To say my DS cant keep missing school because the school “cant cope”??

Genuine question as this is not something I know anything about …

But if they can’t meet needs, what exactly are they supposed to do? Surely they are letting all the children down then?

Follow the correct process with the correct paperwork.

Genuine question as this is not something I know anything about …

But if they can’t meet needs, what exactly are they supposed to do? Surely they are letting all the children down then?

It is an unlawful exclusion if the school does not follow the correct process. Also, as per the guidance, the school should not suspend/exclude just because they can’t meet needs.

I am late to this party, but sorry to say, you are being very blind here.

I can give you 2 perspectives:

1. I work in an AP, specialised provision for SEN and behavioural issues, I have been a teacher and head of department for 18+ years. Your son clearly needs more support. It is irrelevant that he has "managed" before. Needs change. If the school really cannot meet his needs it is not an unlawful exclusion. They will need to demonstrate that they cant.

1. My daughter spent 3 years of her school life (R, y1 and Y2) with a child who couldnt manage in mainstream. What started as tipping a chair, led to tipping all the pencils off every table, kicking children in the line, and escalated to a point that the whole class had to leave the classroom, missing hours of learning because he was destroying their classroom and their work. He ripped up my daughters books when he sat on her table, he took his anger and frustration out on her, told her she was stupid and naughty, tipped pencil sharpenings into her drink, wherever they moved him to he tormented and hurt (emotionally or physically) the children around him. My daughter knows of my job, she is tolerant and understands about different needs. But why should she and her classmates have to put up with this? She learnt next to nothing in y1. Finally he had a managed move and that was it. By all accounts he is doing much better.

He was unhappy, overwhelmed and not learning either. There are excellent APs and SEN schools out there (I work at one) this is no disrespect to any child who cannot manage at mainstream, I love my job and seeing them thrive, but at what point as a parent do you actually take stock of what is going on here? Find him a specialised provision (not easy and takes time) or a school with more support and resources because this is only going one way and he isnt benefitting from this either. These are formative years, you still have time to get this right, dont leave it too late, like some of the young people who come to us in Y10/y11 😢

Nobody is talking about stomping in puddles. We are talking about regular major disruption, explosive behaviour. Absolutely parents should take responsibility for the behaviour. Who else should?!

I adopted a child who could not cope at school. I gave up work and lost my career because she couldn't cope - spent every moment doing therapeutic activities with her, agree with school that she would only do mornings throughout her entire time in infant school. And still she could not cope. We lived in a local authority with no special needs primary provision (that has now changed) and mainstream with a TA was the only option. She wasn't violent btw. But anywa, I had lots of parents call me up and berate me for stuff - one told me off because she had seen her stomping in puddles in the playground. It was the most stressful period of my life. I was giving it my all and it really pains me to hear people say that parents need to take more responsibility.

The problem is the system can't move quick enough for the demand for special needs provision.

The conversation nobody wants to have is why behaviour has got so bad in SEN kids. Just because a child has special needs doesn't mean there has to be the level of disruption currently in schools. Nobody wants to say it but parents need to take responsibility for some of how their children behave. It's easy to hide behind the label and excuse bad behaviour. I'm certainly not saying that outbursts occasionally can't be avoided but as soon as a child has a diagnosis parents seems to go "well I guess that's that, I can't possibly do anything to manage this."

The pot of money isn't endless and there are so many things which need funding. In an ideal world we would have much smaller classes, more would happen outside so kids can move around, there would be 1:1 teaching for when needed, gifted children would be challenged rather than the focus on just getting everyone up to the minimum. There would be specialist staff in every classroom to support teachers and unlimited quiet corners and rooms with all of the best resources science has to offer.

But there's not. So parents need to ask themselves how they can fill the gap and work with schools rather than expecting teachers to fix it all for them.

I know what youre saying but i dont think its as simple as just saying mainstream isnt right for him. He has been in mainstream all this time and he has managed. Its only since September that this has suddenly become such a massive problem.

My older DS has additional needs as well and the school have been very good with him, so its not like ive always thought the school are useless. They have supported him and made adjustments and he is doing fine there. DS2 has always needed more support but we have never had this level of problems before.

