Independance work

[samt1985]

I work with a 16 year old girl with learning difficulties, we are trying to set up some independant living skills work with her e.g using public transport, shopping e.t.c Any ideas on how to tackle this or any experience that others have that may help?

[saxy_jag]

Does her school not offer any training in this area?

I used to work in special school with students like her, and we had a number of projects in place. One was a week, sometimes two, during the school year where we took three or four students at a time, under the supervision of a couple of staff, to a flat where they had to work together cooking, cleaning, planning budgets, transport and activities with minimal input from staff. All this with appropriate classroom preparation, of course.

Is it possible your charge could perhaps plan and cook a simple meal each week, doing the budgeting and shopping and then the two of you (or an invited 'guest') could sit down and eat lunch together?

One of my remits at the school was transport. Depending on the ability of the student, we'd make an accompanied bus journey. Sometimes it would be the home/school journey. Practising this during the day, it would give student and myself a chance to chat with parents, if they were home, and get their input too. I'd gradually get the student to take more and more of the decisions about which bus to catch, where to get on and off etc., until I felt they were ready to do it alone. We'd give it a try, having a car ready for emergencies, and if that worked then they could get a council bus pass and come to school on their own.

If they had other stuff, such as short college courses or work experience, then we'd practice the journeys for those too. Sometimes they could do them in small groups, if they lived or were 'working' in the same area, and could support each other.

[saxy_jag]

Just a continuation by way of an anecdote ...

A couple of years after the school finally closed and I was working in a shop, one of my ex-'bus pass' students came in to see me. She told me very proudly that she'd recently been to stay with an aunt in Penzance and had made the two-way train journey (from Leicester) independently. I have to say, I was very proud of her. I was even prouder when, a few years after that, I bumped into her again and she introduced me to her new husband, who also has learning difficulties and with whom she's now living - again, independently.