aspergers

I am a school busdriver in Ohio. I have a student on board that has asperger's. He continually hits, slaps and kicks us on a daily basis. Today he hit my bus aid 2 x in the face.
What can we do as bus drivers/aids to help have better control of him. He is already in a harness that has 4 clips that we must clip. So we have to bend down in front of him to do so.
Please help!!!

[supermum_ms]

I think you'll find that this child is 'raging' from an overload of stimuli or fear, that really depends on the child. Let me try to explain one example of why this child is doing what he's doing, to be dx with Asperger he should not have cognitive delays or difficulty communicating, though during a 'rage' it can be difficult to understand the behavior when it is seems irrational.

Lets for example assume he's terrified of you touching him, being so close, invading his personal space etc or even terrified of the restraints that are used to protect but to him they are simply torture and your the one doing it TO him. His FIGHT or FLIGHT is activated and he is restrained, unable to flee to safety, so he spits, hits, screems and thrashes until the torture is over or he exhausts himself.

It is most important that his teacher is made aware of the problem he is having, if it is a fear based 'rage' then this needs to be addressed ASAP. They might try to include play based games of traveling on the bus, letting him make his seat belt, pretending to be you the bus driver etc looking for the 'trigger' and then helping him deal with his fear. I have seen the transition to the bus, go much smoother when the person he is most comfortable with is the person who straps him in, usually whilst keeping him calm and distracted by chatting about his personal interest.

Other times depending on the childs age, they strap them selves in and then its checked, all the while the child is fully aware of the safety aspect of why they need to wear the harness. In that case the child couldn't cope with the feeling (sensory overload) the straps produced, he simply couldn't help his reaction to flee, by being involved he had some control over this overwhelming feeling, it made a huge difference.

Good luck