But I thought he was in a special class for kids with autism? There are that many locally? Or has he moved to mainstream? Or am I totally wrong?

There are that many locally.

Well, almost--there are about 13-15 locally, plus the class has about 3-5 neurotypical "staff kids," whose parents work for the school. They get free preschool in return for putting their kids in the class as role models. I should also note that not every single kid is autistic--there is one Down's Syndrome kid, and one kid who has another disability (I'm not sure what.)

When they say it's an epidemic, they're not exaggerating. Our school district just released a report last May showing that the number of children in the program increased 400% between 1999 and 2009. I've said it before, the numbers are going to hit 1 in 10 before people really see what's going on around them.

Wow - I wonder .... How that compares to other school districts.

I know that ours has a lot more than I realized previously.

Talked to a fellow dwellar from the western side of the country.
Its been about a year and was nice to chat with him.

Is this a top secret Dwellar from the western side of the country, whose name cannot be revealed under threat of death?

His name was not important to the point of my post.

I'm sorry classicman. I was honestly not trying to embarrass you.

no prob, my post read harsher than l meant.

Spent the day with my 15 yr old. We went shopping down town, went out for lunch, and attended a Pagan Pride Day Festival.
We met several cool people, and my kidlet enjoyed the day talking with other "gifted people". It was sooo cool, people just sat down in the grass with us, opened their stone/rock bags, and shared their stones. We were given many really cool and interesting rocks. People would just come up to us, and say... ohhhh I have a stone that is yours, reach in, and comeout with a stone that *WAS* significant to us, or that we had at one time thought was neat or interesting. We came home with a beautiful Garnet, some Sunstones, 2 Dragon's tooth Amethysts, a Black and White one, I am not sure the name of... and a symbol of the goddess.

Then I went out for a few drinks with my hubby. All and all it was a great start for my weeks holidays :)

My big boys teams both won their major semi final over the weekend, so they're both going through to the grand final in two weeks time (rugby league). We're all very excited.

Does that mean they'll be playing each other at some point, or are they in separate age divisions?

Yeah, separate age divisions, so no chance of them playing against each other.

Mav has considered trying out for the older age division, and he'd probably be selected, but it's probably more fun for him to play in his own age group.

Awesome!

congrats to the boys, Ali - and to mom of course.

Congrats to all on good days and good things shared.

Our teachers and TAs also make home visits, but only in the first year (Reception) or class one if the child had not been in Reception. It's to help them overcome the horror of their first day at school. Although I don't think any child goes from nothing straight into a full first day any more.

When I think about what starting school was like for my agegroup it seems brutal in comparison. I was fine, but my sister cried every morning from Seeptember to Christmas apparently.