Reasonable adaptations for adult teacher with ADHD?

[Wildroseladybird]

Anyone experienced this please?

what reasonable adaptations should the school make?

Reasonable needs to also be reasonable for the job in question. Many of your suggestions are not reasonable for the job in question here

It sounds like this person is having angry outbursts in the staffroom and upsetting other members of staff. that is not necessarily ADHD, it sounds like bullying and very unpleasant for the other staff.

having ADHD is not an excuse for shouting at people.

I have ADHD and teach but not in schools (AE). The only reasonable adaptation I'd request is that everything you need me to do is in writing.

If you catch me in the corridor and say, 'Can you cover my lesson on Tuesday before lunch?' or 'The Head said when you get back from swimming with Yr 5 can she have a quick word about Billy Brown?', I simply won't remember the details by the time I've got Yr onto the bus to go swimming. But if they are emailed, I will.

He doesn’t shout or even raise his voice, or have angry outbursts. He’s just very literal and I think without understanding him it can be interpreted differently - very much the same as any ADHD children I have taught. Somethings need managing differently and new approaches need to be disseminated differently… I feel this approach should take into account with him too…
i just wondered if anyone had witnessed the same - thanks for all the messages

He quite impulsive around adults and has difficulty talking with self-control.

So you’re asking about other colleagues putting up with what sounds like unprofessional behaviour towards them?

ADHD can include hypersensitivity over criticism (there’s a more medical sounding term) but that is for the ADHD person to learn about and deal with - via counselling and coaching.

Not other people giving him a free pass to be rude or confrontational or unprofessional towards them.

I think k making a thread about a real person like this with such a specific situation and saying all of this stuff about them is playing with fire.

He quite impulsive around adults and has difficulty talking with self-control.

So you’re asking about other colleagues putting up with what sounds like unprofessional behaviour towards them?
Agree, so its just his colleagues he's impulsive around and with whom he has no self control? Not pupils?

Amongst other adults in school however, such as staff meetings, he sees new initiatives as a way to demean his current practice. He quite impulsive around adults and has difficulty talking with self-control. This has now, on two occasions, prompted other members of staff to put in formal complaints
This sounds like many of the teachers I’ve worked with over the years. Teachers should be able to speak their minds and disagree with others without fear of being seen as difficult.

The Access to Work scheme can help fund and provide additional support, and also provide a workplace assessment to determine what adjustments might be helpful. They can provide training and coaching to the individual and colleagues.

In some circumstances they can provide a support worker, for those asking where the cover supervisor would come from.

1. Is there a tiny, glorified cupboard with a window that can be his office? Somewhere that isn't full of other people talking, moving, making demands, existing, disrupting thought processes and generally creating further distraction?
2. Not collaring him when walking down the corridor with 'Oh, can you just...?' as that can happen five times between IT and the canteen.
3. Definitely following up (and not in a formal tone) anything that is said or requested, so 'Can you send me the list of Y8s going on the Globe Trip this afternoon so we know who is out without bothering Reception?' not 'further to our meeting on the....'
4. Emails with tasks in numbered list form. Use green text to say 'Fred has done this', bold for his name and red for Name - need to take 7A to the Hall at 10am, rather than lengthy paragraphs to fish out tasks from.
5. Bearing in mind that the 'outbursts' can be a result of cumulative pressures.
6. Finding the things that he absolutely thrives on - could be project based things, developing plans, creating visually appealing and accessible resources - and making those a measure of success.
7. As he's sensitive to rejection/it being implied that he's not good enough/new initiatives (which frequently serve to completely throw every coping process out the window, disrupt muscle memory and create massive levels of ADHD stress and overwhelm if they're dropped in from above with no warning), talking to him before SLT announce they've had a great new idea that everybody is following from NOW and it'll be amazing. Maybe even - and I know this can be anathema to some SLT - asking him what he thinks or could be an improvement. Seeing as he presumably knows his subject, his students, his parents and a whole load else, he may well have a perfect solution or foresee a massive problem with the new, shiny process that somebody without his specific knowledge and experience won't.
8. The difficult one for a lot of schools. Not solely reacting to things - being proactive and eliminating issues at the planning stage. It's the number one stressor - like if there's a special assembly where all Y10 go straight there instead of formtime first, paper registers are already printed, rather than nobody having a clue whether Nigel B was there or if he's hiding round the back of Art with James D and Becca J, and will be dropped off to somebody who can add the marks without further disrupting the next lesson.

