Usually if someone is homeschooled for a while, they get involved in outside activities like homeschool groups or a church or anything like that.

Answer 2

Every parent has the right to give any education they want to their child. However you're right, a child with Down Syndrome

needs outside contact, see other people, learn about society, but its not illegal if a parent decides to have their children homeschooled.

Answer 3

I tend to agree with what you say, since I have worked for several years with people who have learning difficulties. Such as above.

But it could be that he/she is unhappy at school and the parents are only trying to do what they can for their child and feel what is best.

Over here in Britain there is a charity called Mencap; I was secretary up until recently when I had to resign for reasons such as painful eyes. But Mencap are nevertheless, a great source of information.

(But as former secretary, and I am sure that Mencap will not mind my saying this, much of the information they work hard to produce only reaches a smaller proportion of people with learning difficulties than that it is supposed to reach).

I know many people that have down syndrome some in there forties, some older who enjoy socializing very much.

I also helped run a drama group where they performed before a live audience, that was very successful.

The group is called Ace Drama.  It is a drama group for people who have a learning difficulty and those who do not have a disability.

But it is always best to give them little bits at a time. I left when our drama teacher was replaced with another, that did not have the same experience.

So I do share your concern very much on these matters.

That is why I recently brought my own concerns to Mencap and founder of Ace Drama.

Answer 4

Yes people can, and often should homeschool a child with Down Syndrome.  Many times the schools warehouse these kids and keep them from ever reaching their full potential.  Many with Down Syndrome are only very mildly mentally handicapped.

As far as your opinion, you are right the kid needs special care, and he is most likely getting it at home with lots of one-on-one attention.

You say the kids have no outside contacts, I find that hard to believe.  If they were THAT isolated you wouldn't know they existed, or at least you wouldn't know enough about them to know their ages.

Most homeschoolers do better socially, academically, and professionally.

Most special needs kids start learning much more when their parents pull them out of school and teach them at home.

The parents are probably sacrificing a lot to give their children the best education possible, don't criticize them, instead think about offering to help.  Maybe you could babysit or take the kids to a museum or something, and give the parents a day off.

I also agree with everything Terri said.  Once I lived in a neighborhood with a neighbor who assumed I "Never walked my dog and left him tied up outside all the time."  The fact was, I walked my dog every day around 11:00 in the morning.  I worked from 2:00 in the afternoon until after 10:30 at night, this woman kept more regular hours, getting home at 4:30 in the afternoon and so she saw my "poor neglected" dog tied up next to his dog house and assumed that I didn't care about him.  The dog was actually being walked every day, and came inside with me when I got home at 11:00 PM.   I would get up around 7:00 and put him outside to take care of his business, this happened to be the time the woman left for work.  I would go back to bed while the dog spent about an hour outside, and then I'd bring him back in until 11:00 when I took for a walk before I left for work.  

So anyway, she ASSUMED that because the dog was there when she left, and there when she got home, and still there when she went to bed, that he spent his whole life there.  But here assumptions were wrong.  She tried to steal the dog and I had to call the cops who verified that the tattoo on the dogs ear proved he was registered and licensed with the county as my dog, and was up on all his shots and vet care.

The dog was well cared for and very much loved, and lived with me until he died of old age at 16 years old.

Just because you don't see the outside contacts, doesn't mean they don't happen.

Answer 5

You can absolutely homeschool a child with down syndrome.  Children with special contact with their mothers excel beautifully.  No one will ever have the deep self-sacrificing love and commitment to a child that his or her parents.  

A child needs that commitment.

Answer 6

i think so yea

Answer 7

Thanks for your OPINION, however, you are not really in a position to make that call. No one knows what a kid needs more than their parents.

That said, Down's Syndrome can come in a varying array of severity, so that would be up to a medical professional and the child's parents, the only people truly qualified to have any input on that child.

Lots of people ignorantly THOUGHT my homeschooled kids had no outside contacts as well, until their snooping selves found out that my kids had more "outside contacts" in the context of healthy developing relationships than their kids did, not to mention were actually involved in more activities than they could realize from the impression they got from the few times they saw us.

