To think the school need to support my child

[mychildisnotnaughty]

DS turned 4 at the end of July so started in reception as one of the youngest. Hes been struggling and today I was called in because he ran out of the hall in a PE lesson then when the TA tried to get him back in, he had a tantrum. He then had to wear his PE kit the rest of the day as he refused to get changed and he had no top on as he refused to wear his t shirt.

They said he won't line up either and runs off, also had a tantrum when going to lunch. Also keeps trying to run off at the end of the day.

At the moment I feel he is not being supported, they just keep trying to put him in time out but this doesn't work, I said he needs ignoring but they said that isn't possible. To me it's all down to him being a summer born.

They also complained he's been annoying the school rabbit, this really upset me as at home he loves animals.

AIBU to think they need to do more to help than ring me, as he behaves fine at home so I can't do anything.

Fanjo, I can see why you'd say that. My ds would have done the same at that age as he has ASD. But they need to establish if there is a reason for his behaviour. I have known some kids who do that because it's bloody good fun to make the over weight TA chase you all over school.

But people are not blaming the OP, or ripping her apart. There have been lots of helpful suggestions on this thread. All posters are saying is that OP should be working with the school to help her son.

What's so wrong with that? What's wrong with pointing out something which the OP herself might not have considered. Obviously she hadn't really thought through the 'just ignore him' strategy that she uses at home.

That's ok, no-one is saying she hasn't done anything right, just that there are other things to consider too.

Fairenuff the funding that LAs previously retained for a certain level of additional needs has been delegated to schools.

To apply for High Needs Funding top up a school now has to demonstrate an individual spend of 6k, on top of the AWPU, on additional need.

LAs vary in how they determine the initial funding to schools. 6K extra will not be given to a school for each and every child upfront, since only a small proportion of children have additional needs.

I have posted a link to the legislation details up thread.

So significantly more than 6k on additional needs for the whole school.

It won't be given without a hell of a lot of paperwork first. Where I work that 6k is already well allocated and more.

I would advise you to engage with your SMT YouTheCat. Not get engaged to them though, awful thought!

Perhaps the fact is that he is not mature enough to be in school full-time.I realise that some Summer born 4 year-olds arrive in Reception reading Tolstoy and doing differential calculus, but many of them don't. You only have to read the threads on here about distressed children clinging to mummy, and little ones wetting and soiling themselves to understand that. He'll probably be fine eventually, but in the meantime I feel sorry for his Mum who was hoping to get underway with her college course.

To apply for High Needs Funding top up a school now has to demonstrate an individual spend of 6k, on top of the AWPU, on additional need

So the school can spend £6,000 on additional needs before they apply for extra (which there is no guarantee they will get).

£6,000 for the whole school? To be used for all children with additional needs?

In my school, based on the additional needs that you listed, such as EAL, that would mean at least 30% of the children in the school would qualify for extra support. That does not include those children already on extra funding.

That would mean that each child with additional needs, in my school, could have about £700 a year spent on them before the school reached the limit of £6,000.

£700 does not go very far in paying for a 1-1 worker.

Sorry haven't read whole thread, so sorry if I have missed something.

Anyway, although I think it is important that parents work with schools, I also think that it is very harmful for a child to be in an environment where people who are in charge of him (the school) are giving the signal that they can't cope and that the child is in charge until the cavalry (parent) is called in.

Children do not suddenly display this kind of behaviour for no reason. and there are a significant number of children like the OP's child. If teachers can't cope with this, there is something very wrong with the school system, whether it is too many children in a class, a badly managed environment (e.g. classrooms with poor acoustics, too many flickering computer screens, too much noise at lunch time), too little training, too many part-time staff or too high staff turn over.

The current system seems to be that parents with resources home school/relentlessly badger the LA/privately educate children who have difficulty coping in school, and other children are left to fail (at the expense of children in their class who may have less obvious and loud difficulties).

So yes OP, the school should be dealing with it, but more than that the government needs to stop faffing around with history curriculums and address this wide spread problem.

Some people are blaming her. That is probably enough to make her feel.rubbish

Fairenuff yes! the school has to demonstrate this spend before High Needs funding is applied for.

I don't know what funding your school receives upfront. Did they participate in the LA's consultation? Have you looked at their budget?

