SEN child in park

[AD1509]

This happened a few weeks ago but has been playing on my mind. Myself, DD (4) and DS (7) were in a fairly large local park. There is a piece of equipment that is always popular- it’s basically a spinning seesaw. Two girls around 10 had been on for a while and once they vacated, my two children were quick to hop on. With in around 20 seconds one of the girls returned and said to me “can I have a go?”. I replied “oh they’ve just gotten on but once their go has finished it can be your turn again”. The girl immediately responded “Can I have a go?”. At this point I noticed the sunflower lanyard. I couldn’t see any parents nearby. So I tried “They will be done in 2 minutes then you can get back on”. At this point the child started yelling “get off, get off, get off”. With no parents in sight to advise- I then said “let’s set a 2 minute timer and then they will be done”. The child then ran at the equipment, towards my 4 year old in an attempt to grab the seat. What actually happened was she got smacked full speed in the face by the spinning seesaw and fell to the ground. She also nearly knocked my 4 year old DD off who was now hanging off the seat whilst it continued to spin. My immediate attention was to ensure DD was secure (and the seesaw had stopped spinning). After that I tried to attend to the now wailing child
lying on the floor. As no one approached I started to gesture towards them whilst yelling “is this child’s parent here?”. After a few moments I noticed a man and women sat on a bench on the other side of the playground visually acknowledge us, the man then came across and attended / tried to encourage the child to to leave the seesaw and return with him. Which didn’t go well as they continued to scream that they wanted a go. At this point I removed my children from the equipment and we went elsewhere. I am wondering if I should have dealt with this differently. Once you noticed the child was SEN would you remove your children immediately? Should
I have not engaged with the child directly at all once I realised that were SEN and instead tracked down the parents? Obviously it didn’t turn out well with the child getting injured. I’m wondering what would be the best approach if it happens again as they may also be local to us.

I’m a mum, posting on a forum for parents. I’m not endlessly ruminating on the parenting skills of a child I don’t know because they once ran in front of a swing. I really do find that very odd.

as a mother of a sen child who also doesn’t understand social concepts like turn taking I think you handled that really well Op I would have done similar. I also wouldn’t have let my sen child get into that situation in the first place their parents should have been there to supervise and prevent the accident from happening

Neither you nor the child did anything wrong. The issue arises from the parents being so far away and not intervening sooner imho. (I say this as a sen mum) and whilst I don’t helicopter I would have stayed within earshot when we used to go to parks.

You did fine, OP. The thing with SEN kids is that the usual techniques - all of which you tried, which was absolutely right - often don't work. (Which is something the parents of SEN kids get blue in the face explaining.) But you don't know which techniques trigger and which will work - or maybe the child usually is able to process their emotions and today something else went wrong.

I'm not going to blame the parents for taking their eye off the ball, but as the parent to a kid with additional needs, I'm now conditioned to go running when I hear something kicking off in case it's my DC.

My DS has SEN and I can imagine being in a situation like this with him. He doesn’t understand taking turns, social communication and has no danger awareness. He can be very misunderstood to people who aren’t used to him. The thought of a grown adult laughing at the fact he got hurt would make me really sad

Only thing I wouldn't have done is set a timer. I would have just said when my kids are done it's your time. Sorry but I have a child with ASD and really struggles with waiting but that's life and other children deserve to have fun too. This is solely on the parents for not properly monitoring, especially if they know their child cannot wait without support from them. They should have redirected the child so that your children got to enjoy their turn.

There's is no right and wrong and no playbook for an SEN child as it depends so much on the child how to handle it. Some children with ASD/learning difficulties don't understand waiting/queuing. One of mine really struggles (severe learning difficulties on top of ASD). They wouldn't understand a timer either. But you really tried your best and have don't nothing wrong. I thought what you did was really kind. Ultimately, its down to the parents to supervise the child. Shame her parents/carers didn't do that.

How I would've dealt with it too. Child's parents should've kept a closer eye on her. Hope she was ok though.

Of course you’re evil for finding it funny when a child gets injured, you freak.

OP, it’s not your fault try not to dwell on it.

This succinctly and accurately explains exactly why @B1anche is a nasty piece of work.

@B1anche your response isn’t a dark sense of humour - it’s ignorant and twisted. You don’t even seem to want to understand. Do better.

