about those on the autistic spectrum in mainstream schools?

[OverbearingHouseSitter]

Basically I've read so many threads recently about those on the autistic spectrum being completely let down by teachers and senior staff in schools.

I mean punishing those on the autistic spectrum in incidents when it is entirely inappropriate, and the lack of understanding of some teachers that you cannot use the same behaviour strategies on some children who require a different approach due to SEN.

And then there are times when punishment should not be given at all, such as when a child who is on the autistic spectrum behaving in a way that the teacher doesn't like, yet the teacher not seeming to realise that this behaviour is part of their SEN!

My mother was a teacher and I realise how hard being a teacher is. She got signed off sick with stress... it's a bloody hard job. But AIBU to think that some teachers and school staff- NOT all- seem to be consistently failing those on the autistic spectrum and those with other SEN, whatever these may be?

This is not just from this forum either! There have been instances from people I know I've heard about and with friends kids.

For example, a friends child was recently punished as he did not understand something the teacher said, ie, it was some form of light sarcasm the teacher used, friends DS with SEN did not register this, did what the teacher told the pupils sarcastically not to do and was then mortified and confused when the teacher punished him.

So AIBU?

I also apologise if I have used an language around people with special needs that you do not like/prefer not to use. My friend prefers the term "on the autistic spectrum" opposed to "autistic child" but if I have said anything wrong please tell me!

And there are then comparatively less Mainstream providers....the Specialist sector would be larger and more diverse. So funding for the Specialist sector would decrease, on average, per head, funding for Mainstream decrease overall...More teachers would be teaching in Specialist settings.

It would not necessarily be a very flexible solution, which would allow for movement between settings, either. It would mean more segregation and less inclusion.

non-combatants

I have a degree in Early Years, English and Education and have taught. More recently I have worked with children, in a different capacity, for a children's charity.

from non-combatants giving their advice to professional educators. Here is the reality.

And really, we are all stakeholders, in our children's education. The biggest complaint, on this thread, is that parents and non teaching health professionals are not listened to or respected by educational establishments.

They're called (or used to be called) Special Schools. And they worked.

I suggest you look at our history to see what some of these institutions were like.

I suggest that you don't know that I used to work in one that worked very well actually.

DS10 dx with HF autism. In his last year at primary ..... Thank god!!! Head teacher is inept, SENCO no training. I'm the mum that they run away from in the playground!
I'm really glad to hear that things get better in high school.
My other DS attends a SEN school and they've offer to support staff with training on ways of coping, things they find help in a SEN setting to support kids with ASD. They refused the course .... They usual charge but because we had a link and I was struggling with the school, the heads DH who runs the course offered to do it for free!!!
They bloody refused!

Your point being, MusicMan? I didn't suggest you were 'non-combatant' (competent? I guess you meant, going on context of what you wrote), did I? I didn't allude to anything of your credentials.

There seems to be a belief from certain quarters that all children that have additional needs, whatever they may be, should be in special schools - how would these special schools work? A child with high needs requiring support, but with a high IQ..... child with behavioural difficulties......a child with severe learning disabilities.....is the requirement just 'those pesky kids with additional needs'?

My ds requires 1-1 support (yes a whole TA for one child!!), school consistently chip away at this support, tell me he needs to have different TAs throughout the day (even though this leads to utter confusion, and lack of communication), share his TA with other children, minimise my ds's issues to justify the erosion of support. I am bloody worn out by it. He would not get into a special school (or at least none that are in an hours drive radius of us). Where should he go?
As for living in the real world, fuck me sideways, I work with children with additional needs and I have to fight constantly for the right support for my child.

And we have had a history of very questionable Specialist settings and mental health institutions, in this country. It is undeniable.

Yes, in my professional experience there is a massive problem with overdiagnosis and overmedication (although that's a separate issue).

I have met many children who I don't believe have significant SEN issues or any at all. Besides which, there's the basic argument that with it being a spectrum, at which point on it does a child get to use it as an excuse or reason for their behaviour and get significant extra money?

Whilst it's impossible to prove a negative, at what stage would you ever stop arguing with professionals if they told you your child didn't have [whatever you believe he does].

Fairly recently, a child broke another's nose. The parents blamed his autism and the school. There was absolutely no getting through to them that various Drs etc had said that he wasn't autistic. It was much easier for us to expel him from the school whereas in the state sector, IME, parents can look to keep their children in entirely unsuitable settings to prove a point about inclusion (often at the expense of the rest of the children and staff in the school).

Every child deserves to meet their potential. If you're requires an unsustainable amount then what should happen? He gets a higher portion of the teacher's time than other children who then don't meet their potential?

