Can’t get my child to school

[Palmtreesinthewinds]

What would you do? really need help/advice 🙏

We live in another country where they start formal schooling at age 6.
My dc was in pre school part time from age 4-6 (she turned 6 end of July)
In May she got ill and stayed off Pre school, she is only really recovering now (still not 100% but we’re hopefully getting there)
She tried Year 1 for two half days in September and couldn’t cope, we just tried back this week and she found the work too hard and was very anxious and wants to stay with me.
I just cannot get her to school, she gets very very upset about it and once in, cries a lot and they call me to come and pick her up.

I don’t know what to do at all.
Legally I have to have her in school, we’ve had the Drs reports and absence letters up until now, but their recommendation is to try to get her back to school.

What would you do?

You poor things, you've really been through it and it must have been awful to see your DD unwell; I imagine it's not just your daughter who's been altered by this experience.

I haven't been through this situation as a parent but had in some regards a similar experience at the same age as your DD. For me, long term it wasn't helpful to 'give in' to my anxiety and prolong the time I was out of school, although I know my parents acted in what they thought was my best interest. It seems like putting your DD back a year, pressing reset on both the learning side of things and the emotional sticking point would be the most holistic and healthy option and I'd push as hard as you can for that.

In terms of coming back to the UK you'll likely find it very difficult to get your DD into year 1 rather than year 2, and even year 1 would be a big jump in terms of where she was last at and comfortable (not just with her education but the structure, reduction of play etc) so not necessarily much help even if it was possible.

Year One teacher over here. There may be some ND to explore and you owe it to your daughter to chat with her school on their views and seek further assessment if you or school feel it necessary.

However, the bottom line is that she has to be attending school. It needs to be very, very gradual. School for an hour and then home, the next week increase to an hour and a half, the following week 2 hours etc.

You may need to go right back to the start and ask if you can be in the classroom for that 1 hour, then the next week perhaps you’re ’helping the teacher’ in the corridor, the next week you tell your daughter you’re popping to grab a cup of tea from the staff room / canteen but will be back in 10 minutes and keep to that promise, maybe leave your daughter with a timer so she can see visually when to expect you back.

start really small but keep to the plan. Hopefully you build trust with your daughter that you always come back but help her to learn that there is no negotiation and mummy knows what’s best for her and that is to be learning at school and making friends.

Sympathy for your whole family. Your idea to get her back to pre-school and then start Year 1 again in the summer sounds a good one. It will help her to get used to speaking Portuguese in a more formal setting. I think that if you came back to the UK most children her age would going into Year 3 after the summer, as she would be 7 by then? Although you might find it easier to access a larger homeschooling community here.

Unfortunately OP has said that the school (in Portugal) do not allow parents into the classroom.

This is sound advice.

You need to change your attitude and make school positive and make her go. She’s 6. She doesn’t get a choice. Make her stay at school otherwise she knows she can cry and go home. Be out and unavailable .

She did say PANS diagnosis and that pretty much covers everything - and if you don’t know what that means it is on the poster to check IMO rather than the OP relive traumatic times unnecessarily

its also been pointed out what that diagnosis means by myself and others as well

My DD had a doctor’s certificate, allowing her to go for a few hours a day, just the afternoon to start with, to get her use to going across the threshold, bumping it up as she gains confidence. Ask for DD to redouble, which is done often in Europe. Another idea is to ask to go to another nearby school.

Schooling in the UK is so different to other European countries.

When you restart her year at school, you can tell her you’ll wait outside for her so she knows you won’t be far away. And try that thing you see on social media where you draw a heart on her hand and one on your hand and you can press them when you miss each other. I know they sound like daft little things, but when it comes to children little things are the big things. It also really helps if they have a friend to go in with, maybe the teacher could buddy her up with someone?

Many years ago my daughter experienced the same. It was so difficult at the time but take hope - we got it sorted eventually and she ended up going to a great university and doing well in life. Never enjoyed school tho, just tolerated it. She finds big groups too loud and chaotic. Anyway - what we did at the time was help her associate the place with nice things. We took her to the playground at weekends and had picnics there ( school were very accommodating in this) and for a long time took her for as ‘joining in treats’ every day she went in all day. Things like cafe visits, petting zoo visits, going to all sorts of nice places of her choice afterwards or doing especially fun things together at home eg baking, painting, dancing, crafting together etc. We also got her a lovely dolls house that she wanted and did decorating andfurniture/accessories shopping if she went to school. No punishment or sanctions just no rewards, dullness and boredom if she doesn’t go in. We left weekends as relatively dull so she’d need to be at school first for fun stuff. I also read a lot to her and encouraged her own reading so she felt more engaged in learning and learned to value it. It took a lot of perseverance and constantly stressing the great stuff that comes out of ‘joining in’ never the negatives of the situation. She was evidently stressed enough about the issue. It took a whole lot of investment and perseverance - and a monumental effort on our part to not get frustrated and negative but entirely worth it in the end. Trying not to let her see you stressed about it in the mean time is key tho I think. She was really bad for the first year so don’t expect miracles too soon.

