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SN children

Behaviourally challenged teenage DS just moved to SN school. New teacher too harsh?

4 replies

user1498726699 · 04/10/2017 11:03

I finally managed to move DS (aged 15) to a SN school last month. He has severe learning diffs. He has had behaviour problems since starting Primary (not including at home!) and given a lot of punishments and sanctions as his learning diffs weren't picked up until we were able to get him assessed, initially for ASD, at age 11. As such he disengaged with his learning and this increased throughout Secondary School as again, even though he had a diagnosis, his school believed he could act like an NT child if he tried hard enough Angry. His behaviour includes saying inappropriate things to other children, not completing work and being very immature and 'silly'. He is classed as being 6 years behind his age group due to his learning diffs.

I was not able to get him an EHCP until Yr 10 as school were effectively blocking me from getting him one by not responding to requests from the LEA for information on what support he was getting. He could not move to an SN school without one obviously but we finally managed it for Yr11 and this is a school he can stay at until he is 20 so we were very pleased and hoped that he would be able to settle down and the school would be understanding of his difficulties.

Within 2 weeks, he was apparently separated from his new friend (had no friends at old school) as they were 'goading' other children although DS denies this. He also apparently 'refused' to come in from lunchtime play on day so was thereafter forced to stay with the much younger children at playtime. When I spoke to his form tutor about this, she was extremely negative about him which I was shocked at.

DS gets a special school bus to school and the lady who supervises the children on the bus spoke to me last night about her concerns that the same teacher was 'picking on' my DS and was always telling him off for no reason. Yesterday it was due to DS having his hood up (makes him feel secure) while he was waiting for the bus in the school reception. Bus lady says my DS is good as gold on the bus and she finds him to be a lovely boy but she could see he was getting stressed by this teacher.

I want to approach the school about this today but not sure how as I can't say the bus lady told me as I don't want her to get into trouble.
Any ideas?

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OneInEight · 05/10/2017 06:40

Flowers

Like you we thought it would be smooth sailing once we won the prize of a specialist placement. In our experience though we have had to continue to work hard to get the support right for ds1 so that he is happy and works well.

I would ask to have a meeting at school with the HT to discuss the settling in problems face-to-face. Always better to try to do this in a non-confrontational way if you can so ask for their help in sorting out the issues rather than accusing individual teachers. They juggled ds1's class quite a lot in the first year (two classes in his year group) before they worked out which children did best together and which children clashed so this is quite normal. You could also discuss what methods help your ds do well. Personally I feel if anxiety is decreased by wearing a hoody then they should be allowed to wear one but I guess some will disagree.

We do continue to need a lot of communication with ds1's school but by all of working together he is doing OK.

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outputgap · 05/10/2017 23:04

One eight sounds spot on about going in to school positively.

But I just wanted to say I am horrified a special school teacher would see anything wrong with a hood at a bus stop. It's so obviously an easy to access sensory defensive thing for asc kids. Blimey.

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vjg13 · 07/10/2017 08:47

Are you due to have a baseline review meeting very soon as to how your son is settling in? My daughter started at a specialist college in Sept and we are having this in about four weeks to see how things are going. It may be worth asking for this sooner in your case.

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PoundsShillingsPence · 08/10/2017 11:06

Meeting asap with head to discuss how ds is setteling in. Be posive but frank. It can be much harder to settle in an older child - I would expect a few difficulties at first but the school / class teacher should be working with you to settle him in.

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