ASD DS being banned from nursery

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DS 4yrs with ASD, he's in receipt of an EHCP and due to start a special needs school in September which caters solely to autistic children. In the mean time he's at a special needs nursery, note 'special needs' as it's a nursery which advertises itself as being for disabled children who need extra support. Most of the children there have autism, and some have learning disabilities. We've had a few issues with them with things such as toilet training but didn't want to cause DS too much disruption as too many changes isn't good for him and hes leaving in July, they're OK for the most part.

Anyway DS has had a bad day today, not unusual for a small child with autism. He has meltdowns and does can sometimes throw things. The nursery know him well, he's been there 2 years. He's never been sent home due to meltdowns before, they just remove bim from the situstion and handle it. He's far from being the only child there with challenging behaviour.

Today OH has been told at pick up that if DS is having another bad day tomorrow then he can't go in "because there is small children there now" - the small children being new starters.

The nursery caters to children between the ages of 2 - 5 years.

AIBU to think that's not an acceptable reason to stop him going in? You can't exclude the older children for exhibiting the very behaviour you claim to be there to support.

She's going to call me at some point this evening to tell me the same as she told OH and I would appreciate some unbiased input as I don't want to go in all guns blazing if I'm being unreasonable.

I would have thought they would have phoned you with serious concern, especially if threatening to tell you your DS couldn't come in

OH said he has relayed it word for word and definitely isn't mistaken. He hasn't hit or bit any other children no, not once since he started there 2 years ago. The vast majority of his behaviour he focuses on himself like banging his head or throwing himself to the ground, however he does throw things indiscriminately so that is a concern although no child has actually been hit by anything he has thrown.

I don't understand why they couldn't just escort him into the quiet room and/or remove the toys from his reach.

How on earth do they expect you to just "know" he is having a bad day ? My son (NT) can be perfectly fine but get irritable later in the day if he's tired, I can't predict that happening or not, and he's your average non-SN child - I'd imagine an autistic child would be even less predictable !

I have little experience but I'd suggest asking :

• What has happened for them to no longer be able to meet his needs when they have for the past two years ?
• What has been done to support DS ?
• Presumably other children exhibit the same behaviour, how do they manage it ? Surely they're not just excluding everyone ?
• What do they suggest going forward, as surely they must be aware that routine is extremely important to autistic children and this type of disruption would be hugely detrimental to him.

After the phone call send them an email outlining what has been said so you have proof in writing. Maybe remind them that he'll be leaving soon - they may be willing to do more if they realize that it's only for a couple more months.

Could it be as he gets bigger or on days of a really bad day he's venturing into territory of hurting younger children in a serious way .

I totally understand that he wouldn't ever intentionally do this but it maybe that your son is completely outside of the nursery skill set to deal with (even with their expertise in this area a everyone has a limit I suppose) and may need very different care ratio than the one he's got now .

which if is the case he must be entering into the realms of hurting other or himself in a very frequent and or higher intensity way.

It maybe risk levels have increased and they foreseeing it a for gone conclusion and therefore insurances won't cover it as something is going to happen and it's become unsafe

That sounds really tough I'm sorry. Do you have a place lined up for the future?

I know right.

DS was a bit irritable when he was dropped off this morning so I asked for an update in an hour or so to tell me how he's doing. Nobody called so I called them and was told "it's manageable"

I could hear DS in the background shouting but was assured it was OK and they have it under control.

Alot of brilliant advice here thank you all

Just chatting to OH now and he suspects it'll be a staffing issue that they omitted to mention as they don't want it highlighting.

Parents don't go past the foyer when dropping off and picking up so we don't know how many staff are working on any given day.

There has been quite a high turn over since DS started two years ago. The only consistent staff members are the young apprentices who have been there since he enrolled, the other members of staff seem to come and go quite regularly.

If it is due to a staffing issue and they're not able to manage something like this for that reason, where do we stand? What does that change?

Two things stand out and the first one I'll approach with a question.
If it's a special needs school/nursery, where's the sensory room? There really ought to be one or at least a sensory space.

The second thing that jumps out at me is that your little boy comes across as totally stressed in this environment. What's the staff to student ratio like? Does he have a key worker assigned to him?

I would ask what they are putting in place to help behaviour such as sensory breaks if finding it difficult to regulate. I would also ask have they got observations to highlight triggers (used to drive me mad when told that my ds was doing things out of blue when there was always a trigger and was just them using excuses and as soon as I asked what had happened before could easily see what had happened) I would also ask for early annual review. They can't use new children as excuse, they should have risk assessed to see if they could meet all childrens needs and that they had appropriate staff ratios. Good luck. If it was school it would be seen as unofficial exclusion but not sure how it works in nursery. Certainly in school they would be in trouble. It can be impossible to know what kind of day it will be and alot of time it's based on outside factors so how do they expect you to know

So the nursery is based in a church hall, the nursery have the use of the hall, an office and a smaller room which is the 'quiet room'

That smaller room is used for the children's nap time (nap time is generally from 1pm - 2ish) but when not used for sleeping it is used for watching videos on a projector and winding down at the end of the day. There are bean bags etc. I see no reason that DS couldn't have been taken in there to calm down.

He did have a named key worker but she left some months ago. New staff have started since but we haven't been made aware of another appointed keyworker.

Sorry I forgot to add, there are (I think) 14 or 15 children in total but I'm not sure how many of those are in every day as DS only does two days.

Staff wise there are 2 longterm apprentices and i believe 3 other members of staff including the nursery manager, but the nursery manager isn't always there as sometimes she does half days and all 3 staff members aren't always in at once.