Have you read the funding reform, have the school advised the teachers or the LA your school?

Who is blaming her?

Well i did address floggingmolly before who was going on about ineffective parenting and lack.of boundaries.

No, no. There are crossed wires here.

The AWPU (Age-Weighted-Pupil-Unit) is a figure that is given per child to the school. All children get it.

The SEN block funding is a devolved budget, given to schools and based on a formula based on, among other things, deprivation.

This is with the exception of special schools, who automatically get £10,000 per child because each child is deemed to have high needs by virtue of MS school being unsuitable for them.

The actual SEN Budget for a school is not huge.
Take Swanmore Primary School

426 on roll. Total SEN Budget £47,257. Total per pupil: £110.93

Now, not every child will need SEN Support. Not by a long shot. But, do the maths:

If they spent £6000 per child who needed 'support' then they could only support 7 children out of 426.

Not everyone who needs SEN Support needs £6000 spent on them. Additionally, if a school finds that they are 'overburdened' with children with SEN and run out of funds, they can apply for extra funding.

My point is, that you can't just expect a school to spend their SEN budget on a child who hasn't adjusted to a new environment after just 4 weeks.

If the child had struggled through nursery a more extreme reaction may be needed, but as the OP has said that he didn't, apart from a blip, then it's likely a transient difficulty.

I actually think schools, in practice, will have to rethink the transition in reception, to make it more accessible for more children.

And rethink some of their behaviour policies....expectations and generally their other spending.

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Floggingmolly Fri 11-Oct-13 14:08:27

The additional needs funding is a moot point at this stage, surely?
Op has not mentioned any concerns about the child actually having any special needs as far as she's aware.
What he has had is a lifetime (literally) of doing as he pleased. When any behaviour failed to impress his mum, she simply ignored it, so he's now struggling with the notion that this isn't, after all, how the world works.
It'll be a huge learning curve for him, but it isn't an additional need in the real sense; and the op very definitely needs to involve herself in finding a solution.

This is not having a go at the OP, it is pointing out what might be causing the problems and the poster has said that it will be a huge learning curve for the child. Which it will be.

bramble I am only talking about the £6,000 that you brought up.

You said that this money was available already in the budget to spend on OP's son. So I was illustrating that, in my school, he would only qualify for about £700.

Why is this Fairenuff?

Nobody is blaming the OP. Some people are questioning the attitude that a school should sort the child out themselves because the parent doesn't have an issue at home.

"A school's "funding" isn't a bottomless pit,bramble, to be plundered forNurture roomsfor children who likely as not have simply never been expected to follow instructions or do anything they didn't fancy doing before.The onus is on the parent to send their child to school with some understanding of what's expected of him, behaviour wise"

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NotYoMommaFri 11-Oct-13 19:38:14

but this OP hasnt even tried to support tye school at home, she has told them to ignore him which they CAN NOT DOlets face it, if OP is having to ignore her childs behaviour anyway then he obviously isnt as well behaved at home as she would like us to think.she should maybe stop ignoring her child and help the school with the root cause, throwing money at this with no parental input is a recipe for failureits like when parents dont read with their kids or ensure homework is done and then get pissed at the school because 'thats what school is for'

Or the above? Pretty blaming, no?

6K equates to 12 to 16 hours if 1 to 1 support. If you change this to small group support the cost goes down dramatically, this is only one example.

Children often do not need additional support continuously throughout the day, often they need support at transition moments. Changing these, transition experiences, lining up, changing for PE, drop off and pick up could significantly alter the school experience for these children.

If I was the OP and I read the posts I quoted above I would feel pretty blamed.

I ignore my own dd at times, its the only way to stay sane ime

what I am saying is now it has been brought to her attention that it is causing issues at school, the behaviour/ current strategies used by op May now need to be reconsidered for the benefit of both her child at school and everyone else.

what my point was was not to blame OP for causing this, but that now she should start to engage more with school to try and find the cause and other potential solutions.

sticking to the 'just ignoring him' stance at this stage without at least trying to meet half way isnt going to help.

the school may want to assess for additional needs and want to onow how he copes if different methods are tried etc, we dont know anything at this point really other than so far OP and others do not thibk he has SEN

even OP thinks it is a more summer born issue than a Sen one

Well that is certainly putting it more kindly :)