To urge you to teach your children to be genuinely inclusive, not just polite?

[gingerginger2]

My kids are back at school this week (Scotland) and after a summer of seeing them without the context of their peers it’s a sadness again to see them interacting with other children.

On their own, they are sweet, silly, funny, kind, playful, interesting, creative, chatty. They are part of the world, full of wonder and learning and play.

But in the context of kids their age, they are different. They both have learning disabilities and dyspraxia.

They don’t know this though, they don’t quite realise they are “different” yet. They are little, they learn slowly, despite the constant lessons from society’s exclusions. They run up to their “friends” in such a carefree happy way, eager to talk, play, connect. It doesn’t seem to occur to them not to.

And when they do they mainly encounter silence. Uncomfortable polite looks. Or polite confused monosyllabic mumbles followed by eager escapes into actual easy friendships groups. Or at best a short conversation in a humouring tone, a tone learnt by imitating the tones adults take with small silly children.

There’s not really any unkindness. There’s just a refusal to actually engage, to get to know, to connect. An embarrassment and unwillingness to spend time with my children’s lack of social skills, messy clothes, an uncomfortableness at their invasion of their personal space. So a brief hello before getting on with actual friendships and relationships and life. An obvious desire to politely not engage. A smile with the lips not the eyes.

I’m amazed they don’t seem to realise that they’ve been snubbed again. But they din’t Mainly. Learning disability means everything is hard to learn I guess. But it’ heartbreaking to see they just carry on and continue to fling themselves at people, wide open, encountering boundaries wherever they go. I worry that soon they’ll start to realise and feel the pain of these rejections.

I worry too that maybe they do feel the pain. Maybe it goes somewhere deep, and maybe they are learning day by day that people don’t like them. That society isn’t for them.

I hate it.

Please can you teach your children to be more than polite and kind to their peers with disabilities? Please can you urge them to actually get to know them, to actually connect and include them? Even when they are messy, annoying, noisy and a bit weird. Even then?

OP you’re pissing in the wind. They don’t care. They’re not listening.

It’s a world , a society being built and maintained to exclude those who have learning disabilities.

This is quite frankly bollocks. I'm really sorry truly that life is hard for you and your DC but no one is doing it in purpose. Are you projecting this attitude on your DC because that must be very hard to navigate when your parent thinks like this.

Sinkgirl it's not your child we'd be avoiding it would be you and your hostility and inability to rationalise even when people are going to great lengths nevermind patience to try and explain.

Seriously? I think the parents of the children being insulated and maligned here are the ones who’ve shown exceptional patience.

I’m not a hostile person at all. I’m being hostile right now because there are multiple posters being extremely ableist, and then calling me a racist for pointing out that they would not get away with such bigotry against other minority groups.

My eldest is bright but his autism is significant.

He is an older teen now.
He has a couple of NT pals, nice kids who enjoy his company for an hour or two. The NT kids don't invite him to their nights out or parties though - and to be honest wouldn't want to go stand in a crowded pub listening to an average band while having beer spilled on him. It's not his thing.

He has a couple of true friends, with whom he absolutely lights up. They are also autistic (albeit differently so). They hang out playing ridiculous computer games and talking complete rubbish that says nothing, to me, of any importance (like, how did your exams go, what college are you looking at applying to, any idea what career you might like? They don't talk about that stuff. It's a series of memes and comments about gaming characters).

My son has some adapting to do to fit into NT world. He doesn't especially value cleanliness. He doesn't get fashion. He doesn't always understand how behaviours are perceived or what is appropriate (his first day at work experience he finished his allotted task, lay his head on the desk and went to sleep...)

I expect NT people to be polite, and understand that his autism means he may do things differently. I expect DS to continue to work on understanding what social expectations are in the NT world and understand that in order to manage his life there are some red lines that cannot be crossed (you must be clean; you don't sleep at your desk, etc). However I understand more than when he was younger that for true friendship to flourish, he needed to find his tribe.

Birthday parties for the class, absolutely no child should be excluded.

I do know though that it's important to remember when thinking of solutions to this problem that the children without disabilities are still children.

There was once an incident at school where a mum sent an upset email to the class. Her daughter had given away lots of things at school and she said this was because she wasn't popular and was trying to make herself popular and the other children should be ashamed of themselves for taking advantage of her. The children were 6 and none had disabilities.

I discussed this with my child who had been given a number of these toys. We took them back obviously. My child was genuinely confused about what they had done wrong. In their mind the little girl was their friend and had wanted to give them toys. In the end I just said never accept presents from other children at school without asking me first.

But it did occur to me that this mother saw the other children in the class (not her own) as mini adults and was attributing adult style thoughts and motivations to them that just weren't there.

