School lateness punishments, neurodiversity and the law

I did not write the article in question.

I am only the messenger of the article I read in a GP publication.

What if everyone started wanting ear defenders? Slowly, slowly there are now 30 kids sitting in the class wearing ear defenders and it is un-teachable

The article I saw was in Pulse a GP publication. For the 8th June.

I am so sorry for all the negative responses many from people who probably dont understand how SEND is supposed to work in schools and are jumping on the bandwagon of "adhd is just used as an excuse for laziness"

My daughter started secondary on SEND support simply because I raised the possibility that she may have adhd after some issues which only really became apparant during SATS year with all the pressure. She wasn't referred until autumn of year 7 and has recently been diagnosed. All that time she received loads of bespoke support in her lessons and a time out card. She does get detentions occasionally for lateness but the school would never use such a stupid policy as making her miss an entire lesson! It sounds to me like the school are doing a poor job and all the new legislation coming in will mean that they are acting illegally in not meeting your daughter's needs.

My older son is autistic and had a pass to leave 2-3 mins early from lessons because he couldn't cope with corridors. This is a normal thing for many secondary schools.

I think a lot of the people commenting really dont get the adhd and autism are legally considered disabilities. You wouldn't ask someone who was deaf to work on strategies for learning how to hear. What you would do is help them find solutions such as lip reading and wearing ear pieces in lessons. These are reasonable adjustments. The school sendco should be working with.you to find reasonable adjustments to mean your daughter can attend her lessons and learn.

My advice: write a list of reasonable adjustments that you feel would help her

Write a formal letter to the school requesting that these adjustments are made

Quote the children and families act 2014
child of compulsory school age or a young person has a learning difficulty or disability if he or she— (a) has a significantly greater difficulty in learning than the majority of others of the same age, or (b) has a disability which prevents or hinders him or her from making use of facilities of a kind generally provided for others of the same age..."

And the equality act 2010
"A person does not need to have a medically diagnosed cause for his or her impairment; what matters is the effect of the impairment, not the cause"

If they refuse then I suggest you contact your local authority sendiass and ask for support.

Keep fighting for her. This thread has shown what a mountain we have to climb for send support to meet the needs of children

@KateSixer Well the school system is a lot worse for one

Support in school was far more likely in the past. And early support means less long term support /lower long term support.

But when needs are left unsupported the needs become worse.

My child has EDS and one aspect of this is hyper mobility in fingers. When I was a child anyone with poor pencil grip was given a special pencil now they won't do this without OT approval and this can take years.
By the time my child was seen by the OT the poor pencil grip they had adapted to be able to write was ingrained (ie too late to correct with special grips) and damage had been done to the fingers - the OT said they couldn't write in school as they would worsen the damage

By the way we did use grips at home because of the pain writing caused but because the school did not allow this and told my child it wasn't needed they became embarrassed about the grips and started to refuse them.

So a small issue that could have been corrected in early years of education (and would have for past generations) has had huge negative impacts on the child's education

Canada, here.
Diagnoses are up everywhere:
better and proactive screening
broader umbrella
recognition of more subtle symptoms
Recognition that symptoms in boys and girls differ

It’s not increasing due to money. That’s just minimising and gaslighting in order to not have to deal with an issue.

What doctors are saying this?

I have an autistic child a they get awarded DLA. This doesn't touch the sides of the extra costs involved in raising child. I also get carers because I am severely limited in being able to work. Not least because they don't have a suitable school place they can attend

However, if my child wasn't disabled I would have continued being able to work in my career.

The income I would have earned by working even part time around school hours would have far far exceeded the benefits we receive and fundamentally our outgoing would have been far less that they are to provide for our child's needs.

So please explain why anyone would opt for this life?

Also benefits are based on the support needs not diagnosis so their are children awarded DLA that haven't yet got a diagnosis and children with diagnosis that don't receive DLA

Sigh

Take 3 pupils and ear defenders not being allowed in school A
Pupil 1 can't stand the noise in class and keeps becoming overwhelmed - this impacts the whole class as the become distressed and behaviour worsens.
Pupil 2 also can't stand the noise they don't become disruptive but their body shuts down which means they cant learn and become very fatigued
Pupil 3 doesn't have noise sensitivity

In school b ear defenders are allowed
Pupil 1 wears their ear defenders and isn't disruptive
Pupil 2 wears the ear defenders and can learn
Pupil 3 could wear ear defenders if they wanted to but they don't because they don't need to.

