To challenge autistic DD’s detention?

Most children get a detention that they don't really deserve at some point. It doesn't really matter. They aren't particularly unpleasant. On the flip side, every child definitely manages to avoid getting a detention at some point when they should have got one.

That’s a really raw and honest post by @Kreepture why wouldnt you want to do this for your child?
would you be happy with others reaching a stage with the ‘honesty’ of “well X is coming across as constantly rude and insulting to me, why should I guard what I say back and be polite?”

Im aware what autism is, having two teenagers with it and myself also 😂 I and my eldest often had detention for being “cheeky” and we are fine.

Adults telling other adults that they are boring is generally considered rude.

It's not about complaining though, you can send a non confrontational email to help a teacher understand your disabled child better. I understand it's exhausting to be a teacher, it's also exhausting to be the parent of an autistic child.

My son was once asked if he could "hold it" for 5 minutes in a classroom when he asked to go to the toilet. The teacher explained they thought they were asking a yes/no question. My son took it as an instruction to physically hold his penis, and wet himself. I would have been doing him a massive disservice as his mother if I hadn't explained that to the teacher the next day. He didn't think he could say no and took "hold it" so literally. The teacher just wasn't on his wavelength at all and I understood that so we had a productive conversation. Another parent would have gone mad but that's not my style.

Ridiculous the amount of people accusing actually autistic people of not understanding.. literally live it daily and am raising two kids with AuDHD, one of whom is in specialist education and like the OP's daughter would respond that way.. but who we have put a lot of work in to help teach social rules to help him.

Autism IS NOT a get out of jail free card, or carte blanche to ignore social rules once you've been made aware of them.

Yes, of course accommodations need to made, yes its worth explaining to the school/teacher that the OP's DD was being 'honest' and doesn't understand rhetorical questions.. but that doesn't also absolve the OP, as a parent, using it as a teaching moment to help explain to her 14yo about social rules and why the teacher thought was she did was rude, and what the appropriate response would be in that situation should it arise again.

As parents its an absolute failure to teach our kids to let their autism hang out there knowing that the world IS still autism unfriendly, all it's doing is setting them up for failure in the wider world.. and possibly for being disliked/little to no friends.. like i was, because my parents didn't teach me and i had to learn myself to keep my mouth shut in certain circumstances because it got me into trouble.

I would LOVE to unmask, to speak my mind, to say what i think, i do sometimes, it usually gets me deleted for breaking the TG.. and i often have to apologise for upsetting people when it wasn't my fault, and has me largely unliked by most people.

Why the ever loving fuck would i not teach my kids to avoid repeating my mistakes?

I’m trusting the OP knows her child in this case.

One of my children (the one with ASD, probably not coincidentally) I would absolutely know I could get an honest account of what happened and his understanding of it.

The other one it would be 50-50 whether he was spinning me an excuse.

Absolutely, pupils are praised for being ‘honest’ (rude 🤨) to staff by mummy and daddy, but woe betide the staff member who uses an unapproved inflection in their tone!
instant parental horrified email!!!

I do think OP will know. She knows her child. She says it was a genuine misunderstanding.

Thankless, underpaid job. Parents thinking their precious offspring can do no wrong

The intent was clearly not to be rude.

I don't see how any of us, including the op, can possibly know that?

There, are some extremely bright Autistic Children who play up.

She was “rude” in the same way that a person with a chronic health condition is “lazy” - it’s entirely down to how it’s perceived by others. The intent was clearly not to be rude.

It is really quite a tricky one for a child who is very literal. There are circumstances where it would be perfectly fine to answer the question “am I boring you?” with “yes a little bit” - the social rules about tone, context etc are quite subtle.

They are some extremely bright 'Autistic' children who play up on that sort of thing being 'direct' which in other circumstances is a skill. I wish there were more 'direct' speakers in Politics for instance. However, the fact the child is able to give a quick 'witty' answer, means they are well aware of what they are saying. I am sure she was the Class 'Spokesperson' having been in that situation myself at school. If the child is High Functioning Autistic i.e with intellectual ability above IQ of 75 they likely know what they are doing. My DS year 10 for instance is working recently towards grades 3/4 GCSE, yet he gives back very clever 'ripostes' to teachers worthy of a clever wordsmith! The, teachers are aware of his disabilities, but aware of his strengths, thus his actions with some teachers can lead to a Detention, other teachers try to advance these skills. This is to state Autistic people need to develop strategies and 'awareness' though their own experiences.

The difficulty for Autistic people is that they cannot be taught in a conventional manner but own from learning, through their own experience.

At our school parents cant email teachers directly, and the vast majority of moany parent emails are not even passed on to the staff concerned.

Are you for real? Your child was rude. Autism is not a excuse for everything.

No wonder the OP hasnt been back.

Or dd caused it by not paying attention in class in the first place. Mountain and molehill.

There is very little training around autism for mainstream teachers (unless, as above, they have an autism unit in the school). Much of the training is optional, at least where I am (Ireland). The training is available, but it’s often up to the teachers themselves to access it.

It actually really varies and people have off days!

So i work in a school which has a unit for autistic children who can access the mainstream curriculum. The staff at that school are very well trained. We do whole staff communication training regularly.

But they do outreach to other local schools who really arent quite there yet with understanding and training and have a lot to learn.

One of the biggest complaints about teacher training is they dont feel they get enough time on send and feel unprepared for the classroom.

The teacher is a trained professional they know what they are doing

If the teacher knew what they were doing, why would they use sarcasm to make a point to a student who literally doesn’t understand sarcasm because of a social communication disability?
And then punish the student for not understanding that sarcasm?

Seems very unprofessional to me. In the moment they probably didn’t think of the child’s diagnosis, or perhaps they don’t understand much about autism, but that’s their mistake and they shouldn’t dole out detentions because they handled something badly.

Some detentions are unfair and its not a big deal. Suck it up and resist moaning to the school.

Given the large number of SEND children being included in mainstream schools, I presume there is training on dealing with children with various conditions.
Presumably this is included in disciplinary approaches and appropriate levels off punishment. These are trained professionals in a professional and regulated organisation.

Or saying “am I boring you” is a verbal nudge to pay attention

You could say the teacher could easily have just gone to “detention Susan for not paying attention” rather than pointing out to her and the whole class that not engaging is not an option,

This is a class of 13/14/15 year olds - they are not the easiest bunch to keep listening - as the laughter reaction shows.

The teacher is a trained professional they know what they are doing, imagine being emailed all the time by a family member of another employee who wasn’t in the building about every little thing you do at work? No wonder recruitment and retention is difficult in the teaching profession.

I’ve shared this video with other teachers at my school. In this instance, quite clearly the child did not mean to be rude. Often children are labelled “rude” unfairly. Yes some children are rude but on other occasions there is something totally different going on.

YABU. Look at it from the teacher's point of view. She HAS to give a detention for this kind of thing, otherwise she loses control of the class. Just tell DD to do the detention.