Sorry haven't RTFT. But my dd has a learning disability alongside other disabilities & attends a special school.She is 12.
We have tried over the past 10 years to integrate her into mainstream activities,so she can mix with a variety of her peers. If she was mainstream,this would be no problem but as she is non verbal & has a learning disability it obviously is. It all starts out quite well but then she gets more & more isolated. At Brownies she was actively ignored by the others.
As a result we have made the decision to just let her attend special needs activities. She has started to realise she is 'different ' from mainstream children & due to her previous experiences does not attempt to join in with them.
She dearly loves all her special need activities that she attends,the people who run them go out of their way to make it fun & inclusive.
But society,on the whole,IS NOT inclusive. No matter how many people come on here to say it is. It isn't & will never be & I have eventually made my peace with that,even though it saddens & angers me in equal measures.
Nothing will change this as people don't really want to understand learning disabilities if it doesn't really affect them. Our children are just seen as odd & different & sometimes scary.

Sorry, I have skipped a huge chunk of this thread, but wanted to add my story.

There was a boy at my primary school, let’s call him Ben, with learning and behavioural difficulties. As a class we all knew (although I don’t remember how) that it was our joint responsibility to look after Ben. When we were young it was easy. Ben was impulsive and full of energy and truly great fun to play with. Over the years we matured and the games we liked changed and Ben didn’t. It became more of a chore to play with him and have him in our group in class. However, Ben was our joint responsibility so we did and we, never, never let Ben know that we were less than thrilled to be the ones playing with him. It wasn’t always fun or easy, but the lessons it taught me were immeasurable. As adults of 39/40 we have a class Facebook group that we keep in touch with everyone on. Ben (who has a job he loves and is doing great, btw) is the heart of that group. I’m not local, but when everyone meets up at the pub, Ben is always there in the photos. He’s the glue that’s kept us all in contact.

There is a girl a little bit like Ben in 9 yo DD’s class and, sadly, she is not as lucky. The class do not feel a joint responsibility to include her, instead she is foisted off on the same few kind children who would probably genuinely enjoy her company one day per week, but end up resenting her due to being asked to play with her every breaktime and include her in every class group. It’s heartbreaking.

So based on my personal experience I think that the responsibility for inclusion needs to be shared to stop it becoming a burden and resentment setting in. Sorry if that’s worded a bit bluntly, hopefully you understand what I am trying to say.

And to everyone with children who are struggling socially.

I don’t think you’re in a mind set to hear what I’ve said, but I say it as a parent of a disabled child. I can think of some big lows. A seizure just before morning bell in nursery where she lost control of her bowels by way of introduction in the first few days, being excluded from parties, not talking for years after others and being mocked, parents pulling kids away, the whole community feeling free to discuss her speech/ autism/ hearing aids and poor movement and hearing shit back. Not being allowed on nursery trips, a few awful community groups.... and so on

BUT I honestly over the years found a way forward and a positive attitude. Dd has friends, she’s happy and the worlds not perfect but she’s essentially happy. I meet parents who remain very angry an Sen groups and withdraw children, it’s not just as simple as exclusion or one side not being open. Sometimes you need to take a breath and plough on.

And the posters having a go at Sinkgirl,you're talking bollocks.
Stop making excuses & walk mile in our shoes.
Oh wait . . . You don't have to,do you!

But society,on the whole,IS NOT inclusive. No matter how many people come on here to say it is. It isn't & will never be & I have eventually made my peace with that,even though it saddens & angers me in equal measures

It’s clearly evident from this thread alone that you’re not wrong chickensaresafehere
I’m sorry and sad to read about how your DD has been made to feel. It’s actually depressing.

Just read the whole thread gingerginger2. I don’t have children so can’t put yours and other posters’ ideas directly into practice but just wanted to say this is a really really important thread that says so much about a lot about inclusion in society. It’s made me think a lot about the social model of disability and I really liked what zaziecat wrote about the value of being a good neighbour or good colleague, not just what legal frameworks we have in place.

Clovermoon

Ok hercule I understand. We fundamentally disagree.

I am trying to explain that tolerance is not enough, and exclusion is still exclusion regardless of whether it is couched in politeness or not.

You disagree and think that individuals are responsible only to themselves and have no obligation other than politeness.

We disagree. I get it.

I still do not understand why you have an interest in continuing to say this on this thread full of mothers of disabled children experiencing experiencing hardship and social inclusion. As the mother of a preschooler who seems to have no experience of any of these issues.

This is really really upsetting.

My son just came in to me with breakfast all over his face. I asked him to wash his face as I often do. I asked him why he should remember to wash it , as I often do, as i’m Trying to teach him to keep his skin clean. And he said “so that people don’t think i’m A horrible monster”

Love to all those parents on this thread that are finding this continued prevalent attitude upsetting. So sorry. It’s utterly shit. Society is not for our kids. Because of a quirk of their genetics or an injury of their birth, they are not allowed to participate.

The amazing world of MN where people tie themselves up in knots over fairly simple matters.

Back in the real world, I have managed to teach my DC’s the difference between excluding someone because they have a disability OR are a little ‘different’ ‘weird’ etc and enforcing their personal boundaries if they feel unsafe. So do many other parents. It’s nigh on impossible with small children but 7 years upwards it’s not a difficult conversation to have.

As an adult I know the difference between recognising someone is ‘different’ and someone that makes me feel ‘unsafe’.

Strangely enough it’s almost always a NT person that falls in the latter category.

