12 year old son not coping at high school

Hi, I am new to the forums and looking for a little support.

I have a 12 year old son who was diagnosed with dyspraxia in 2009, and has behavioural problems. He's always been volatile and uncooperative, destructive and struggles socially. He's currently going through the diagnostic panel for ASD despite the fact a consultant diagnosed him with ASD at the time of dyspraxia (letter lost by NHS trust and consultant retired!)

During his transition from primary to high school last summer his behaviour went off the chart and he had a few psychotic episodes. It was this that prompted me to seek help. We ended up having a TAF/CAF opened as my son was violent at home, but now thats been closed as my sons behaviour calmed down for a while.

The thing is, his behaviour is ramping up again. He refuses to do homework, refuses to work in class at school, he's disorganised despite constant help, he intimidates other children because of his size and demeanor. He has a detention practically every night after school for being abusive to teachers, disruptive in lessons, bullying other kids at times. At home we cannot get him to do homework, he just won't do it. If we push the issue he melts down and destroys things in his bedroom and becomes threatening. School have not put anything in place apart from the detentions. He had a room he used to go to when he was wound up, but according to my son they keep kicking him out and forcing him to go to lessons, where he will not participate.

I don't know what to do, I feel the school should be doing more. Its clear my son isnt coping at high school and I don't know what my options are now as we are still awaiting a formal diagnosis, which I am worried we won't get as he's above average intelligence and the ADOS came back showing problems but without a diagnosis of ASD....what can I do?

MrsLPanda over 9 years ago

Hi Recombinantsocks
I am very likely on the spectrum myself, I had very similar issues to my son at school, I am physically clumsy, a bit of a geek, socially awkward. Can never keep friends and obsessive about certain things. Sometimes I think I come across as dry and matter of fact, or even pedantic. I don't see any point in seeking a diagnosis I have read so many books I could probably tell my GP a thing or two. We have parents evening this week, I'm going alone, without my son to get a proper picture of whats going on in lessons. I'm planning on cross questioning the teachers to a degree, to ask what THEY think is causing the issues. That way I will be able to gauge their opinions on autism and whether they are trained/empathic towards such children. After that it will be an appointment with the head of year, and if they won't make changes to enable my son to reach his full potential then I will look for a school with a specialist unit to support him.
Former Member over 9 years ago

(You can edit previous posts and remove the duplicate, the site is a bit cranky and everyone has to learn not to click submit more than once!)
Teachers and heads are all different and some of them really have no empathy and understanding for how to get the most out of kids (perhaps some of them are on the spectrum too). If it is one or two teachers then something can be done but if the leadership is that way and they have recruited people like themselves then the whole school may be beyond hope. In any case, it isn't your job to fix a broken school.
If you have autism in the family then do you think you or your partner may be affected? I ask this because you may want to be careful about how you deal with the school in that you really need as much tact and diplomacy as you can muster to get a school to change and that is not one of our strengths.
MrsLPanda over 9 years ago

Thanks, yes thats who he is feeling, completely overwhelmed. As am I. I have a niece who has PDA, ASD, ADHD and a host of other things. She gets a lot of help and goes part time to a special unit within the school. I expect my sons school just don't know what else to do, which is a shame as they seemed so competent prior to his admission. He gets a of negative comments and bad behaviour points from teachers who do not understand his condition. Some days he has 3/4 bad behaviour points and 2/3 detentions. I can hardly keep up. But instead of punishing him perhaps they should be looking at ways to enable him to work and succeed. I am going to ask for an appointment with his head of year next week to talk through this, I think I need to be more assertive. Any tips of how to get the message across that he needs help not punishments?
Former Member over 9 years ago

It may be that the school simply don't have a clue on how to deal with someone like him. His behaviour may be transformed by moving him to a more understanding school.
Force and threats often meet escalating refusal and disengagament. There is a thing called PDA http://www.autism.org.uk/about/what-is/pda.aspx that may describe his behaviour. My understanding is that if he is unable to enageg successfully with the world then he may just register his inability by refusing - it may seem to him that everything he does gets criticised so there is no point in doing anything. I've kind of got into a similar state myself before so he has my sympathy.
He is likely to be disorganised - this may come painfully slowly to him and he may always struggle (again, I know exactly how he feels!) One of the things we think has to be done is that every task has to be done completely 100% with nothing missing. This can turn into a never ending, enormous pile of things to do and one can be completely overwhelemed by not knowing where to start. He needs to learn that an essay, for example is only, say. 1000 words that discuss an issue. The essay must not be an attempt to write the definitive text on the question in hand.