OH does pick up and drop off and he never gets past the foyer.

The OP has said that he hasn’t hurt anyone. And even if what you say is true, they have processes that they have to follow. They cannot simply greet the father at the door and say the child can’t come back to school starting tomorrow.

They have to demonstrate that they cannot meet his needs - so first they have to have in writing what his specific needs are, the measures they have taken to meet those needs and what has failed and why they cannot meet the needs. Then the LA can put adequate support into place to ensure that he can access education.

The OP has had no process here, no warning, no opportunity to give input, no understanding of what exactly the problems are, how they were attempted to be addressed. Was any outside consultation taken, what did the nursery do to try to adequately meet his needs?

Good suggestion RE asking for observations to highlight triggers. I've made a note to mention that when they call.

As far as I know its not an official exclusion, basically they want us to agree not to send him in if he's having a day like he has today.

As a PP Haa highlighted it's just impossible to know how his day will be as hour to hour his mood can change.

Yes just to reiterate he has never hurt another child, not once in the two years he has been there.

I've got a list written down with the points highlighted here, just waiting for the call now. Manager told OH she'll call me to go over what she has said to him.

Just had a text to say she's going to call in 15 mins so I'll update with the outcome

Throwing toys could hurt other children. As they have new starters in I would consider agreeing to their request.

@MahsAllToff firstly I have a SEN child so I know OPS struggle. Unfortunately I have also seen this play out badly for the child because process doesn't often protect the child but often about risk management and protecting themselves.

I'm simply saying that her child may need more support than what he's getting and or they can provide. Now would I want my child in a place where they don't have the ability to look after them at the rate my child knows. It's a two way street and people stating facts doesn't mean the others being attacked. The facts are simply as they are. I certainly wouldn't want my child hurting themselves to such a extent and them saying well we warned you and you took on the risk as such.

Throwing toys could hurt other children. As they have new starters in I would consider agreeing to their request.

That's one of his default behaviours when he's stressed or in meltdown, throwing things. They know him well enough to know when he's edging towards a meltdown that's what they can expect.

At home we remove anything that could be used as a missile and move him away from the other children. Surely they can do the same at nursery?

They can't expect parents to keep children home because they're throwing things, it's a nursery full of autistic children, children with suspected ADHD and children with learning disabilities, there would be no children there if they excluded every one who displayed challenging behaviour.

I totally acknowledge that they have a duty of care toward the new starters but their duty of care toward DS doesn't end where theirs begin iyswim.

It sounds like they are finding him too challenging to manage. I think that I would be asking them what needs to be in place to manage in the short term given that he will soon be attending specialist school. If he needs 1:1 how can they organise this? How do you fund his care? Is it a private nursery? I think ultimately they could exclude him or ask you to collect him if they think his behaviour is unmanageable. Obviously, that's not great practice but to try and avoid this, you need to focus on how they can cope in the short term. Saying they are an SN nursery and therefore should be managing isn't going to cut it. Children are excluded from specialist provisions. Not all children with asd can be managed in any SN setting.

I don't understand the people here saying he needs more support than the nursery can provide and so he should just stay home when you have no idea what if anything has been put in place to support him - does he have a 1:1? Doesn't sound like it so why haven't they done that if he needs more support? what about his needs, how is him staying home meeting them? Not to mention that throwing off his routine by him not going could really affect him. Why are his needs less important than others?

The whole new starters thing is bull shit - if a child throws a block and it hits a 3 year old it's going to hurt just as much as a 2 year old. If that's really the issue then why is it acceptable for 3/4 year old to be potentially hit by a block but not a 2 year old new starter?

It's one day, to ensure the newbies can settle. As I said, maybe just consider it from their pov.

As a mum to a child with asd and having worked with children with additional needs. No way should they be sending him home for behaviour. There is always different strategies to use. I've never had to send home a child because of their behaviour. If they are getting physical or going into a melt down then I've failed to recognise a trigger or something happened that I've been unable to prevent but that on me not the child. It's says alot more about the pre school then anything else.

Agreed. And excluding hun for a day will only escalate his behaviours as he needs the routine to support his emotional regulation as the OP has said that he knows his routine of days at nursery.

I suppose just from my experience, my child did better in another nursery that were used to the trades they held. Less children, more consistent care and better supervision.

The reality is, if tescos doesn't have what you need in stock, you don't demand they produce it out of thin air. Especially if your requiring double the amount you usually purchased. You just go to another place that can provide what you need and at the quantity you need it.

Nurseries are a paid for provision, you are assessing their ability to provide care as much as they are providing a service. Schools are slightly different in this regard.

Should this happen, no but do a child's needs change naturally, does a child that is sen change more frequently absolutely. You have to adapt to what that child needs and the Nursey may not be able to meet that need anymore.

I feel for op and what this implies for the child and her, sen children are challenging at best of times but they simply don't get easier or simpler as they get older.

It's frustrating but currently that's the society we live in in terms of support for sen children and we can scream all we want about it but real change is slow. We all have to do our best given the cards that have been dealt.

So I've spoken to her.

Before I could even get to the bullet points I had prepared she said not to worry because there's a change of plan and he can come in now but she wants it to be after 10am, rather than at 9am, as she has a hospital appointment in the morning and she wants to be there when DS is, as she's the member of staff best placed to manage his behaviour if he becomes agitated.

So it seems like the other members of staff can't handle the challenging behaviour, which I can believe for the young apprentices as they're late teens and only have their current experience from being where they are whereas manager is a qualified HV who has worked with SN children for decades.

I'm not sure why the other, older members of staff wouldn't be able to manage him though.