IMO what you did was great.

Sounds to me like parents that have just stuck a lanyard on their child and think that means they no longer need to bother watching her. Poor kid.

This was entirely the parents fault, horrible to see what happened, but you handled it really well OP.

It’s hard to know what a child with SEN’s reaction/understanding is going to be so I would have probably have done something similar. This is why I don’t ever have my DC out of sight as I know he’ll probably do something like this and other people won’t know how to respond/ its not their responsibility to deal with it.

I’m a SEN parent and I think your idea of the timer was excellent. You couldn’t have known what the child would do next and you were absolutely right to re-enforce the concept of turn taking. This is one of those scenarios where fairly taking turns is the best approach for everyone regardless of additional needs. Please don’t doubt yourself, you definitely did the right thing.

Yes that’s really depressing

The OP claims there were two girls of a similar age, so for all we know friends or relatives could have taken the girl out, or they could have just been knackered, or an off day.

Or they could be shit parents. I really feel like the post was inviting everyone to criticise them, which isn’t really something I can get on board with. It can be hard managing behaviour out and about, even with ‘NT’ children. My DD had a massive tantrum yesterday and I was pretty much stuck. Depressing to think others would judge me.

@B1anche Yes, I'm afraid you are awful for being happy at the child injuring herself. That's a really horrible thing to say.

The child was obviously unable to regulate her impulses and should not have been left unsupervised in that situation.

OP, it sounds like you were very thoughtful and had a really kind approach to dealing with the child, even if things ended up with her getting injured and you concerned about possible injury risk to your kids. Unfortunately ime many people would not have behaved as considerately as you.

Going forward, if this child is a regular at your park/play area, I would engage with the parents to see if they understand how much supervision their daughter needs for safe play around other children (especially much younger children as in your case). If they are clueless and won't provide adequate supervision then I would avoid using the equipment at the same time in order to avoid any of the children getting injured. I would also tell the parents why I was doing it in the faint hope that the message eventually gets through.

I have a Sen child and think you did the right thing. I teach my son he has to wait his turn. He struggles but he can’t get his own way all the time. The parents were at fault here for not watching her. You did nothing wrong.

I agree you handled it well OP

Put the shovel down and stop digging.

I think you handled it really well OP and it’s just bad luck that your ideas didn’t quite work to keep the kid from injuring themselves this time.
Other ideas that can help in similar situations with kids who aren’t quite understanding turn taking or playground safety either because they are just young or because they have some SEN that means they haven’t developed those skills yet:
Sometimes swings are other potentially dangerous equipment have some kind of visual marker that shows where it’s safe to stand while you wait - something like a box painted around the swings or a half fence or even the colour or texture of the ground surface. You can explain to the child that the rule is children must stand there while they wait for their turn.
Sometimes you can distract kids by sending them to act their grown up a question/tell them something. So you could say ´Have you got a grown-up with you today? Go and tell them it’s your turn to go on the swing in 2minutes when the timer goes off’. - This had the added bonus of alerting their parent/babysitter to the situation!
Of course, these ideas may or may not work depending on the child’s level of understanding and desire to listen to other parents in the park.

It's so depressing that others would support your totally horrible reaction. It does not suprise me but it does disappoint me. Some people are truly awful.

Not really, when the behaviour being mentioned sounds like autism?

You did the right the thing. You noticed the child's lanyard but also with their parent not being there that the child's needs were such that they didn't need a parent shadowing them to help them enjoy the equipment.

You explained very clearly in 3 different ways that they would get their turn soon.

You were with your own children helping them with the play equipment and also helping them to navigate any tricky social situations, the parents should have been doing the same.

Same. My son really cannot delay gratification at all, and we're working very hard with different therapies and interventions to try and teach waiting and patience, but no the OP didn't do anything wrong.

In fact the setting a timer thing was wonderful, because it's a good visual and auditory aid.

The kids parent is actually at fault here because if they know their child also cannot delay gratification they should be on standby to redirect. Instead their child got harmed and nearly harmed another child because of their lack of supervision.

I do think there's a place for playground politics and letting kids work it out for themselves especially SEN kids but if you have a child who can and does get physical you hang close by to intercept this before it becomes a nuisance or worse.