Trying to remain quite lighthearted about this but it’s still bugging me mostly because I’m not sure what exactly I’ve done to bother the woman.
my DD, 5, has a split teaching rota. So she had one teacher half the week ( So chatty and kind from what I’ve observed so far but I try not to be the parent who’s badgering them after school so I haven’t spoken to her a huge amount. I have had a few interactions with that one though and she was just so warm and lovely about DD. It made me feel like she ‘gets’ her and my DD will be happy in her care. )
the other one literally couldn’t be any different if she tried. It’s almost like a cliche Disney comparison. And she’s the one I’ve had more time in the company of. She’s very well put together but also quite reserved and ‘clipped’ in her manner. The first red flag was that she attended a child planning meeting for my DD, a multidisciplinary meeting to discuss a child’s needs. My DD is currently diagnosed with ASD). There were five adults in the room and everyone had so much to say and share, you could tell people had got a real feel for DDs personality and her needs.
DD is a bit of a character, but hasn’t presented as challenging in school. She was much higher need in a nursery setting annd then school seems to have given her a lot more structure annd predictability and all of a sudden she’s become a lot more able to mask and manage her needs during the school day. Which obviously has its pluses and minuses. We get the overwhelm and burnout at home but she’s coping at school so I’m grateful for that.
Again, all the staff in that meeting were just really warm and lovely about her. And yet, this teacher, who is the one actually spending all day with DD , and surely would know the most about how she’s coping… said not a word. She didn’t speak through the meeting, she looked a bit flustered and bemused when asked questions and really looked like she just thought the whole thing was a waste of her time. I think for a class teacher to sit through a CPM and not say a WORD is really quite bizarre.
DD is very heavily masking at school. Which I think is ok to a point because it’s a skill that will be useful to her in life. But it does mean that her difficulties and challenges are not always ‘obvious’. She doesn’t behave in a particularly challenging way at school, and I’m beginning to get the feeling that this teacher might have taken a dislike to us as a family because she maybe can’t be bothered with being asked to be aware of her being neurodivergent , if she maybe thinks that DD is not? I have convinced myself that she resents having to attend CPMs and make adjustments for her. I know that sounds a big leap. But the only interaction I HAVE had with her was to just quickly ask her about something which is related to my daughter’s ASD, I basically said, I just wanted to ask if there’s anything relating to this behaviour you’ve seen in the classroom so I know if this is just a home thing…
And, the WAY she looked at me!? She screwed her whole face up as though really keen to emphasise how ridiculous she thought the suggestion was and said ‘no, I can’t imagine her having difficulty with that’
it felt a bit unprofessional and judgy but then again, I know how hard teaching is. My best friend is a teacher, I know it’s hard when parents are bombarding you at the end of the day with lots and lots of bits of information and requests and especially with five year olds, I guess there’s a lot of parents who really do think the world revolves around their own little darlings. I also think there is a lot of expectation on teachers to bend over backwards meeting individual needs of children, and there’s a lot less expectation on parents and children, and a real quickness to throw issues at the school and expect them to sort it. I try SO hard not to give that impression and I tried to write this one off as maybe me having got her at a bad moment, her not being quick enough to cover up how ridiculous she thinks it is that DD is considered ND when her behaviour isn’t a challenge for them yet.
I really don’t ask much of the school. Some people may actually think that I should be more demanding but there are some things which I think my wee girl is ok to be challenged by. Unless it’s really distressing, I think that sometimes it’s ok for her to find something a bit harder than other kids, but muddle her way through and find a way she can cope. I don’t automatically think they should provide a way for her to avoid anything she finds a bit overwhelming.
other instances where I’ve got the same feeling, were when my daughter told me she found the school assemblies really overwhelming because there were just too many people and too much noise. I told the teachers that I’d asked my DD to tell them if she felt this way and maybe they could (if there was a way to do so) have her taken out of the room. I do know they have thirty kids each and can’t just drop everything for one, but I was a bit shocked that seemingly this teachers response in the next assembly when my DD said ‘I’m finding it too much, I need to get out’ was apparently to tell her that everyone else had to sit nicely and she couldn’t have ‘special treatment for being bored’
I mean. If you haven’t gotten bored yourself yet of reading this, I fully accept that people may think I’m OTT and a nightmare parent who just doesn’t know it. But I really REALLY haven’t asked for any major special treatment. We have been told by teams working with my DD that we ‘should ask the school’ for various adjustments and I’ve never felt it necessary because overall, I know my DD is coping and learning how to continue doing so in a mainstream setting. Which will be expected of her throughout her life.
I just wondered if maybe anyone else has experienced having a ND child who maybe wasn’t super high need or super challenging, and felt the teacher was a bit dismissive and seemed actively irritated by the notion your child might have additional needs at times.
ive grown to dread the days it’s her in the classroom because now that I’ve noticed it, I’m forever feeling like I’m over reading any interaction. She recently took away an important part in a school production my DD had been given by the other teacher, and gave it to another child on the day because DD said she didn’t need to practice it because she already knew it off by heart. Which felt a bit icky because DD maybe did sound a bit stuck up saying that but she wouldn’t have meant to. She genuinely would have just not understood why she should stand in a corner herself to practice something that she did already know by heart without having to practice. It felt a bit like teaching her a lesson for being a ‘smartarse’ or something.