Children with special needs represent a very diverse group. Among them are children with oral-linguistic disorders, mental growth disorders and autistic disorders. All the previously mentioned disorders cause a number of problems regarding a child's motor control and in its oral-linguistic, social and intellectual fields, which affect the family dynamic. It is not easy for parents to accept a child with special needs and their diagnoses, as it is a hard and long-term process for the parents because they have to face their own feelings and emotions of guilt, helplessness, concern, anger and many others. It also includes gathering information, consistent work and searching for suitable help strategies. Parents constantly adjust their expectations, focused on the image of a »normal« child, to their child's particularities. Incomprehension and the pressure of the local society make their task even harder. It is necessary for parents to maintain quality cooperation with professionals while such cooperation can be achieved within the cooperative model of working together.
This master's thesis is focusing on a mother's personal experience of dealing with her daughter's oral-linguistic, physical, social and intellectual development problems as well her personal involvement in the process of her daughter's empowerment. The mother's experience in the form of records is combined with underlying expert opinion and the daughter's diagnoses. The extended research represents the applied qualitative research method including an extensive processing of the child's personal file and partially structured interviews with 1st, 2nd and 3rd grade teachers. The daughter's main problems since birth have been particularly in the field of motor control. Due to distinct muscle tone disorder, overexcitement, slower and atypical physical development the daughter was regularly undergoing neuro-physiotherapy. Since the problems have gradually started to appear since her second birthday in all the previously mentioned fields, the daughter has been diagnosed as a child with moderate oral-linguistic disorders. A suspicion of autistic disorder was also suggested. Later, she was diagnosed as a child with mild mental disorder. While despite all the extra professional help and consistent work during pre-school period there was no essential improvement, progress started to appear more distinctly in the 2nd grade of elementary school. Daily communication between parents and teachers as well as equivalent and respectful relationship, searching for mutual solutions and the daughter’s increasing motivation for school work and knowledge proved to be quite important. Specific work and help strategies during pre-school and school period are demonstrated along with the material that was used, didactic tools, photographs of daughter’s drawings and work from her mother’s personal documentation. The case study is not the basis for any kind of generalization but it can help to understand the distress of parents who have children with special needs, it can also help to understand children as well as the importance of work and assistance within the scope of a child’s abilities.
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