Holiday club and SEN child

[Veeanna]

My son is 6. He has ASD and ADHD. I am a lone parent and work full time so have put him in holiday club. I had no other option. It seemed really nice to start but they just keep reporting issues to me. Mainly that he doesn't listen. Today they said it was time to tidy toys away and he 'point blank refused' because he hasn't played with all of them. I asked if they had given a 10 minute warning or similar and they hadn't. I can see what happened, they wanted to stop what he was doing immediately with no warning at all, which is incredibly hard for him. I get a list of these kind of issues every day where they're asking me to talk to him about it.

They said they were fine with kids with additional needs but they don't seem to have a clue.

I guess my main gripe is that there is so little affordable provision for kids who have AuDHD over the holidays. School deal with him brilliantly, but his teachers are highly qualified and the sendco is amazing. I can't expect that from a summer club.

I could honestly cry right now. All the other kids seem to just run out to their parents, and I always get list of all the things he's done wrong. I also got the vibe that she just didn't want him there and seemed quite off with me. This might be me being overly sensitive.

What does everyone else do?

Have you looked for anything more suitable? I doubt any of them have had SEN training so it's not really their fault they don't know what to do. Would be better all round to try and get him into a setting that meets his needs.

There are a couple but they're over £55 a day and I just don't have that kind of money.

The total lack of childcare that is suitable for children with sen is a disaster.

I feel your pain. There very often is nothing more suitable. There is no right to childcare in the way there is education. There can be some charities running respite clubs but they generally involve bidding for places for minimal amounts of time.

Would a nanny arrangement be possiblr? Like a uni student doing social care or wanting to go into teaching

Why don’t you ask for a meeting with the manager.
point out behaviours they have highlighted and tell them how you have had to adapt for your son’s needs?

little swaps they could do- such as a 10 minute warning. Asking if he’d like to help rather than ordering.

Have they got a dedicated member of staff for children with additional needs?

I've also booked it for the month as everything gets booked up so quickly, and it's non refundable. He got on so well in their taster sessions. Think I was a bit delusional that it'd all be ok.

If you don’t have another option for childcare I would push back with them. I’d write him a one page profile about his strength & how they can support him. Things like a warning when activities are coming to an end. They need to make “reasonable adjustments” so I’d use that phrase & explain that means understanding that he isn’t able to help tidy up sometimes. Demand avoidance is a trait of Autism & causes him real anxiety & a fight or flight response. Maybe take some printed info as well as the specific one page profile.

How long is he there for? Do you have time to order a sand timer on Amazon and ask them to use this when asking him to transition between activities/ give notice that said activity will be ending soon?

This is a good idea and I'm going to do this now. Thank you. I have given them a verbal list but I think it really needs to be reiterated.

Have you given them a quick reference info sheet on your son to help them?

I have a 10 minute sand timer!

I put everything in the application form when I signed him up. They have a specific SEN form that asks for things they can do to help him, where I wrote about 10 minute warnings, but it's obviously a tick box as they didn't have a clue.

Bring it with you tomorrow and also if they can use the ‘now and next’ method eg now we are playing with Lego, and next we will be painting

Some really good ideas here on giving the info to staff. I hope it works out.

It is a nightmare OP- we have two DC with complex SEN and get very little holiday help. The playscheme they go to is £112 a day each and get 3 days over the holidays. I have a job which gives me school holidays off otherwise I wouldn’t be able to work at all.

Hmm, I'd take a different approach really

It's not that bad that he didn't tidy up the toys. Yes, it's not ideal, but did he play nicely for the rest of the day? With other kids? Enjoy himself? Polite etc?

We had a similar report yesterday at day camp. Siblings squabbling. Camp monitor said it wasn't ideal. Ok, it's not ideal but... Who cares??? They behaved otherwise -

I have a laminated one page sheet on the front of my child’s backpack. Three clear sections

I need…
(things like her routine/ clear instructions/ reminders to go to the toilet)

i like..
(Activities she really likes)

if i am finding things tricky then please…
(give me time and space, write down instructions rather than just verbal, offer me my fidgets)

I want to make it as easy as possible for the staff and her. I know they probably won’t read a detailed care plan but they have no excuse not to look at this. It might help?

I think you have to be realistic that a lot of holiday clubs are staffed by students so the level of qualification and experience will be very different from a school setting. I’ve been quite aware that the camp my kids are in this week doesn’t seem to have anyone on site over the age of about 22.i’ve always been a bit happier when there is someone more experienced around as I think it does make a difference in case of emergencies but also for behaviour management in general.

If he’s happy and the staff haven’t asked him to leave I’d just crack on as you are and see if there are any methods or tools that would help with behaviour but otherwise I wouldn’t worry too much.

There were three women there today, two who are in their 50s. They both told me they'd been doing it for a long time which is part of the reason I liked the club. The 20 something year olds at his after school club on the other hand are fantastic!!

Summer Childcare for SEN kids is just very very hard: honestly if you have found a club that is at least willing to take him, and that he is willing to go to, then you are doing better than most SEN parents. So even though it’s a massive pain it’s worth investing time in making it work now so that you will have it for future years as well.

Agree with those recommending a little sheet about him, just to reiterate the info you already provided in the initial form. At least they may then actually read & take notice of it, it’s worth a try.

After that all you can do is wait and see if the complaints continue or if they ask him to leave. It is really rubbish, especially for SEN kids, my nephew has never managed to last more than a few days at one because they don’t have the experience or the ratio’s to provide the support needed.

Fellow Mum of an AuDHD 6 year old (plus an Autistic 11 year old) here. It's really hard. I ended up taking a pay cut to work term time only because the lack of affordable childcare for SEN is woeful.

I think pp's suggestion of a one page profile is great. I would give them very specific strategies under the "things you can do to help me" section as it seems like they don't have enough knowledge of SEN to come up with their own ideas. So for my DS for example it might be something like "instead of telling me to tidy up, challenge me to see how many toys I can put away in 5 minutes" because he has some demand-avoidant traits. If there's anything they're doing that you think might be triggering him don't be afraid to mention that and suggest an alternative approach.

Definitely lend them the sand timer, and is it worth him having a couple of other familiar items from home that regulate him? Favourite fidget toy or something he likes the texture/smell of for example?

Do you have a small whiteboard at home that they could use for 'Now and Next'? So two columns headed Now and Next and they can write the activities for him, or he can do it himself if he wants to. This works really well in the school where I work, they have it on their table next to them as a reminder.

I would explain that he needs movement to regulate so if it's a sitting down activity like crafts, painting etc he would benefit from a movement break partway through, being allowed to stand up and stim etc. Can they find him jobs to do (such as carrying things, or sweeping up) that will give him proprioceptive sensory input if they notice he's getting a bit 'fizzy'?

This may not be applicable to your DS but just a thought, do they feed him or does he bring lunch and snacks from home? My DS went to a holiday club where lunch was provided and we got the menu in advance but it kept changing on the day and he found that really hard. I solved it by sending him with a 'back up' packed lunch so he had some certainty about what would be available.