If you have a child with autism that can be violent..

[Colouroutsidethelines]

How do you feel when you find out they have attacked school staff? How do you respond?

I am a teaching assistant. I was playing in the garden with another staff member and four children who all have an autism or ADHD diagnosis.

The child I was playing with in the construction area is in year 4 and very articulate. We were conversing nicely, talking about his favourite cars. He then got up and walked off and before I stood up, he had gone behind me, picked up a large wooden log and cracked me hard over the head with it.

It caught me completely off guard and I did cry with the pain as I ran inside to seek first aid.

Curious to how you would respond if this was your child.

I feel like whatever is provided it will be deemed the wrong thing.

OP, if this is how you think of the kids and classes and parents and schools - get another job and I’m glad you aren’t in my son’s room.

I hope you get a concussion assessment and feel better. I do think that the parent had a wrong reaction to you, but also that it’d be better if someone else had the conversation. The parent could be ND and at the end of their tether or a psychopath. One reason my dh and I switch out pickups is the last straw would make me cry or him react “weirdly”. So yeah, I’d probably have cried and felt you were putting it on me like the awful teacher last year asking me to go over hands are not for hitting (we do. I guarantee much more often than she does)

I have an autistic child that can be violent at home and I would be mortified I would apologise profusely and probably send you an an apology card and some flowers. It’s so unfair that there aren’t enough special schools for children who are obviously in desperate need of them. I hope you’re ok? It must have been such a shock.

That kind of language implies that the SEN children in that school are a burden.

It makes them the issue, when the issue is that they’re not in the right setting or being properly supported because the school and LA are letting them down.

I’ve seen your other posts. My son wouldn’t end up in prison, he’d be deemed to not have capacity.

He would get a hospital order which means indefinite confinement to a psych ward until deemed not a danger to the public - and that’s IF he was judged as not having capacity, the bar is very very high - look at Jonty Bravery.

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2020/dec/09/tate-modern-attacker-loses-appeal-against-sentence-jonty-bravery

I really don’t know what I’ve done or said that makes you think that I shouldn’t be with children. Really devastating to hear when it’s been my life work.

You had the audacity to be upset you were hit over the head with a log.

There is a bullying pack mentality among some parents toward some school staff. Good luck to them when all the staff quit!

Well the Equality Act hasn’t changed, there has been no recent material case law on reasonable adjustments in the context of neurodevelopmental disability afaik, so there is no real reason for this to be the case. Do you think you might be letting your pretty transparent dislike of these children and their difficulties colour your perception of the school?

Would you feel differently if the adjustments were made because a child was deaf or blind? If so, what is it about neurodevelopmental disability that makes you want to punish the child? Could it be because you are unable to resist the inference that it must be the parents’ fault? How would your view differ if you could conceive of a world where it wasn’t someone’s parenting that was to blame, but just rotten luck and/or genetics? Would it make you kinder to the children? To their parents?

fwiw if SEN children are likely to end up in prison (and autistics ARE over-represented in the prison population) then it’s all the more reason to get schooling right for them now, and stop the “out of sight, out of mind” craziness described in the OP. As a society, we need to do all the things that we already know help ND people to regulate their emotions and cope more readily in the post-education world.

He’s 9 and currently still likes to eat sand/mud, so I think we’re doing fairly poorly on the capacity front.

If you spent less time removing your children from the vicinity of SENd children, and more time attempting to understand them, you might have something of a clue.

I think people are genuinely horrified when violence is concerned.

I don’t hear people rushing up to defend those with obvious mental health problems when they then commit murder for example.

Violence around children, even if caused by children, shouldn’t be normalised at this level.

I'm very happy with my son's package but it wasn't easy and that was with the schools full support which isn't always the case.

So where would you like the “violent children” to go, because there are very few schools available where they won’t have peers and other children/people around them.

If you’re still working with this child, I hope you’re not still making him feel terrible about it. At some point, you’ll have to move on, or that relationship will absolutely crumble.

But why were there fewer violent children 25 years ago? They weren't all locked up!
I have spoken to several teachers and even head teachers and they all whisper that SEN is being used as an excuse for really poor and disruptive behaviour. Children are no longer "afraid" in a minor way of being "told off" because they never experience an unpleasant "telling off". They have "chats" with staff.
This is all well and good, but when teachers are leaving the profession due to poor behaviour, it's really worrying.

Why shouldn’t he feel terrible about it.

perhaps he won’t do it again hopefully

I can assure you nobody with any professional sense is chatting with a child who hits people.

Schools, particularly specialist ones, do not “gentle teach,” in the sense that some “gentle parent.”

They have firm boundaries, firmer probably than with non disabled children, because they have to be.

Agree

Where on earth have you got the notion I’ve made him feel terrible?

I acted as professionally as always. I’ve shown nothing but care towards him since he started in the unit and we actually have a good relationship.

I am however, allowed to be deeply concerned by the other children witnessing such violence every single day in schools.

I’ve said I don’t really know what the answer is. But loads more funding and more specialist provisions would be a fantastic start.

He probably will, unless he’s given a teacher and staff who are trained for his needs, a 1:1, outside space that isn’t actually someone else’s, isn’t shoved in a library.

When the school attempts to meet his needs, he might stop lashing out.

I think some of you forget you’re talking about a child.

He’ll not go near a specialist provision without the procedure being followed, which it isn’t being.

The “violence against staff” might actually evidence that the school can’t meet need and speed that up, if anyone eventually does push for an EHCP.

Perhaps it isn’t always possible

'The other children'?

What isn’t? Meeting the needs of children, or even trying to?

It’s a basic educational right.

All children have a right to an education. Even the difficult ones.

Space is a massive problem. We are a three form entry school. We had 3 spare rooms. One was medical, one was the library and once was a computer room. Now they are the infant behaviour unit, junior behaviour unit and our unit, which doesn’t know what it is!

It isn't going to be possible if there is no support from school for a EHCP. I'm not sure why it is the child who should feel terrible about that though.

Unless you’re set up as an Additionally Resourced Provision, with the relevant funding, those rooms shouldn’t even exist.