This is the article that auntie Liangzhen was talking about. I think he's the same guy who started the petition...

The two forgotten groups in the Budget
Susan Long
ST/11/03/06

ALMOST everyone, from the young, the old, high earners, the sandwichedgeneration in between, to the needy, made off with some bounty from theelection year Budget unveiled recently.
Except for two groups, who felt left out in the cold. On the surface, bothhave nothing - and yet, looking closer, everything - to do with each other.
One disgruntled group are parents of disabled children who earn more than$2,500 a month combined, who have had subsidies taken away.
The other are housewives, who do not have 'real jobs' with pay cheques andhence do not qualify for the Workfare Bonus.
Those in the first group feel that whatever little they had is being takenaway. From next month, when means testing kicks in, families earning more than$2,500 will have to fork out more to send their disabled children to twostate-run rehabilitation schemes.
Under the Early Intervention Programme for Infants and Children, which helpsimprove the motor skills of disabled children up to age six, families earningmore than $3,500 will see subsidies whittle down from $368 a month to zero by2010.
For the Community Integration Support Programme, which helps older, disabledchildren adjust to mainstream schools, those earning more than $3,500 a monthwill see a $240 monthly handout disappear by 2010.
These special needs families resent that although the Government isostensibly doing more for disabled children, it is doing less for theirs.Although the Ministry of Community Development, Youth and Sports says thatsubsidies will be given to needy cases, few parents - there are an estimated800 new cases of children diagnosed with disabilities each year - arereassured.
The bottom line, says remisier Tan Choon Kiat, 36, who has an autisticthree-year-old son, is that a $3,500 monthly combined income is no princely sumfor a special needs family.
Sick of long waiting times at public hospitals for physiotherapy,occupational and speech therapy sessions, Mr Tan now spends more than $2,800 amonth on three-year-old Troy's private therapy.
Each month, $1,600 goes to Troy's education at ZEE School, $100-an-hourspeech therapy four times a week at Speech Connection, $100-an-hour ofstructured learning four times a week at Children's Partnership, and $50acupuncture sessions twice a week.
That does not include his food, medical bills and the maid hired to helpout. His mother Lee Lee also quit her job as a $4,000-a-month IT specialist totake care of him full-time. The couple also have two daughters, aged six andseven.
Mr Tan buys the Government's hard-nosed heath-care arguments. 'I know if youcan afford it, you shouldn't be depriving others. If you don't take care ofyour health, you've only yourself to blame.
'But my kid was born like that, not by his or my choice. What hits me mostis their message: You don't deserve our help',' he grinds out.
He is now living off his 'savings and past investments'. More than money,what he seeks is some 'recognition' - any token subsidy will do - that specialneeds families, even those who fall within the middle class, bear an inordinateload.
To that effect, he has started an online petition (www.petitiononline.com/shbi2006/), which has garnered over 1,200 signatures from parentswith disabled children and well-wishers.

since end last week, stephen is down with fever and diarragne. doctor confirmed that it is not HFM. so we are waiting for the recovery. haven't been able to do much of the intervention during the school holiday too as deborah needed the attention.

some areas noticable are words "up and down". the has been clear as often as we play the throwing of pillow. just the the "dowm" has recently sound more like "town".

on play doo, we notice that he is able to decern which box it is placed in. even when we change the position of the box, he will usually be able to pick it in one search. interestingly the pictures on the boxes are similar, only different in colour tone. that's quite smart right? i tried more on passing the play doo items to him instead on him taking by himself and this is working out find. the intention is to interact, as well as pull his waiting skill and turn taking, which he need to work on.

one of the day, i played throwing of rings with him. he was able to follow the movement of the ring going up and down. when i throw it to him, he will throw it back as he didn't want it. when the ring hit my leg, i "cried in pain" and he laugh heartyly. (wicked boy). whanted to video it but when i got the video, he was so excited about it that we missed the previous scene.