It’s absolutely not difficult for children to learn the difference. Perhaps as a black female I understand only too well people feeling ‘unsafe’ because of a genuine reason or because of prejudice.

I think the OP just wants children and seemingly the many adults on here to recognise that sometimes, it’s their own prejudice, not The Gift Of Fear that causes the exclusion of others.

There is a girl a little bit like Ben in 9 yo DD’s class and, sadly, she is not as lucky. The class do not feel a joint responsibility to include her, instead she is foisted off on the same few kind children who would probably genuinely enjoy her company one day per week, but end up resenting her due to being asked to play with her every breaktime and include her in every class group. It’s heartbreaking

Ultimately we have to ask " where are the adults here" adults should be helping with this. Monitoring the situations. Making sure all the children are happy. That no ones upsetting or hurting or taking the piss out of anyone else. I have a dd who although is NT will go back for more no matter wtf children do to her. Shes had her trousers pulled down shes been pushed, shoved had some unkind things said to her, had her kindness taken advantage of etc but she still gives everyone the benefit of the benefit of the doubt every time... ( no idea if there are needs with one or all or none.of any of these children that's not my business. I'm talking in general here about her experiences with other children and the fact that she too struggles to get the balance right in fact shes probably too far one at for her own good at times)

Words you never expect to hear your child say when they get back from.school " it's ok X didnt strangle me today" like it was completely normal that this would happen.

Until adults start stepping in and facilitating all children playing together r interacting nicely I think it's unfair to be so harsh towards children who find things tricky enough for themselves.

Totally agree with you fast&furious.
This thread makes me want to cry.
Some people are such assholes.

Which is fine, but earlier you were saying liking someone and spontaneous friendship wasn’t a choice.

It isn't a choice. You can choose to talk to someone, you cannot choose to like them or become friends with them, because those are feelings. I can choose to go on a date with someone, I cannot choose to love them or find them attractive or like their personality. So no, friendship is not a choice.

@gingerginger but maybe your son was joking when he said about being a horrible monster? Surely he couldn't have been referring to society's attitudes towards children with disabilities.

This was kind of what I meant in my post above about it not always being helpful to bring our adult mind set to bear on the behaviour of children or on interactions between them.

Anyway I am very sorry you are having a difficult time. And I wish your children every happiness and success for the future.

OP, I have to be honest with you. It frustrates me that you are reading some nefarious motive into me posting here. You started a thread that contains challenging points of discussion that will soon affect my child. Naturally I have an opinion. I am not sharing that opinion to upset you.

Yes, we disagree. My disagreement is not invalidated by your experiences. You say my child will be obliged to have social interactions whether she wants them or not. Why do you think I am not entitled to express my thoughts on what my child is or is not obliged to do?

Btw I agree with @SarahTancredi about it being the adults that need to help facilitate inclusion.

The story about Brownies was so sad as well.

People don’t like the equation with racism because they don’t want to admit that they are actually focussing on disability and that disability is an issue to them.

Let’s be honest here, this isn’t about personal boundaries, everyone has the right to make those choices. However, if a child came home and said that they didn’t want to be friends with Giano who is from Italy because he talks funny i.e. with an Italian accent, or his English is broken would you genuinely tell them that they had every right to make those choices based on those attributes? Or that they didn’t want to be friends with Johnny because he likes boys instead of girls and they’re afraid that he might want to go out with them, would you say that was ok?

It’s perfectly ok not to be friends with anyone. However it’s not ok to allow prejudices to decide who is and isn’t an acceptable member of society.

From the other side however its also not ok to decide that you should be nice to someone because they have a disability or are black or gay or whatever other characteristic they have. It’s one of the reasons why my parents never wanted me to go to mainstream school, because their view was that I would initially be treated like (in my mum’s words) “the class hamster,” where children would want to be with me out of curiosity rather than genuine wish to be friends. That’s not ok either and we do need to look at how we find that middle ground between prejudiced exclusion and curiosity inclusion.

God, can we stop this hysteria over boundaries and personal space. We are talking about disabled children...not bloody Jimmy Saville reincarnated.

One of the examples given was a child who didn't want to walk next to another child for a couple of minutes to get to school. He's hardly a dangerous predator.

Surely we teach our children about different situations and whats dangerous or not.

Besides, my dd has sn and it makes her incredibly shy...she wouldn't be getting in your precious child's personal space god forbid, she'd probably be glued to my side!

Despite my son having learning disabilities, he is there when other children continually exclude him. He does see the polite disinterest followed by the shift to easy chatting with others. He does see the look of disgust on people’s faces when they interact with him.

Hercule, yes I think in a society your child should be obliged to have social interactions with those with learning disabilities. Not forced friendship. But yes, social interactions.

At the very least social interactions.

God this is so depressing.

God, can we stop this hysteria over boundaries and personal space. We are talking about disabled children...not bloody Jimmy Saville reincarnated.

This is the hysterical post, not the posts that say small children have the right to walk away from situations that make them feel uncomfortable.

*Hercule, yes I think in a society your child should be obliged to have social interactions with those with learning disabilities. Not forced friendship. But yes, social interactions.

At the very least social interactions.*

Well, she isn’t.