To think that a five year old boy should not be permanently excluded from school?

[whatatanker]

My son has been threatened with permanent exclusion today.

His behaviour is poor, but I have honestly tried so many things - have an older son, who is absolutely delightful and enjoys school.

He is 5 weeks into school in his reception year. He’s emotionally immature and struggles to sit still and has started hurting others in the classroom.

Should this really be happening?

It’s a bit fucking early to be deciding the child can’t cope with mainstream. It sounds as if precisely nothing has been done to get to the root of his behaviour and try to address it. There could be some very straightforward adjustments that could make a huge difference.

yes they always get so nasty and nobody seems to direct their anger at a broken system that is failing all these children.

Do people know how BLOODY HARD it is to get a place at a specialist school? To get an ECHP? How long the waiting lists are?

I sympathise with everybody in these types of situations and as a mum of an NT and ND child I have experienced BOTH sides of the coin (yes newsflash we don’t all fit into the neat boxes of ‘bad mum of biting child’ and ‘good mum of frightened child’ lots of us have experienced being both at different times) and it can be a crappy situation for everybody involved.

But these threads always seem to try and paint mums of disabled children as the bad guys. 99% of the time you have a parent who obviously cares and feels mortified about what is happening and it absolutely stuck because there is no help and support or anywhere to turn to. Getting extra help for a child even once diagnosed can be such a long exhausting fight. Special school places can be like absolute gold dust and again a long fight. It’s exhausting and isolating and only made worse by feeling judged and shunned by other parents for none of your own doing :(

@Whydothat the idea that just excluding him without changing anything would then mean either another school (hurting different children) or no school.
That's what those who say "yes exclude, my child can't be near him" seem to be saying.
The answer may be preventive strategies, trained 1:1, or a specialist setting but just excluding will only move the problem.

Good grief - she didn't say her child was disabled - she said she has tried everything with his behaviour - he is hitting and biting other kids. There are children who do this and do no have SEN. Until he has been diagnosed why are you all saying he needs a diagnosis?

Perhaps he's just poorly behaved and mum hasn't managed to work with the school to better assist him.

No he doesn't have a 1 to 1.

I can't work out if it's special needs issue or parents or a combo of both potentially with parents refusing to get an assessment. Parents appear totally oblivious and like kid is delightful. Nice middle class professional parents I might add.

There been issues with other kids in the class previously but vicious kid has now settled on making friends with my son... Its not a healthy relationship. Don't want to go into details but third child is clearly being bullied. DS is getting dragged into the mix. We've decided to intervene and are going to start documenting everything because we fear it's going to be a long haul to get any kind of intervention.

In the meantime two kids are regularly getting hurt in the name of inclusion. And the education of the whole class is really suffering.

Ive seen it unfolding first hand both in class whilst helping and first hand out of school. It's not just DS and his friend coming up with this. We know at least one other parent had major issues before too. We are now several years down the line and it's still clearly happening. We've had an incident this week which teachers haven't even noticed. Its deeply troubling.

It looks like it's going to be up to us and the other set of parents to make a concerted effort to get SOMETHING done. Whether that be support or child kicked I don't know. The status quo can't continue.

We are going to be really officious about it because we know there is a back story with other parents and we want to get this in writing to get it taken seriously before something more serious happens.

Its not fair on any of the kids involved.

@Coucous Have you actually met a 4-year-old with those behaviours at school who was just being naughty? Because I haven’t.

Yes I have - hitting other children frequently - mum refused to speak to school and made dad go in instead. He is better behaved now in class but still a bit energetic but not violent with friends outside which isn't too unusual for boys with lots of energy. He seems to now know what behaviour is expected of him in different settings.

Well if he's hurting other children then yes he needs to leave.....I would be pissed if my child was constantly hurt at school.

OP please ignore everyone saying he should be removed to safe guard other children. It’s just as likely what he needs is a 1-2-1 both to support him and to step in before he injures anyone. The LA have a responsibility to provide a suitable place for him. That may be with support in mainstream or it may be in a special school. It’s far too early for anyone to be talking about permanent exclusion.

@drspouse other schools have more resources to deal with things like this. A child behaving like this for any reason is not going to learn to control their emotions or behaviour whilst being forced to fit in a box that they aren't ready to fit in. The fact it can take a year to get the child help is madness, you have not only caused more damage to them but also to 29 other children. Schools and local authorities are failing all the children involved but I would refuse to go to a place I felt unsafe everyday so I don't expect my child to be in that position.

In our case, kid needs less other kids in class as well as 1 to 1 support imho, with where it's at.