Can you see that in school A every pupil regardless of needs will have negative impact of the no ear defenders rule (that also contradicts disability laws) but in school b no one has an over negative impact. Some people may say it's not fair because pupil 3 doesn't have ear defenders but if pupil needed them he could have them
This is fair for everyone and everyone gets access to education
Most reasonable adjustments have no negative impact on peers and lots of positive impact

Doctors have stated recently that they feel the huge upsurge in diagnosis of ND is due to money.
They would have existed before but nothing like today. The rate of diagnosis will mean being ND will be usual as opposed to not.
And only in this country it would seem.

Your response doesn’t surprise me (especially after reading this thread), it just solidifies what I think and fear that people who don’t live with these issues think of those of us who do, and also makes me really bloody angry.

My response is this - would you say the same to someone who lives with pain / fatigue / mobility issues / insert other physical health problems there? Would you say that someone shouldn’t seek a diagnosis of rheumatoid arthritis, osteoarthritis, hypothyroidism, relapsing / remitting MS, neuralgia etc because they can then seek pity, become a victim, claim benefits etc?

Because unless you would, you have absolutely no right to say that about people who have sought and have been given a legitimate diagnosis of a neurodiverse condition in order to try and understand and improve their lives through appropriate support and treatment.

FFS.

I think it's directly comparable.

If it's safe enough for a profoundly deaf child to walk without one on one guidance down a crowded corridor then it's safe enough for a child with noise cancelling earphones, whose evidenced disability is their inability to walk down that corridor without them, to do the same.

But can you not see that for some people (I don't know you so I am quite happy to accept that this does not apply to you) such a diagnosis could also give people an excuse to cop out of life, claim benefits rather than work, see themselves as unfortunate victims deserving of the pity (and support) of others.

I suspect you have shown resilience but perhaps this better qualifies you to answer the questions of how as a society do we better distinguish between those who have genuinely significant mental health needs and those that just think they have?

They are educated elsewhere. I’m sorry you don’t like what I am saying, but I’ve had children in a school with lots of disruption and some in schools with minimal disruption and the difference in the quality of education is really very stark indeed.

We can have shambolic, ‘inclusive’ schools where learning is really affected by disruption or we can have separation where those who can sit quietly can really get on with learning, and make great strides. We’re choosing the former which is certainly more inclusive, but we cannot turn a blind eye to the downsides.

So then you don't no what it is like when a child isn't coping because of unmet needs

Either your child's needs are being met by the school or they don't have the needs.
Either way you obviously do not understand the situation of a child being failed by a school.not meeting needs.

As I said my child wasn't disruptive but in many ways I with they had been because this would likely have resulted in the support they needed - however, as they were not disruptive they were easy for the school to ignore and neglect

So, the punishment is to deny education? 🤔

Both. Coping and not disrupting others.

Yes I agree. We need more specialist schools. We aren’t going to get them. Children with difficulties will be put into mainstream who shouldn’t be there and educational standards will plummet, anxiety and violence in the classroom will skyrocket. Don’t believe me? Look at Scotland. They are the guinea pigs for what is being proposed for England and it’s horrendous.

Fine as not being disruptive or fine as in receiving a suitable education for their age, aptitude and learning needs?

My child was apparently 'fine' in school because they caused no issue for the teacher, but they were far from fine because they were in a constant state of fear, they couldn't learn because the work wasn't appropriate for their SEN and their mental health was being destroyed

People have different views in what fine actually means

If you haven't experienced school as a disabled child or the parent of a disabled child you have no clue how difficult it is to get their needs met.

Bringing is bringing a lot of ignorance to thd discussion. How cute

Well I think most people would be happy for specialist provision but the government want to force even more into mainstream so I think this is unlikely.
Those with specialist provision are often travelling over an hour each way so also has further costs in transport.

So it's not simple as just saying put them in a special school.

But didn’t you want all disabled children to be put into a separate school? You do know yours would be included in that?

Edit to add: this is what you said
We need to have schools for those with a disability and schools for those with no disability then.