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What do I do next? how do I expain to my son about exculsion?

Donegal Diva

I'm at my wits end.  My son has suddenly gone from a lnow has a lovely boy to suspected ASD and second fixed term exclusion for three days from now. 

  • This is the first time I have posted on this forum but as soon as I read your message I knew i had to post. As a head teacher and mother to an 8 year old boy going through what sounds like the same situation as you and your son, I understand what you are both going through. As far as our school were concerned, my son was a 'normal, hard working, conforming, slightly quirky boy' until just after hs 8th birthday. Suddenly, he became a cross, angry, anxious, 'naughty', stressed child who was not safe at school. His school were fantastic. They reduced his timetable, put in place a one to one teaching assistant, took advice from specialists in ASD, made him a safe space, applied to the LA for emergency funding for full time one to one TA hours, started to increase the number of hours each week in school and applied for statutory assessment. He is now in school all day except for a half day on Wednesdays. He still has times when he cannot cope, but with his TA and safe space these times are managed safely, with dignity and in a manner that supports him. It has taken 8 months to get to this point and that is with a supportive school, so there is a long road ahead. My advice to you would be: * contact parent partnership www.parentpartnership.org.uk/ They will be able to support and advise *Ask the school to put in place a team around the child (TAC) by completing a Common Assessment Framework (CAF) and ask for referrals to CAMH, the paediatrician and the local authority special advisory service for children with ASD special needs. * create as many good times for your child away from school, with friends if he can cope with this. * discuss with the school reducing how many hours a day he is at school whilst they establish ways of working that keep him safe and allow him to learn * remember that the school may never have met this before and may be out of their depth or they may know exactly what the problem but won't put the time and resourcing into resolving it. You could contact your local authority for advice about how to manage either of these situation. I hope you have a positive result when he returns to school.

  • Hi Donegal Diva.

    I really felt for you as I read your post because we have experienced all this stuff ourselves.

    Firstly don't allow the school to pile the guilt on to your shoulders. While our little lad was in mainstream school we were constantly told the responsibilty lay on our shoulders for his behaviour. Its too easy for teachers to shield themselves from responsibility by laying the blame on the parents who are struggling and doing all they can for their child. We can't expect them to fully understand how the mind of a child on the ASD spectrum operates but we can expect them to be trained and have at least an understanding that they can't educate and discipline these children as they do others. In many situations a basic understanding of the fundamental difficulties that ASD children experience is enough for a teacher to prevent this type of behaviour occurring in the first place.

    In my case I decided not get upset any more but to get determined and become a strong and knowledgable advocat for my child.

    It might be helpful for you to have  plan of action written down before you go to the integration meeting next week.

    Write down the family strategies that you have at home in order to try to alleviate your child's stress levels where you can and how you prepare him for school.

    Then ask the school how they are going to work with you to alleviate his stress at school because that's what this is likely to be all about.

    The school need to take on board that he is fundamentally unable to conform (that's a big word that schools seem to cling to in these circumstances) in the way that they want him to and that inclusion for ASD children (another biggie that schools get wrong) is not about making him behave as a neuro typical child would. It's about allowing him access to neuro typical relationships with children at school and learning coping strategies that will enable him to live among others as he grows older. The school will probably consider that they have a badly behaved and angry child to deal with, when in all probability, they have a confused and very frightened little boy who desperately needs understanding and because he can't get this his emotions are boiling over in the only way he knows how. Some teachers can't seem to understand that in the case of many ASD children, fear and confusion doesn't look like fear and confusion...it manifests itself in difficult behaviour, sometimes violent because ASD children find it impossible to vocalise their fear and emotions. He is as unable to operate as a neuro typical child would as an unsighted child is able to read a blackboard!

    I do hope some of this helps. I've lost count of the times I spent crying about the injustice that my child is subjected to so I do understand the pain that you are in. I wish you the very best with your meeting next week. Let me know how it went.

    Blossom.

  • I believe Step 1 is to get a formal diagnosis, Step 2 is to get a statement, and then Step 3 may be to find him a school that can implement the terms of the statement.

    I also believe it's no near as easy as that makes it sound, but that there's help available on and through the NAS website, somewhere.

  • over past few weeks it has got much worse and he is bright, smart, loving but when he gets mad he loses it.  His teacher is unable to spot signs so we've had two behaviour incidents in the past two weeks.  He get's so uptight and angry that schoool now say they cannot "keep him safe" and have given him another exculsion. 

    I'm not sure where I go next but need help..  School have now said that we are making his behaviour worse as he is now getting more attention for his bad behaviour and have come up with no solutions and have integration meeting week after next.

    Please help.  Crying as I type.