• Replies 25 replies
  • Subscribers 28 subscribers
  • Views 4590 views
  • Users 0 members are here
Options
Related
Hints and tips
  • To quote someone's message, first select/highlight the relevant text, and then use the Quote button that appears
  • To "mention" someone, type @ followed by the start of the forum name, and choose from the list; that person will get a notification of being mentioned

School don't see my daughter's difficulties

jamaicanbluetaz

Hi there, I've just joined the community.  My 10 year old daughter was diagnosed with Aspergers in July 2013.

She has always hated going to school and it got to the point that I changed her school to a smaller school in the hope things would change.  As it is things are the same.

Once I got the diagnosis I believed the school would be willing to help - ah yes, they say all the things I want to hear - then my daughter informs me they are not quite telling the truth.

Recently I had my third meeting with the headteacher - one of my daughter's year teachers and the SENCO.  My daughter does not have a statement.  She does not present symptoms or difficulties at school, however the stress of the whole school - information processing, social etc - builds up and then she has a huge meltdown at home over something trivial.

I put this in an e-mail - what the stressors at school were.

In the meeting I was told that children with asd cannot behave one way at school and differently at home - it was impossible for them.  If she is going to have a meltdown she would have it at school just as easily as at home!!  This is contrary to all the asperger literature I have read and discussed with others. 

Further they told me that they do not see her having any difficulties at school - she is no different to all the other children at school.  She does understand what she is doing, she needs a motivator to get her to work faster (she is slow at processing tasks etc!!) and as for difficulty in the dinner hall they will watch out for this but they cannot staff anywhere else for her to go.  As far as distractions go - she doesn't get affected by sensory distractions otherwise she would have made a fuss many times when there is painting or cooking etc happening in the school.  When I suggested ear plugs for her so she didn't find noises distracting they told me this was only used for severe autism and there was no need for my daughter to go down this route.

They are not seeing that all of this quietly builds up and up until she blows up and that to alleviate her pressure they only have to change a couple of things.

Basically there answer to all of my points was that is severe autism, not aspergers, she does not present this at school but they will watch out for it in future.

Has anybody else had problems like this - silly question I know people have had problems like this because I have heard it but now it is happening to me I don't know what to do.

I know this is a bit of a rant and may not make sense - but basically all the "typical" symptoms of Asperger Syndrome and some not so "typical" are apparent in my daughter at home and with what she says about not liking school and other social occasions but the because the school don't see any of it they are treating it as if it is not happening.

Hoping somebody out there will reply to me.

Thanks for reading.

Jamaicanbluetaz - xxxx

Parents

  • Part of the problem lies with what information schools get.

    There are standards and guidelines, mainly at the level of Special Education Needs Coordinators (SENCO) and leadership (head teachers etc.). SENCO are supposed to arrange training for staff, head teachers have a responsibility to ensure the school meets the expectations. Do remember everything is being thrown at schools at the moment, with OFSTED, Government obsession with assessment, and league tables, so it is little wonder the system is at breaking point.

    You might think the detail of special education needs is decided at national level, but a lot of it comes down to schools through the local authority, which may be using their own commissioned or modified guidelines.

    The information they get on autism, as far as I can see from a glance at some of the guidelines, is worse than useless. For a start most of it is driven by the diagnostic criteria - the Triad of Impairments. So sensory issues, while referred to, come way down at the bottom of the priorities.

    A lot of the problem with autism is that the market is flooded with books on it (JKP in principle), and it is very hard to find good advice for schools amonst this lot. But scholols would have to use educational publisher reference books, and some of these are quite dated in their understanding of autism. 

    I happen to have a copy of Martin Hanbury's "Educating Pupils with Autistic Spectrum Disorders - A practical guide" (Paul Chapman Publishing 2005) for no other reason than it was in my University bookshop and I wanted to better understand the background support at school level for students coming into university. So I haven't looked at any other books for schools.

    Take sensory issues, raised by jamaicanbluetaz in the first posting, I couldn't find anything about ear plugs, but there is a section on sensory overload. This hinges around an illustration pupil called Dan, who is sensitive to the sound of chairs scraping against the floor when the children stand up at the end of class and car alarms going off in the staff car park. The solution is Dan is allowed to leave the class before the others, time being adjusted down as he desensitizes, and when a car alarm goes off Dan will be sent out the room, ostensibly to go and report the problem, but so he can get further from the noise.