2 imp finding during this peroid of his sickness.
whenever i does sponging for him, or feed him the medication. he will say "go away" very clearly with emotion and kick me (don't think the kicking is part of autism, should do some charactor training soon.)this is now extended to whenever i gets near him. i will have to rebuild father-son relationship when he gets well.

some of the nights, he will also be awake and talk. and mind you, we really think that he is talking sense and in context. of course only he knows the context. he will talk from loud to soft and high to low pitch and with body laugange. not the staring in the air talking he often use to do. we can also hear his 1-20 count in it. guess it is similar to hui ping experience on the puppet play. it was so loud that i ask him to soften down and he did. surprise!

we feel that he really kind of understand what we say many a times (better comprehension. even when we talk about his medication, he will get angry. interesting. btw, the only kind on medication he will take easily will be those that are tastly, colourless and textualess and can dissolve in water. so keep a look out for us. any others, he will create a powerful "mouth fountain"



on the school side, they are working with him on using pictures to communicate (PECS) as well as a structure way of work system (teacch). will share more in our next meeting.

thanks hui ping for the post. how did you figure out a musician talent? maybe some sports hero might be possible.

I'm quite sure Stephen will be a highly talented musician!

Autistic boy turns national hero
New York teen scores 20 points in 4 minutes during school game
He's now flooded with Hollywood offers
TNP / March 14, 2006

ALL that Jason McElwain, 17, a New Yorker born with autism, wanted was to play basketball.

Not making it into the school team because of his condition and his height - he is only 1.68m tall - he became the manager of the Greece Athena High School basketball team.

Coach Jim Johnson's way of thanking Jason for the dedication and enthusiasm he brought to his two-year stint on the sidelines was to let him play with the team in the last four minutes of the final year basketball game.

Jason didn't let his coach down. Not only did he shoot hoops, he created a school record - scoring 20 points in four minutes.

His teammates bore him out of the hall in triumph and his story has become the sort of fairy tale that America loves.

Three weeks on from his triumph, Jason has appeared on numerous TV programmes and is being courted by Hollywood, reported US and UK newspapers.

Even White House officials are planning a meeting between him and President George Bush.
Jason has high-functioning autism with a reasonable level of capability. He started speaking only when he turned 4.

Dad David McElwain, 51, said of the night of his son's triumph: 'He was really happy on the way home. He didn't sleep a lot that night.'

Jason's sporting victory might have remained a glorious memory had not his performance been captured on videotape.

By the evening, a clip of Jason in action was on the Net, eventually reaching sports cable network ESPN.

Today, he is a national hero.

Twenty-five film companies and publishers have bombarded him with offers, starting with basketball superhero Earvin 'Magic' Johnson, who instantly saw Oscar potential in the story of a boy who, through courage and determination, beats the odds.

Johnson is now in a bidding war with, among others, Oprah Winfrey.

Tomorrow, when the President Bush makes a trip through upstate New York, he will present an award to the teenager.

CALM AND COLLECTED
What has impressed Jason's friends is how coolly he has taken his overnight success.

Mr Tom Batzold, sports editor of the Rochester Democrat and Chronicle, said: 'Jason didn't ask for the publicity. Through it all he has held up under tremendous scrutiny. He's calm and collected. He has handled this like a champ.'

Jason's performance is proof that some autistic children can achieve at a highly capable level.

Bill Krueger, former baseball pitcher, college basketball player and longtime crusader for autism awareness, said: 'Autistic kids find a zone and it's as if nothing else exists beyond it. Their focus can be on baseball statistics, signs on the road or shooting a basketball.'

Jason's next challenge? To graduate.

The best achievement for today...Stephen didn't cry when I walked into the room!! Yayy!

But he still ran to his favourite place and whined a little. But after yesterday's sharing, I've learnt that I should give him some time to cool off so I don't disturb him when he starts wailing. It works 'cos he would just wail for a little while and stops when he realises that I'm not there.

I succumbed to watching DVD with him 'cos he saw it before I realised what he was looking for. It's quite amazing to see him enjoying the music and how focussed he is on listening and watching the singers.

I think his motor skills are very good. When I played 'Twinkle twinkle' on the piano and he climbed to the window to 'look' for stars, he can climb all the way up the window. Erm...a little too good maybe :)

He kinda learnt how to pick up after himself today. When we played play-doh (I think I'm now play-doh queen, just as adrian is bubbles king), I started putting the pieces back into the box. I kept putting them in each time he took them out so he decided that it's faster to follow me. When all the pieces are in the box, I asked him to pick it up and put the box back. After some coaxing, he actually did! But he didn't clap for himself this time as he did the last time. Hmm...I wonder why...

