Dyspraxia and sports day

[schoolsupportproblems]

AIBU to be really mad at my sons teacher?......
My son (11) year 6 had his final school sports day this week, he didn't attend, the morning of the sports day he was a wreck, gagging on tears - all because he had been chosen to be on the skipping rope race.
He has coordination related dyspraxia -skipping is just totally unrealistic for him.

He hadn't told me prior to the day, and I had to coax it out of him on the morning as to why he was so upset.

I kept him home (please don't judge me) for the couple of hours that sports day was taking place and then he went in for the afternoon.

I contacted the school but heard nothing at all from them.
His teacher was sarcastic when he arrived at school "nice to see you bothered to turn up"
And one of the others (child) on the skipping team walked up and threatened him, saying he was a waste of space. He told a pier mediator, but that will honestly go no where.

AIBU to feel the school let him down?
Was IBU to allow him to stay home?

The school tried to make a dyspraxic child do a skipping race!?!

I know little to nothing about dyspraxia but even I know that's a no no.

Who are they letting become teachers these day? Clearly standards are dropping if they're displaying that level of intelligence and empathy.

I kept my dd off on a sports day once because I knew it was going to be very badly run, very hot, no shade and not enough access to drinks
I would do it again if necessary.
I completely understand your position OP.

My dyspraxic Dd also year 6 always ends up with the skipping race. She does skipping as part of motor skills so I'm not sure if it's related.

I’d have done the same. No point in embarrassing a child with dyspraxia by forcing them to take part in a skipping race if he/she doesn’t want to.

As an adult he would never be put in this position.

My dyspraxic son has missed the last 5 years of Sports Day. End of. Too late now, but you should always keep him off the WHOLE day. If I was you I would meet with the teacher. Explain that dys is a SEN and ask how she fucking supported your child to meet his very public SEN. Ask her what she thinks it feels like to come last in every acativity associated with physical prowess. Make sure she knows how unhappy your child was. Ask her if on re-felection she would do anything differently. I would say that as she had failed to meet your child’s SEN, you had to do it for her by keeping him at home.

If you are not happy speak to the head and ensure that the school trains its teacher to recognise SEN and make reasonable adjustments to meet them rather than giving them one that requires fine coordination.

Witch.

You weren't unreasonable to keep him off.
I don't think people understand unless they are in this position.
Ignore the sarky teacher and try to put this misery behind you.

YANBU.

I think often schools bundle the kids who aren't good at running into the "fun" races, even though they are often not fun at all for the kids forced to participate in an activity they struggle with in public.

Completely unacceptable. I'd be following up on: the teacher's original decision and lack of understanding, the teacher's comments and the other child's comments. These things are so damaging to a dyspraxic child, the school must do better.

Awful and you should speak to the head about what the teacher said. Dyspraxia is not as acknowledged or well known as dyslexia wouldvthey have put a childcwith that in a spelling be? We recently had the whole bikeability issue.. I wanted to pull my child on but they wanted to plow on regardless and good for him he did. Staff didn’t quite know how to assist properly more training needed..

I think on sports days you've got teachers who don't normally do PE or sports as well. Last year I went to my DS's sports day, and there was a girl there and I thought what's she wearing, it doesn't look like PE kit. I spoke to her mum later and she didn't have her kit so was given a t-shirt to do it in with just her knickers as bottoms!

What were they thinking of? Secondary has been much better for PE than primary and they have a bigger range of students so they are more likely to realise that asking a child with dyspraxia who can't skip to go in that race is just cruel. I would complain in the hope that the next year they will think beyond the box for other dc. I would talk to the teacher and the SENCO.

Does it even matter about the dyspraxia? Noone was diagnosed with this back in my day but plenty of us could not skip or have the coordination but we didn't get forced to do it either. If a child can't do a physical task, it's not right to throw them into it anymore than you'd throw a non swimmer into the deep end

Presumably the school knows about his dyspraxia? I would ask to speak to the senco and ask what disability training there is in place. That is a failure to make reasonable adjustments

Thank you for your support - I will draft a letter for the senco today.
I might post it here first for advice!