School lateness punishments, neurodiversity and the law

I have and it seems the op thinks her DD cant get from lesson to lesson on time as other student do for undiagnosed psychological reasons in relation to "busy corridors",and being "overwhelmed" i wanted to know specifically practically what she has difficulty with as sometimes a solution can be found to resolve or make things easier for her DD.

Is there anyway you could afford to get her assessed privately, there is such a wait at the moment we went down the private route for our eldest.
A couple of things really stick out though to me are
The school should be helping her find a solution regardless of a diagnosis of SEN, it sounds like they really don’t care, I would ask to speak to the head of year and then escalate it if they won’t engage to the head. Is there any option of a smaller/different school locally that may suit her better?
If it’s the chaos of the corridors and they won’t let her leave a few minutes early, would loop earplugs help? My son wears his when not in class and moving around the school/lunch etc
My Sons school is part of a big trust, and I was worried about sending him there but the head and team are amazing. Yes there are rules, but not for the sake of it and the pastoral care is great.
Pupils are individuals not robots and need to be treated like people…. Can they assign her a buddy that she can walk with to her next lesson to keep her on track and less overwhelmed?

Sorry this was a reply to ScamWorried at 17.11 who seemed to think 30 children in a classroom all with ear defenders was not necessarily a problem.

Apologies.

Ear defenders don't mean the person hears nothing. It tends to quieten background noise.
In addition deaf people don't hear in meetings and manage perfectly well via automated captions or interpreter.
If the person wearing ear defenders because of background noise couldn't hear the presenter they could use otter ai or Google transcribe to read what's being said.

It's what works to get the best results for pupils or most productive team member at work

Yes, or nip out of the classroom to the toilets.

Difference was the teachers just tended to let them get on with it, provided they weren’t disrupting the class, not pull them up for “poor behaviour”.

I dont know if this is a joke but i will answer assuming not.

workplaces wouldn't allow this. It's not a reasonable adjustment if you do a job where you need to watch and respond to a presentation and you are unable to listen to the presentation.

What they potentially would allow is for someone who suffers from sensory overload to access the presentation remotely or watch a recording later. But if your disability means you are not able to watch and listen to a presentation even with these adjustments and therefore you cant do the job then that's not the job for you unfortunately.

I remember sometimes some children would get upset and put their hands over their ears, others would put their heads on the desk and cover them with their school jumper , probably due to feeling overwhelmed

They might have been.
But I also think children who couldn't cope were filtered out of mainstream, into special schools

I find this really ignorant. You seem to forget that school pupils are children. Their brains are not fully developed they need support /support aids sometimes this doesn’t mean they will necessarily need them forever.

I'll try to re-phrase. No one used to need ear defenders while I was at school. They just got on with stuff. So what has changed?

Schools were possibly quieter back then.

the 40-ish % of kids who have disabilities

Where have you got this statistic from? 40% of pupils in schools are not disabled. Neither do 40% have SEN.

Doctors have stated recently that they feel the huge upsurge in diagnosis of ND is due to money.

Disability benefits are based on needs, not diagnosis. A diagnosis isn’t required in order to claim DLA/PIP. Equally, a diagnosis doesn’t automatically make someone eligible for DLA/PIP.

So if you are at a meeting at work giving a presentation and your audience all put in ear defenders so they can't hear you, then you think that's ok? 🤣

Its not that they didnt need to, it's that they didn't know they needed to. So they became overwhelmed or stressed or switched off and didnt learn effectively but this was put down to daydreaming or lack of ability or a personlity trait. Or they weren't in the school in the first place because they were in special school or the noise sensitivity meant they misbehaved and were deemed naughty and removed.

Depending on your age such children were not in our mainstream schools anyway.

And despite ear defenders being perfectly accepted in my children's schools only one or two in a year group wear them so suggesting thats a huge growing issue that has no end is nonsense.

