To believe my 5 year old, not his teacher?

[Jamhandprints]

My 5 year old has ASD with challenging behaviour, usually triggered by routine change.
So today at pick up time the teacher called me over to say he had got his best friend in a head lock for no reason (typical of his behaviour) Then, whilst in time out he has pinned down another child and put a bead up his nose.
I was horrified about this and nearly burst into tears.
I collected my son from the deputy head and asked him, on the way home, to tell me what had happened.
He said he hurt his best friend and put a bead up X's nose.
I asked him to tell me how he had done it and he said:
"I...I don't remember doing it. Miss Y said I did but I just I definitely don't think I did."
I asked a few times in different ways and got the same response, including tears. "You don't have to say tell the truth mummy because I definitely am".
So I phoned the teacher and she said nobody had actually seen it happen but X had said it was my son. She will investigate more tomorrow.
Thinking about it, my son has terrible fine motor skills, so to pin someone down and put a bead up their nose would require a lot of skill.
So i just feel terrible because all the school mums already hate my son (understandably) and I was going to contact the mum and apologise but I think he probably is telling the truth.
He is slow to process speech and respond so probably didn't know what was going on when he was sent to the deputy.
Does it matter?

Z O M B I E THREAD

Z O M B I E THREAD

Z O M B I E THREAD

The problem with the zombie thread posts is that they are at the end. Unless someone reads all the way through, and we know that people don't (like me!) they don't see it until they've already posted. It needs a warning at the top (yes I know the dates are there, but people don't see those either).

It does sound unlikely from what you’ve said that your son would do that, or even be able to do that. I’d be concerned that your child is being used as a scapegoat by other children (if they’re listening to their parents talk about your son it’s almost inevitable as they’re all so little) and the teacher is content with believing your son is the one who’s in the wrong.

ffs I didn’t even realise it was a zombie thread til just now 🙄

This was my first thought: that the kid did it himself and is embarrassed.

On the other hand, age 5 is when my previously 100% honest son started telling fibs if he’d done something wrong, more telling me what he wanted to have happened.

OP the truth is none of us will ever know what really happened. The big question is why no teacher saw it. I mean surely it takes time to pin someone down, grab a bead, and hold the thrashing victim still long enough to get a bead in a nostril.

If I had to put money on it, I think it wasn’t your son, and instead that the other kid was playing and put it up there intending to sneeze it out for fun, and then couldn’t. But we’ll never know for certain.

We have some rough/aggressive children at nursery, some with ASD and ADHD investigations. These children can and do hurt others but some of our brighter children are learning how to manipulate them and get them into trouble. I'm now extremely careful to make sure I know what happened before blaming a child with a 'reputation'. Children are very aware of their peers and blaming them to get out of trouble. At preschool level you can figure it out if you know your children and group dynamics but I imagine the older they get the better they become at telling staff what they want them to think.

No one knows what happened other than possibly the children involved and even they may not really know. For school to assume it's your son is poor on their part. He's also being penalised for his communication difficulties.

I’ve had this many times with my son who is autistic. The worst episode was when he was accused of a really awful ‘attack’ on another student with injuries as a result. He was excluded immediately regardless of how much he declared his innocence.

I just knew he didn’t do it, so insisted on a thorough investigation and to check the CCTV in the area of the school and at the time the ‘incident’ happened which, with some reluctance from the school, they eventually did. The CCTV proved my son DIDN’T DO A THING!l and was actually hit himself. I was fuming. Apparently, after investigation, the other kids thought it was ‘funny’ to wind my son up and get him into trouble 🤔

I’d definitely wait for the teacher to look into it further. It isn’t a case of believing what your child says no matter what but no one saw your child do this, why is the other child being believed over yours?
Just because your child has done some things in the past, it doesn’t mean he should be the scapegoat for everything. Obviously you will deal with it appropriately if it turns out he did do it, as I would have done but it can’t just be assumed it was your child.

Hope you’re ok op, it’s very difficult managing these situations.