Its highly possible he's sen but there's clearly an issue with the parents too. They simply aren't supervising and intervening when they should be. And both DH and I have been stunned over a number of incidents like this. They've been completely Awol.

Kid really needs 24/7 attention, 1 to 1 including over breaks, just to keep him nd others safe. That's not happening.

I totally agree. I do voluntary work in education rights and the desperation and unmet need out there is like a tidal wave.

I’d remind parents that at any time any of them could have a child with additional support needs, no one expects or thinks it’s OK for children to be hurt but FFS this child is 5, it’s really not OK just to Chuck him out of school and pass him around from school to school without trying to identify what is going on and put support in place.

Doesn’t seem right if he has been offered a specialist setting (and the cost/funding that entails) yet no extra support in mainstream?? He must have an EHCP? Certainly where I live you can’t even consider a specialist school without an EHCP. Sounds like a rubbish situation and everyone is being failed.

Other people's kids are not punching bags in the name of inclusion.

Its not good enough if its a year. Kid has to go sooner,if its going to be that long...

This is as a result of a system that tries to shoehorn kids into mainstream without identifying whether it actually meets their needs. It fails all the children.

What strategies do you use at home that school would benefit from knowing? You know him best, what are his triggers and things that support him, is this all completely new or did his school have a support plan I. Place that could be used as well

The level behaviour displayed by OP’s DS is classed as SEN in its own right. You don’t require a diagnosis to be considered to have SEN. (nor btw do you need a diagnosis to be considered disabled.)

Until he has been diagnosed why are you all saying he needs a diagnosis?

Now is the time to suggest OP seeks an assessment for any potential diagnoses, what would be the point in suggesting it once he had already been diagnosed?

So if your child thumps another you'd 100% support his/her exclusion? Really?

OP if there’s an education special needs board why not post there or ask for this to be moved. You and your child need some help, not endless posts putting the boot in, and telling you that other children have a right not to be hurt, which I am fairly sure you already know 🙄x

You and your child need some help, not endless posts putting the boot in, and telling you that other children have a right not to be hurt, which I am fairly sure you already know 🙄x

This!

Also all the posts about ‘just putting’ a child into a specialist setting or ‘just getting’ a 1-to-1 in a different space.

Im sooo glad there’s an abundance of special school places and 1-to-1 TAs that we can just get like that! 🙃 Thank you to all the parents of non-SEN kids for offering all this invaluable advice I’d never thought of doing that!

But you'd also be concerned about the other child right?

No one has diagnosed him. Posters have, rightly, suggested that an assessment of his needs should be carried out and that there may be SEN.

SEN refers to education needs, specifically that the child needs support in one or more areas to enable them to access the curriculum. The four broad areas of SEN are communication and interaction, cognition and learning, social/emotional/mental health difficulties, and physical and/or sensory needs. The child may well have difficulties in one or more of these areas requiring support, in which case he would have SEN. This is not a diagnosis or a condition or disability, it is purely an indicator of support needs. There is often overlap between SEN and SN (special needs, i.e., a condition and/or disability) but you can have a child with SEN and no corresponding SN. You can also have a child with SEN who, once the correct support is in place, progresses and improves to a point where that support is no longer needed at which point they no longer have SEN.

I say this as the mother of a child who was bitten by another child in Reception this week, no he shouldn’t be being threatened with permanent exclusion so early in the term.

You do need to sit down with the teacher and the SENCO though, and come up with a behaviour plan for him. The school should be on with this anyway - parents will be asking how the school is going to keep their children safe if the hitting / biting continues.

The child who hurt mine yesterday clearly needs 1-1 TA support, and if the school isn’t going to provide that, and the biting continues, then it’s a safeguarding issue.

Believe me, merry hell is going to be raised this week over it.

Whole class is wild. Lots of other stuff going on. More than one very difficult case. There's an abnormal level of special needs on top of the violent child and known serious sen kid.

The class currently has 1 ta. It needs at least two unfortunately.

This is in a good area. I know the school are generally regarded as good on sen (parents of sen kids at the school I've spoken to have all been really positive and say they have been proactive rather than reactionary)

Something is off with the handling of this violent kid though. I've been told through the Parent Tom Tom's head isn't happy and has said as much to his parents but parents are unhappy with the what the head has said (this has allegedly come from the mum herself). I do take with a pinch of salt but it would make sense if there is some sort of dispute / stand off between school and parents over handling violent kid.

I'm at a real loss and do feel it's going to be a battle all the way to protect DS and his friend who is also getting hurt.

Its a right bloody mess.

Of course they’re not but school need to put extra support in place now, while the application for an EHCP goes in. Schools get funding for special needs support as part of their ordinary budget, they need to use it now.