Ear defenders and children leaving lessons a minute or two early and children having a toilet pass or a coloured overlay are all things that have been around for years and dont really impact on other children at all. As an ex secondary teacher the biggest single thing that negatively impacts children is other children's disruptive behaviour and none of the reasonable adjustments listed above cause that. Many of them help.prevent that.

Not all neurodiverse kids misbehave and most badly behaved children are not ND.

Its not that they didnt need to, it's that they didn't know they needed to. So they became overwhelmed or stressed or switched off and didnt learn effectively but this was put down to daydreaming or lack of ability or a personlity trait. Or they weren't in the school in the first place because they were in special school or the noise sensitivity meant they misbehaved and were deemed naughty and removed.

Depending on your age such children were not in our mainstream schools anyway.

And despite ear defenders being perfectly accepted in my children's schools only one or two in a year group wear them so suggesting thats a huge growing issue that has no end is nonsense.

Ear defenders and children leaving lessons a minute or two early and children having a toilet pass or a coloured overlay are all things that have been around for years and dont really impact on other children at all. As an ex secondary teacher the biggest single thing that negatively impacts children is other children's disruptive behaviour and none of the reasonable adjustments listed above cause that. Many of them help.prevent that.

Not all neurodiverse kids misbehave and most badly behaved children are not ND.

I don't think kids just got on with it. As a peer, how would you have known or understood?
I remember at least three boys in my class who were made to sit at the back with a make-shift cardboard box barrier around their desks to block us/them to curtail distraction, I assume. Imagine how that must've felt for them. I can only really reflect on this now, as an adult and parent. I lost track of them as we got older, but I remember hearing one was a "druggie" (cocaine). Could they have had autism/been on the spectrum, adhd, maybe?
I feel bad for those kids and wonder how things would have been different if they were supported and not shunned and treated as bad kids when they were likely just struggling. It's quite sad.

Well for anyone struggling - they can mic drop - remove the ear defenders

Children with DS were never seen - does this mean they didn't exist?

Nope it meant they were locked and hidden away

Ear defenders allow ND people with noise sensitivity to manage in noisy environments

In the past before ear defenders they would not have been able to meet their potential. The noise would have caused them not to be able to focus and learn - so they would have not got the results they were capable of.
With ear defenders the noise isn't such a big barrier and so they are able to learn and participate to their potential.

Before there were so many brail options for blind people. They relied in others having to read to them and scribe their thoughts. With brail books and typing/ writing guide options blind people can read and write fully independently. Should blind people have their adaptations removed because years ago blind people managed without adaptions? Even if removing these adaptions severely worsens the quality of life?

I think we are in agreement. Years ago people took practical helpful steps and there was flexibility at the level of the individual child.

Now we have institutionalised this so educational law has become an industry in itself and the exercise of individual discretion by teachers is frowned upon

Utter nonsense - and a really worrying opinion - that if a disabled child isn’t disruptive then they’ll be fine in mainstream. All that means is that the other children in the class won’t be disrupted by them.

Unfortunately our village infant school completely believed the above. They told me DS would have to be ‘drowning’ (delightful choice of word) to be moved to a special school. He was drowning. They hadn’t taken the time to notice.

Might it not make it difficult to hear the teacher?0

Whoever said that "SEND support is based on need not diagnosis", I'm not sure the schools have got that memo!! (From my experience, anyway)

So my last reply to this comment was deleted which seems a bit odd as there was nothing offensive in it.

I'll try to re-phrase. No one used to need ear defenders while I was at school. They just got on with stuff. So what has changed?

So much of this stuff just seems confected to me and it does impact other children.

We need to ensure everyone (including parents) has more resilience.

There how was that?

Clearly rubbish - the heading states GP's under pressure to diagnose
GPs can not diagnose autism so it's obviously fabricated for an agenda

I didn't suggest they were...

So what if they did. Would it matter..ear defenders don't actually make teaching impossible anyway.

So if 30 pupils wear ear defenders it hurts no one. It would never happen through as bob and Sarah won't want their hair messed up and they give frank and mark a headache

It would only be an issue if ear defenders became compulsory