I'm late to this thread (per usual) but I just felt the need to comment on this situation.
As someone who works with people who have developmental disabilities, while I've never directly worked with someone who is autistic, I can certainly comment firsthand on how difficult and frustrating it can be to interact and try to connect with someone who's brain is wired differently than yours. In my opinion (and I should think this would be obvious), the key is to have some clue about what you're dealing with and how to handle it, and to have patience.
Clearly this teacher is not qualified to work with special needs children as these concepts seem to elude her. It sounds like Michael is doing extremely well if he's been mainstreaming for so long, but she still should have taken the time to educate herself on the subject and to talk with the rest of the school administrators to find successful ways to work with him. It must be so frustrating because really, the whole situation could have been avoided with a little effort on the school's part.
My heart goes out to you, and I hope this whole thing gets resolved soon.