I think you should A) find a hobby OTHER than deciding what is best for other people's kids and B) find out more about the plethora of healthy and developing activities that homeschooled kids participate in

Answer 8

Specialized care takes money and when free forms of assistance are available the resources are often stretched so thin that the envirnoment, even when lead by professionals, are less than ideal.

In the city where we used to live, a neighbor friend of mine had a child that cried all the time as an infant and she knew his development was not normal. He had many repetitive behaviors, avoided eye contact, and was nonverbal. She kept asking her pediatrician if something was wrong with him. The pediatrician kept saying to be patient that all kids develop at different rates. A new job meant that they had options outside of their previous employer's PPO plan. This pediatrician immediately identified her son as autistic. He was 3 years old by this time. The pediatrician recommended him for a special program for autistic children. This program was a free, five day per week program. They were thrilled. It turned out to be an absolute disaster. After a few months in the program their son became violent, his behavior was uncontrolable, he wouldn't sleep. They kept him in the program because the experts kept assuring them that he would adjust. They finally had enough when he was dropped off one day with duck tape layered around his ankles, sleeves, and neckline. It took them an hour to peel it carefully from his skin. There was no explanation given and it wasn't until the next day before they got someone on the phone to explain what had happened. For some inexplicable reason he kept trying to take his surface clothes off. The tape was to keep him dressed. Now assuredly a child that is trying to undress can be a problem, but I agree with his parents that duck tape was abusive. If they had done something like that to him, a nosey neighbor would surely have reported them for child abuse. The experts threatened to force them to keep the boy in the program, but they eventually let it go. It took about six months of him being home again, but he began to settle down and seemed blossom after that. I noticed that when I would visit he now actually came to sit in my lap which was a shocker. He normally didn't pay any attention to me. He even smiled often after that. I think that his parents, now that they knew the diagnosis and found that experts were not going to be the cure all, dug in and began learning about his condition. They became his advocates and his partners in dealing with autism. He thrived.

I haven't seen this family since we moved to a new state ten years ago. I truly believe that the experts, the pediatrician that they first trusted and the experts in the autism program, were a disadvantage to this family, not an advantage.

Answer 9

no, most of those guys die before age 20.

Answer 10

You certainly do know a lot about this family, which seems next to impossible considering they have absolutely no contact with the outside world in your opinion.

So, since you are completely aware of every aspect of their lives and what they do all day and all night, am I to assume you do not work, nor leave your house nor have any outside contact with the real world? I mean, how could you? Watching a family that closely is pretty much a 24/7 job.

I say that to illustrate the point that just because you do not see someone doing something, does not mean they do not do it.

I have a BFF, we've been friends for years, yet we have never seen each other bathe (thankfully, lol)

Based on your argument against this family we could assume neither of us bathes.

Do not judge someone based on appearances. I have neighbors that have been my neighbors for three years. They are home during the day (retired), and we are home during the day. Yet they did not know I homeschooled for over a year because we had different schedules. They would be out gardening during our morning lessons, then go in for lunch, while we would pop out to the park to run off steam, so on and so forth.

Another neighbor has been a neighbor for over 12 years, yet he works during the day. He did not know I was home during the day at all, because he is not home during the day.

Just because you do not see something does not mean it is not happening.

Now, as to the special care for a DS child? absolutely they need special care, lots of love, patience, understanding, guidance, support, encouragement, not to mention familiarity with the specifics of his condition. Who better to provide that than his parents?

Oh, but you argue, it takes a trained professional to do that.

True, don't you think the on the job training that mother has had more than qualifies her for the job?

Answer 11

Whether or not a child with Down's syndrome needs "special attention" while being homeschooled depends upon the severity of his/her disability.  The parents' decision regarding the child, not your opinion, is the deciding factor.

How is it that you could possibly know whether the children in this family have any outside contacts, friends, or playmates?  Are you intimately involved in the lives of these people?  It is not easy to know what a family is doing 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, unless we live with those people.

Following is information from the Home School Legal Defense Association (HSLDA) website regarding homeschooling special needs children in each of the 50 states:

http://www.hslda.org/strugglinglearner/s...

If you could help this family in some way, perhaps that would make their lives better.  It is a major struggle for many families with a special needs child.