He said 'go' and 'yes' and some form of 'watch' quite clearly today.

This is for last monday...was on to my fifth word before I was whisked off to a full day of meetings...

Stephen still cries quite a bit when he sees me...probably sees a locked door looming in front of him when he sees me :) But he was pretty responsive that monday. He filled in the word 'you' when I sang the Barney song and played play-doh. One interesting thing was that he went 'yeah!' and clapped whenever he takes out all the play-doh stuff and put them in order. He is prompting us to cheer for him!

I think he is also learning to tell stories...'cos I like to tell him stories with the shark & his favourite Barney. He uses different voices when he holds the different animals and moves them around...of course, that may just be his usual way of talking :)

Week 27Feb - 3 march

Home – played stack blocks, was able to wait for me to give to him the blocks. After building up will push down. Try to do turn taking also, he was able to wait.

We also did bowling. He likes to do the arranging of the bowl, but to quick to push all down by hand. Only twice we management to have him use the ball. Was able to aim correctly. And is any was still standing, he will push it down.

Started to say “down”. Was doing to pillow play. I held the pillow up in the air and he said “down”. We did this for a while.

Once I said “bye” to him, getting out of house, Stephen actually looked at me for a while, then came over to give me a hug. (think the longest so far for me, about 8-10s).

We notice also that when Stephen initiate clap sometimes (or maybe always) he is acknowledgement. There was this occasion at Annie’s place that he did something then he clapped but we didn’t. He kind of looked at us with surprise (as if we didn’t participate in his achievement) I notice it and clap then he looked at the rest who didn’t until all of them notice and clapped. Then he stopped clapping and move on to the next thing and repeats this for a few times.

Stephen was able to take off his shoe when we told him to. Of course with a two strip, he needed some help in opening the Velcro.

Guess what? Stephen said “bye bye” to me and waved to me the very first time as I was going out to work.


Outdoor – grandparent followed us to school once. When they got into the car, Stephen actually was aware enough to look at them a couple of times by turning his head (they were sitting behind) then he started to “wooooo” cry, (didn’t wanted to have them so close).
He got into the mobile. This is definitely a big achievement. He used to be so afraid of them that he will pull me way whenever he sees one. Somehow he got into one with Deborah. To take a step further, I put in a coin to move it. He tried to get out but I kind of make him stay and he did stay on. Tried him on a static one on another occasion and he willingly got into the mobile car. (This is part of very coming some sensory issues I think).


Play ground – today Stephen said “swing” to get the swing effect. He also used the word “go” and “up” to get the same aim but uses “go” more. He tends to use “go” more often for many things. He also overcame some sensory issue by swinging alone while sitted down and standing up on the swing (wooden swing) while doing the swing together, he didn’t use any gesture to day as his words got the things he want. 3 cheers. He also tried to get the swing swinging by himself as in a few occasion, he push me to back off helping him. He also responded to “sit straight” and he was sitted out. (Speech T said he is actually hearing and understanding, so to work more on how he can express his need to us).

Did chasing again. Eye contact was excellent in quality and duration. He was able also to chase me by taking alternate path (shorter) to reach me (thinking boy).

This time when I ask him to got to the spinner, he when straight on. He also used “go” to activate the turning process.

When walking on the see-saw, he said “down” in anticipation that it will be going down when he reaches the higher end. He also sat on the other end of the see-saw by himself and we did a while of real see-saw, but very slow of course. at one point I also did some funny sound with the coming down of the see-saw and he looked at me and laugh for a long while.

He tried the net this time and was able to walk in the net finding his way out and he succeeded. He also walk at the side to do balancing.

He also did bird chasing. So he also notices birds. So happy at each chase.

There was also aeroplane flying. He used to be frightened to hear their sound but not this time. Once he actually looked up and his eyes followed the plane.

So much for this eventful week. His gross motor skill should be quite ok. fine motor skill to be build more (was able to spin flower thought). His sensory defiantly has increase and acknowledge of people around him. More words also. Thanks guys and thank God.