You need to relax about this. If she wants to be with you then let her. Maybe you can take her out to educational places, do some reading with her at home. I think as parents we worry unnecessarily. Also why she is with you, you could maybe look at getting her some counselling, I know she is young but they could introduce play as a way of helping her. What's the worst thing that could happen apart from her being happy. I have lasting trauma from things I went through as a child and I think if there had been more understanding and compromise regarding my issues, I wouldn't have gone through what I did. Just take each day as it comes, work on her confidence around separation and stay calm and relaxed. Everything will work out just fine x

This is great advice which I’ve found helpful with my own child, especially the school social story. I’d do this asap so that you can read through her school day with her so that she knows what’s expected of her.

It helps my child enormously as they hate the thought of the unknown. It helps them to “study” for their day until they are settled.

You obviously understand your child's needs very well and she has had a rough time. You need to ask for professional support and work with the school to increase her resilience but she absolutely should not be left there when distressed.

I think you need to leave her at school - she’s 6.5 now so is plenty old enough for you to have a good talk with her and explain that it’s natural she is going to find the work hard, but that will only improve by staying at school and working with the teachers to catch up. I would also make it clear to her the parameters of being at school, and staying at school for the whole day, whilst reassuring her that you will be there to drop her off and be there to pick her up, every day, on time. At the moment she’s learning that if she feels worried and cries, she can go home. She’s not doing it to be manipulative, but it will become an issue if you and the school don’t work together to keep her in class. at 6.5 she is old enough for you to let her know that she needs to be at school and will be staying at school even if she gets upset, and then follow through with it. Could you work with her teacher and her to make a new plan for what happens when she feels anxious or upset? So for example, maybe there is a specific adult she can go to, and a different place or activity she can do to calm down and then rejoin the class. If you take her out of school until next year then the work will be much harder for her to catch up to and surely that will compound the problem?

At my sons school there is a ‘quiet room’ where children who are feeling overwhelmed can go to, to calm down and self regulate, along with a TA or the deputy headmistress who is great at pastoral care. They also have a support dog available, who can go to the quiet room if needed. Is there anything like that for your daughter to utilise? Basically it’s about deciding whether you want to/ are able to home school her (possibly long term) adequately or whether you need and want her to be in school and making that change. It’s probably easier in the long run to make that change cold-turkey rather than a long drawn out phased approach which is more likely to be confusing for a child. Short term pain for long term gain.

@Palmtreesinthewinds Don't you think your child would be better in the UK? Is there a possibility for you to move back?

Therapeutic intervention seems the only way to go.

She has had Encephalitis! She is not going to be ready for full days at school for quite some time (one of the things frequently mentioned about recovery is the extreme tiredness) and certainly isn't going to be able to catch up, especially as she already has several things against her (not entirely fluent in the language, summer baby, missed loads due to being extremely ill) and her brain will almost certainly still be healing.

@Palmtreesinthewinds I'd see about dropping her down a year (it is by far the simplest solution) and just doing what bits she feels able to do now (in the year below) whilst she is still so wiped out. I can't imagine the school not helping with this as they can obviously see that she can't cope with a full day and must be aware of how long the recovery can take. I'd also approach https://www.encephalitis.info/ for support groups, information and general support.

OP, you said in response to my last post that you gave the diagnosis near the beginning of the thread, but you didn't give us details such as ' She finds it tricky to colour for longer than 5 minutes some days and forgot what month came after February the other day.' This is what I was referring to, as this detail shows just how much she is struggling, and why she will be finding her school work difficult, as if she can't even do this some days, she certainly can't be expected to think in Portuguese, and react to instructions etc., without one on one teaching. Just telling us that she's anxious and is struggling with the school work, doesn't give enough context as to what the actual problem is, in my opinion.

I really don't understand why you won't teach her yourself, as you are going to be MUCH more understanding and patient when dealing with the problems she has, than a teacher who has a whole class of other children to deal with.

As a pp stated, I said what the diagnosis was above, if you didn’t know, it’s easy to give a quick Google, rather than me going into a long list of things that have happened.
As I also said in the thread, I can teach her, but it’s a complex process here and also she’s highly sociable and there aren’t many homeschoolers here. She has a large group of friends and neighbour pals on the street, but during the week they’re all obviously in school. This is what i’m trying to weigh up, what is the best option for her

No advice OP just wanted to send hugs and sympathy. I googled your daughter’s condition and my god I can’t believe some people would pile on if they’d read about it! Easy enough to google! Sounds horrendous and so difficult do all of you. I hope she’s feeling much better and her recovery continues. She sounds like a bright girl so when she’s better and ready I’m sure she will catch up on any missed schooling without issue. I wish you all the best OP.

Thank you so much ☺️

6 is way too old! They get too used to their status quo by 6. I expect that's why she's struggling. I didn't know any countries waited until 6, wow

Eh? Yes lots wait until 6/7 and focus on learning through play. There are lots of studies about the benefits of this. 4 is way too young for formal learning imo.

The majority of countries start compulsory school at 6 or 7. There's only a handful that start at 5.

https://www.theglobaleconomy.com/rankings/Primary_school_starting_age/

But many of those have compulsory kindergarten/preschool from 3/4