Sorry ... Just seen this !!!!
You are a typical teacher !!! Of course you are qualified to diagnose ASD !!'n you my friend are a dick!

Was there a quote in there Ice? For clarity, because your post seems to say different things.

My point was that we have abandoned Specialist provision due to a mistaken politically correct assumption that to exclude anyone from anything is ipso facto BAD. Just because some previous Specialist provision was (and is) lacking in quality doesn't negate my point.

Imagine the funds used to provide that TA in my example being instead pooled and used to provide the right environment for that kid and others like him. He can't help being how he is of course, bless him, but I really don't think in that situation that anyone (especially that child himself) was benefiting from placing him in a context where he was simply unable to cope.

Mainstream was exactly the right place for my DC. Additional support has now been ceased for some years. My DC is happy, well behaved, well adjusted and achieving better than average. They had significant additional funding for support at primary, which ceased towards the end of primary. Where would a child like mine fit?

He can't help being how he is of course, bless him,

I cannot believe people still say this. How patronising. Would you say that to people like Chris Packham?

My child is at special school in a class of 3 with 3 staff. His placement with transport costs around £100,000 a year. Special school is usually not the cheaper option.

" He can't help being how he is of course, bless him".

Don't be so bloody patronising. He's not less than you.

Music man can't help how he is, bless him. He was born an ignorant fool and there's no special provision to help with that.

OK, I'll probably get flamed for this, but what the hey...

It's easier to insist on mainstream provision for a kid with SEN rather than accept special provision because then we can kid ourselves, just for a moment, that the SEN doesn't exist.

All the stuff that schools do that parents of SEN kids object to is driven by fear. Fear of OFSTED, fear of league tables, fear of 'failure'. And who drives this obsession with OFSTED and league tables? Parents.

We have kidded ourselves that educating all kids together and throwing a few thousand quid at employing a few TA's would achieve this spurious 'equality' of provision. It's a myth. And it damages everyone's chances.

We have become as a nation so fixated on this false notion of 'equality' that we have forgotten some other things that are more important. Those 29 kids in my example didn't have the right to be heard and make the progress of which they were capable because their rights were being trampled upon by the rights of the parents of one child. Sorry, but that's simply wrong, however you dress it up.

What I know is the reality that I experience as a professional. Sorry if it's unpopular folks, but I see what I see. If you want to shoot the messenger go right ahead, here I am, ready, aim, FIRE...

if it's true you're in teaching, musicman, get out of it. Maybe you've been doing it too long, maybe you were never any good. Kids - all kids, not just those with special needs - deserve a better teacher than you could possibly be, with the mentality you have.

Sorry if it's unpopular folks,

If you are genuinely sorry, why say it? Especially in such a cliched, unintelligent and offensive manner. I dread to think what the Special School you worked in was like. Where is your sense of scale and appreciation of diversity?

You never answered my question, by the way. Where would my DC fit?

Music man you're not wrong. However some children, like my son who has AS are not 'bad enough' for special school as it stands, but he was, and I fully accept this a right royal pain in mainstream.

I am so glad he is not teaching in a special school anymore. The last thing my child needs is that sort of person around him.

As for "don't be so bloody patronising, he's not any less than you", right then, here goes.

On a purely human level yes you're right, we do all have the same rights and most of us I'm sure strive to bring about a world in which that's true as far as possible. Certainly I don't do what I do to get rich LOL.

However, I doubt whether the 'vampire' kid that I was talking about will be able to do some things in his life that most people aspire to. This to me makes him worthy of my compassion on a human level, and I'm not going to be told that compassion is automatically the same as condescension, it simply is not. Since when did compassion become automatically "patronising"?

OMG there are some smug people on here aren't there. If you have all the answers already then why bother to read what anyone else posts? LOL.

What I'm trying to get some people to see is that there isn't only one way to achieve what I hope most people agree is a desirable outcome, namely provision for all kids that meets a minimum standard and hopefully in most places is way above that. There is a cosy consensus in liberal circles that putting them all in the same room is some kind of panacea to achieve this. All I'm saying is that it isn't, and I don't have all the answers but I do have lots of experience in working with kids.

Anyway go ahead and shoot the messenger if it makes you feel better, I'm outta here.

Wishing you all a lovely weekend...

Shouldn't be teaching in any school. Attitudes like that are not compatible with being a competent educator.

However, I doubt whether the 'vampire' kid that I was talking about will be able to do some things in his life that most people aspire to.

He might do more. That is just one aspect of his behaviour. One one occasion. With good provision he might learn to manage this behaviour. He might learn anyway.

I did lots of, quite frankly, odd things, as a child. They did not impinge on my future success.