    I'm not knocking the advice, its just I'm not convinced there's that much understanding of autism in the book. I think parents have to get hold of copies of teacher guide books like this one to find out the teacher's perspective. I'm sure you have every right to ask the school if you can peruse the staff reference texts.

    One of the key criteria for successful Special Education Needs Support, in all the guidelines is that "professional and parent should work together".

    Countless times I see in this forum schools effectively locking out parents, not being prepared to discuss with parents how their child behaves in class, versus at home. It clearly just isn't happening. I guess parents night and some nominal parent's questionnaires is considered adequate.

    However I'm reluctant to put blame or extra obligation on the teachers; they're having overwhelming problems landed on them. There's a chain of command here: head teachers, Governors, Local Education Authority, national education bodies.

    Governors are supposed to get genned up on this, I don't think they are. But the real failures often lie with the Local Education Authority - your county council - or whatever. Just as with the Adult Autism Strategy, most of the mess is down to the appalling standards amongst local government civil servants.

    That's where parents need to direct their anger and their protests rather than schools.  

Reply

  • Part of the problem lies with what information schools get.

    There are standards and guidelines, mainly at the level of Special Education Needs Coordinators (SENCO) and leadership (head teachers etc.). SENCO are supposed to arrange training for staff, head teachers have a responsibility to ensure the school meets the expectations. Do remember everything is being thrown at schools at the moment, with OFSTED, Government obsession with assessment, and league tables, so it is little wonder the system is at breaking point.

    You might think the detail of special education needs is decided at national level, but a lot of it comes down to schools through the local authority, which may be using their own commissioned or modified guidelines.

    The information they get on autism, as far as I can see from a glance at some of the guidelines, is worse than useless. For a start most of it is driven by the diagnostic criteria - the Triad of Impairments. So sensory issues, while referred to, come way down at the bottom of the priorities.

    A lot of the problem with autism is that the market is flooded with books on it (JKP in principle), and it is very hard to find good advice for schools amonst this lot. But scholols would have to use educational publisher reference books, and some of these are quite dated in their understanding of autism. 

    I happen to have a copy of Martin Hanbury's "Educating Pupils with Autistic Spectrum Disorders - A practical guide" (Paul Chapman Publishing 2005) for no other reason than it was in my University bookshop and I wanted to better understand the background support at school level for students coming into university. So I haven't looked at any other books for schools.

    Take sensory issues, raised by jamaicanbluetaz in the first posting, I couldn't find anything about ear plugs, but there is a section on sensory overload. This hinges around an illustration pupil called Dan, who is sensitive to the sound of chairs scraping against the floor when the children stand up at the end of class and car alarms going off in the staff car park. The solution is Dan is allowed to leave the class before the others, time being adjusted down as he desensitizes, and when a car alarm goes off Dan will be sent out the room, ostensibly to go and report the problem, but so he can get further from the noise.

    I'm not knocking the advice, its just I'm not convinced there's that much understanding of autism in the book. I think parents have to get hold of copies of teacher guide books like this one to find out the teacher's perspective. I'm sure you have every right to ask the school if you can peruse the staff reference texts.

    One of the key criteria for successful Special Education Needs Support, in all the guidelines is that "professional and parent should work together".

    Countless times I see in this forum schools effectively locking out parents, not being prepared to discuss with parents how their child behaves in class, versus at home. It clearly just isn't happening. I guess parents night and some nominal parent's questionnaires is considered adequate.

    However I'm reluctant to put blame or extra obligation on the teachers; they're having overwhelming problems landed on them. There's a chain of command here: head teachers, Governors, Local Education Authority, national education bodies.

    Governors are supposed to get genned up on this, I don't think they are. But the real failures often lie with the Local Education Authority - your county council - or whatever. Just as with the Adult Autism Strategy, most of the mess is down to the appalling standards amongst local government civil servants.

    That's where parents need to direct their anger and their protests rather than schools.  

Children
No Data