If he's reacting impulsively and emotionally to having new information / decisions / practices 'sprung' on him in meetings, but after consideration is able to be more considered in his response - surely the answer is to give him the information before the meeting do he has time to absorb and consider it privately before it's discussed an a group?! Tbh, that's probably not a bad thing for everyone else either, just sending an agenda and any announcements by email before the meeting seems like it would be sensible.

How would this play out in a school though? I’d feel the same about Doctors, nurses, firemen ect..

There are some job roles that if you are not up to it it has a greater impact on everyone else.

Please excuse me, I don't have direct experience with ADHD.
Could the teacher use whatever techniques he uses with his pupils and parents with the staff?

I am an adult with ADHD, I have Rejection Sensitivity Dysphoria (I can’t cope with being criticised or insulted or rejected). And I agree with you that this person needs coaching / therapy etc personally.

Not all people with ADHD are the same and I would never offend anyone (my RSD comes out as people-pleasing).

I happened to marry someone with ADHD (we are both adult diagnosed) and he does not have an ounce of RSD but he is self-aware so also doesn’t offend people.

OP perhaps you need to suggest ADHD coaching / therapy to him? Is he very young? As after years of counselling myself, I have learned that it gets “easier” as we age.

That's a great answer especially to someone lacking in knowledge (or trying to wind others up).

Wow. Ableism worthy of the 1970s.

StMarie - it just a fact, not ableism. If someone has a condition that means they can’t do a particular job despite reasonable adjustments it’s very sad but true. I know someone who wanted to be nurse - she’d have been brilliant. But she was rejected, as a wheelchair user there were just too many aspects of the job she couldn’t do. It was sad but came down to practicalities in the end. People need to choose jobs that fit their skill sets and abilities. Teachers have to be able to deal with a class of kids on their own for an hour. They have to be able to plan lessons, deliver them, assess progress and give feedback in a timely fashion. They have to be able to remember duties and behave appropriately in a professional manner. Many adjustments can be made - disabled access, voice support, hearing loops etc etc but teachers can’t just not do key bits of the job. It would be like a doctor expecting to be allowed to pop out half way through a consultation if they needed time out - it just can’t happen.

Tbh, that's probably not a bad thing for everyone else either, just sending an agenda and any announcements by email before the meeting seems like it would be sensible.

Although this can often lead to endless strings of emails where people pull everything apart before the meeting…!

But maybe that’s academia, not teachers.

I was in education for twenty years.

I am a wheelchair user.

Previous posters who are saying teaching is not suitable for disabled people are wrong, as there are many disabled teachers.

The NASUWT (teaching union) has a section for disabled teachers and a very good conference.

www.nasuwt.org.uk/advice/equalities/under-represented-groups/disabled-teachers.html

If anyone reading is either disabled and thinking of getting into teaching or is in teaching and has become disabled I would ask you to ignore the ignorance and prejudice against disabled people on this thread and contact the nasuwt for actual useful information.

It can and does work in all of these roles and more.

‘Not up to it’ is ableist, by the way.

no schools can't.

Look, I worked in a (university) department a few years ago with a colleague who was in denial about being bipolar ( he attributed his behaviour to epilepsy and then an hormonal disorder when he was sectioned).

After resisting Occupational Health advice, he tried to impose his own adjustments, but these were not reasonable in that they basically came down to doing only a half or three-quarters of the job on full pay.

Could not be given any kind of significant admin or leadership role. But managed to publish pretty well.

The inequity of this situation was wrong. More junior colleagues were picking up after him. I found him almost impossible to manage because he refused to engage. It is so nice not to have to work with him any more (I left because the extra workload was getting unhealthy).

So from some POV, my attitude was ableist. But for those around someone not capable of a job it can be highly stressful. This man was in denial about his serious health condition and would periodically stop medication or be sectioned and we had to cope by picking up his teaching etc. Because universities are very specialist places with no possibility of just employing someone else.

So there really is another side to this for colleagues in some situations.

Agree!
Do not talk to them or allow anyone to talk to them while they are having their PPA time would be my absolute number 1.

Manage the team properly so the ADHD person does not end up doing the lion’s share of the work and it’s shared out evenly.

Don’t refer to the ADHD unless person who has ADHD brings it up.

Definitely following up (and not in a formal tone) anything that is said or requested, so 'Can you send me the list of Y8s going on the Globe Trip this afternoon so we know who is out without bothering Reception?' not 'further to our meeting on the....'

You know the right way to do this with any member of teaching staff regardless of their ADHD status is to go bother Reception.