And yes he has a new teacher. I dont know if that is relevant or not but i do think it is a bit strange that he was managing before the summer and now after a few days back he is being sent home. The new teacher is much stricter with him from what DS has told me and he keeps saying she doesnt understand when he is getting overwhelmed.

I dont think its fair to say the other children are all scared of him either. There has been one chair thrown and a table pushed over, its not like he is attacking children every day. Obviously it could have hurt someone and i am not making excuses for that, but people are making it sound much worse than it actually is.

DH has always been more in favour of specialist school than me. He thinks if somewhere else has more staff and is set up for children like DS then why wouldnt we use it. But then he isnt the one having to explain it all to DS and his brother either. DS2 already knows he is different and i dont want him thinking hes being sent away because hes bad.

I have looked at specialist schools and there arent loads near us anyway. Its not like there is a lovely school down the road with a place waiting for him. Some of them would mean a long journey and completely changing everything.

I also dont think i should just stop questioning the school because they say they cant cope. If they genuinely think his needs cant be met then surely they should be able to explain exactly what they have tried and what they think he needs instead. At the moment its just phone calls saying he needs collecting and then another meeting.

In our LA there was a distinct lack of provision for those who were academically able but couldn't cope in mainstream. All the specialist schools were for PMLD/moderate learning difficulties/physical and complex medical needs. We had one school in the whole county for asd which was too far for many to travel and severely oversubscribed. So you can imagine how many got shipped out of county or into independents. They have now built some semh settings and opened some units attached to mainstreams. However, they are now using the units to dump children who should be in the above specialist settings (to save money no doubt) meaning the units are unsuitable for the very children they were built for - because they are too academically able/or they're too verbal and the rest of the cohort aren't! So yet again they get shipped off to expensive independent settings because that's all that's available.

I have certainly considered sending mine a bill for my time! After two years I'd lost all trust in them and hence chose a school in a different borough (it costs us about a grand a year in train fares). While I was researching I discovered that 20% of their EHCP kids are "exported" to other boroughs.

I'm not sure I totally trust the motives of that poster.

Certainly when I was at primary in the 70s there was direct teaching of shoe lacing (possibly comparable in difficulty to doing up a modern day cheapo plastic zip) and intensive discussion of why one might carry spare knickers!

Thanks!
We have similar (not called EHCP) but made at the school with head teacher, deputy head, (ASN provision if required) and parent.

In this situation I’d call an immediate meeting with head to discuss and get this sorted, if support is supposed to be in place then school should comply and child should also know what is in place for them 🤯

I just spotted this thread. Mind boggling. What are people (not) doing with their kids?

https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/5577511-to-be-shocked-at-school-readiness?utm_campaign=thread&utm_medium=share

Yes I can do, he's a good MP.

Indeed and if LA's didn't kick the can down the road when help is requested by refusing to put early support in place, they wouldn't end up spending millions on the AP and transport and specialist settings that these children end up requiring once they're too traumatised to attend mainstream anymore. If they'd invested in send settings they wouldn't be paying out 100k per child plus to attend an independent one because it's the only one available. If they stopped spending money on legal action they have zero chance of defending they'd have more money for actual send support. I could go on.

I think one can appreciate the wider political situation without losing sight of the suffering of the children and their parents when needs are not met.

I personally find it difficult to feel sorry for my LA when I consider how they treated us at a time of difficulty.

So you will write to your MP about the Schools' White Paper then?

It's not prejudice, that's a cop-out. It's easy to say when challenged and the difficult questions are asked. There are too many kids who don't know how to use a book. Too many who are addicted to screens. That's on parents. Screens make your child LESS regulated but parents get stuck in a cycle of depending on them.

It's a big chunk of teacher training days because of the level of poor behaviour teachers have to deal with. Schools absolutely should not be there managing kids behaviour. That's a parent's role. Too many parents forget this. They expect someone else to control their kids, teach their kids to behave and even expect them to toilet train because many parents are too busy or lazy to do it themselves. There are children without SEN in juniors who aren't toilet trained simply because parents can't be arsed.

The level of poor behaviour in schools at the moment is completely unacceptable. The types of training teachers should have in behaviour management should be around motivating kids, helping them learn independently, work well, etc. it shouldn't be stopping them throwing tantrums, being violent etc. Regardless for the reason why, it's still not a teacher's job.