This is uncomfortable reading as a parent of a boy with ADHD. I also have a quiet hard working girl (separate year) who often gets put next to disruptive children.
I get that it's hard for your kids. It's hard for my daughter too.
My son does not qualify for any additional funding to support his needs. However,at the moment we are waiting for medication and he is really struggling to be within the confines of class, especially after 6 months out of school.
His school is very short of funds and there is no dedicated TA for his class.
I know the other parents dread their kids being sat next to mine. He is bright but also dyslexic, and those elements combined means that his concentration span is that of a gnat, and unless he is given specific focus by an adult he forgets what he's supposed to be doing and then distracts the person sitting next to him.
I get it, I really do. But I am constantly fighting the system - to get a diagnosis, to get medication, to get help in class, anything. I spend hours with him out of school explaining appropriate behaviour. He wants to be liked and fit in, but his brain is not wired in a way that enables him to make the right decisions in the moment.
He is not indulged, spoilt or allowed a life free of consequences. However, he lacks the impulse control that allows him to make good choices. He also needs to stim constantly to enable him to focus, which, for him, means drumming with his fingers. Irritating as hell to sit next to.
No money for Sen kids like him, the funding (rightly) goes first to the significantly disadvantaged. All of you who are complaining are probably complaining about someone like my child.
But there is no facility available until - frustrated at constant rejection and living in a world he doesn't quite understand - he behaves in a manner that gets him excluded.
We haven't reached that stage yet, because we put in so much work behind the scenes that none of you have to do.
Constant discussions about appropriate behaviour and how to fit in, how to learn effectively, what to do when he is left out of playtime for the hundredth time that week. It's relentless and exhausting. Even if there were more schools for sen, he wouldn't qualify as he's too academically able. You have to be working at least 1-2 years academically below your peers to even be considered for 1-1 funding. Imagine the frustration of being bright but unable to access learning because you are consistently taught in a way you can't work. Lockdown in some ways was a revelation for him, because he could run round the garden or bounce on the trampoline every 10 minutes, and that sensory stimulation gave him the ability to focus. Of course it would be impossible to allow that in a mainstream school.
So he's constantly trying to sit still and focus, which takes up all of his concentration skills. He can't even hear the content of what's being taught because he's thinking "I have to sit still and focus and not pull Pippa's ponytail, pull Pippa's ponytail" reaches out and pulls Pippa's ponytail and bam, he's in trouble again.
He comes out of school like a bottle of coke that has been shaken constantly. You would not believe what I have to deal with as a consequence of him coping to that degree all day. But instead of his Herculean efforts to try to do the right thing being acknowledged, he's told off for the one time he let his concentration slip and irritate the child next to him.
Blame a broken underfunded education system that only can provide one outdated model of learning for the fact that your child is sat next to mine.
But please also show some compassion and understanding of what families and children with "low level" additional needs to through every single day. We are the pariahs of the playground, whispered about and tutted at by parents like you who don't get how much effort we put in behind the scenes.
Behaviour is communication and the children who are "naughty" have back stories you have no idea about.
It's not right for any child to be scared of another child, or be physically hurt by them; I am not minimising the impact of their behaviour at all. But next time you march in to complain, think about me and all the parents like me, who are parenting relentlessly behind the scenes at a level of input luckily your children don't need. And that our kids are constantly viewed as a problem and the effect that has on their mental health and understanding of the world. There's a horrifying statistic about the number of young men in prison with ADHD. It is no wonder. They have no impulse control and have gone through education being told they're constantly in trouble without any support to help them manage this bewildering world. No positive messages in school for them at all.
So you can choose. Hoick up your judgy pants and carry on encouraging your children to complain about our kids and leave them out, or teach them kindness and compassion and understanding. You give them communication skills to say "Harry, I'd really like to play with you at break. I need to concentrate now" and give them a smile of encouragement. Or "please don't pull my hair/kick me under the table. Do you need some help to concentrate?" It might just be as simple as alerting the teacher that he needs time out or a fiddle toy. And yes in an ideal world the teacher would notice, but when they are dealing with a class of 32 with no support they would be delighted to be signposted so they can deal positively too.
Because it's always the child with Sen who is expected to fit in with a neurotypical world, rather than the NT world making accommodation for them.
I don't see my child as disabled, rather that he is constantly in a disabling environment for him. A bit like if your child has a broken leg being forced to play football on it, because they could do it if they try hard enough...