ds has refused his first 2 days of year 7

[dinosaursroars]

my ds was due to start year 7 yesterday, he’s got asd but no ehcp which i was already concerned about

i don’t drive so he was going to to with his older brother (y10) on the bus but he wasn’t starting until today so I tried to take him yesterday but was also with my baby in the pushchair and my 5yo.

he got ready and everything but when we were walking to the bus stop he kept saying he didn’t want to go and was getting upset and tried to run in the road and it just wasnt safe as it was just me and also trying to keep an eye on my younger children so i gave in and we went home which probbaly wasnt great

Today I had to do the school run for my 5yo so couldn’t take him in and he was going to go with his brother as planned but he just wouldn’t get dressed he kept saying things like he wanted his old school and he didnt want to start a new school etc so again i gave in as he was going to make my other children late

have phones the school and the head of year 7 is supposed to call me today but hasn’t yet

I just feel like a failure already i was already worried about him going to school and how he’d cope but not actually getting him there i didnt think this would be the issue

in all fairness the child hasnt gone to the first 2 days so we don’t know if school would go badly for him.

OP were there issues in year 6? maybe he just needs routine after the summer holidays.

can dad take him until he gets used to it

Yes I agree. And inclusivity is not the child being in the building as some LAs seem to think.

if this was an option I’m sure it would have been mentioned.

sadly it looks like this could and should have been predicted. You can’t drive but your kids take a bus to school? How do you plan to get there in an emergency? Assuming that’s a taxi, you need to get one now and take him in for a chat with head of year 7 or pastoral team. Letting him come home (to do what??) just extended the problem.

It sounds like you have far too much on your plate with 4 kids. Are you on your own? The 11yo needs attention and specialise support. How are you going to manage that? Are you working as well and if so can you get some time off? What family support do you have?

Just drop him outside the school and tell him he's not allowed back in the house until school has finished. Parents are too soft on their kids nowadays. I would never have been allowed to refuse to go to school. It wouldn't have even occurred to me to refuse.

My son is autistic. Never missed a day of school unless for a legitimate illness.

Lovely attitude to a child with additional needs.
Op you don't need an EHCP to request reasonable adjustments at school to help with his transition to the new school

I hardly think homeschooling is the solution here with 3 other kids and an absent father? OP needs to be focusing on getting them all into school and working herself

I think you need to get Dad involved to either look after the younger ones or do it himself but I think a parent needs to go in with him at first - maybe a little late u til he gets used to it

does he have friends who moved up?

Balloonhearts
Year 7? Seriously? He's what 10/11? He doesn't get a say in whether he goes to school. He does as he's damn well told, even if I had to drag him there by the bloody ear.

Yup, a 10/11 yo can totally be dragged / carried into school (being sarcastic op, don’t worry!!) I agree with everyone the hurdle is getting him in first, so this afternoon/ tomorrow morning. And if you can get some help with the other kids so you’re ready for him that would help

Take him in for afternoon school today.
As many posters have said it will only get more frightening for him as the days pass.
It might be hard for you now but if you leave it it will just get worse and you will have even more problems.

Hopefully he will see it is nothing to be worried about ,but you might have to plan to go with him for the next week or two. Inconvenient as that might be it will be less so than having a school refuser permanently at home.

Agree with the others - get him in now/late. The longer you leave it, the more he will realise he can 'get away' with not attending.

Secondary school is an absolute binfire IMO, but attendance needs to be absolutely mandatory. Mine were met by teachers so that they couldn't run back. Even if they went in late and had to spend the entire day in the SEN room, I was an absolute bitch about it. It was not a negotiation. They had to attend.

In the long run, if you don't get very, very strict about this, you will end up with a 16 year old with no qualifications and even worse mental health - and no future. Your job for the foreseeable is getting him into school.

Did DS have any transition sessions? How did they go?

Did you speak to the SENCO before DS started? What support were they going to provide? Have you requested to speak to them now?

Have you requested an EHCNA yet?

Have you looked at transport?

How do you know that there is one or that this would be an option

Did you miss the part about the child threatening to run into the road?
Seriously....my daughter would have actually done that if I had attempted to just leave her at school.
It's not that simple with a child with Autism.
It really isn't.

She says she has a baby, so that’s a recent thing. And she knew she had an older child with SEN when having that baby, and made a decision to do it anyway. That’s not something people generally do alone so there is probably a dad.

You need to do whatever you can to get him in, OP. I know it's easier said than done, but I know a few school refusers, and the longer you leave it the worse it gets, if you can't make him go on the first day of year 7, when everyone is new, teachers make allowances, and he's still fairly small/young he's never going to go in Year 10 when he's 6 inches taller than you.

Hopefully the school will be able to help, but in the meantime I'd have a 1-1 chat with him this evening explaining that he HAS to go in tomorrow, no ifs or buts, and every day thereafter. Do whatever works, telling him you'll get fined if he doesn't, threats, bribes, whatever.

Can you get a friend or family member to take the 5 year old tomorrow and for the start of next week? Or the big brother? If worst comes to worse it would be better for the 5 year old to be slightly late in these extenuating circumstances just for a day or two than for their brother to miss school again.

If nothing works and he does stay home make it as boring as possible for him. Unplug the router and lock it in the car/give it to a neighbour so he can't go online. Take his phone off him if he has one, etc.

I suspected ADHD with DD2 but never in a million years thought of autism, yet she was also diagnosed with ASD at 13. She is highly sociable and makes friends easily, no academic, behaviour or social concerns at primary school. Yet her anxiety about secondary school was through the roof and unfortunately anxiety and ASD and secondary school refusal go hand in hand.

She takes no meds at all and deals with difficult customers at work, multitasking, very busy shifts in a restaurant with aplomb. At 17 she is staff representative and will start training new staff next month (with a payrise for this). She is fab, I am so proud of her. I just wish secondary schools could stop failing pupils like her left right and centre so badly, I mean how can they not meet the very mild needs of someone like DD2?

Is there an attendance officer at the school you can speak to? Head of year is a good start and hopefully can point you in the direction of as much support you can get from the school.

Can you partner take a few days of annual leave/parental leave so that one of you can give him their full attention in taking him into school? As you've discovered its difficult with a baby and a 5 year old in tow and I think it's a lot to expect his brother to deal with. Also ask to speak to the SENCO not the head of year. This must be something they are used to dealing with. One thought, have you considered breakfast club for him? This worked for a friend of mine, whose son has ASD and wouldn't go into school. He was anxious and overwhelmed, but arriving at school early, with a relatively small group of children, eating together before being taking to his classroom, has really helped him. He had an EHCP though.

You clearly don’t have an SEN child or any understanding of what the OP is going through so please don’t comment.

Do you have anyone who can help you in the mornings? A school refuser and younger DC is a really tough combination.

Today was first day back for ours and I was worried about our occasional refuser. DP was about to sail off to a hobby but I said very firmly that we’d need to take a kid each to get the tricky one into school.

If you don’t have a DP is there a family member or friend who could take one of the other kids?

If you are anxious. He will be pick up on that. If you anticipate that he won’t go. He won’t go.
Outwardly expect him to go. That it is a thing children do. To look forward to it even. It might be better than his last school. Unless he goes he will not know.
But he needs to take his lead from you. That you expect him to go. Not in a hand wringing way either. Just that you do.
I would expect a ten or eleven year old to be able to walk to a bus stop by themselves too.

You will probably need more than one go at getting an EHCP, OP @dinosaursroars I tried at the end of Y7 but was turned down. I never appealed as I thought we would end up home schooling one way or another and having an EHCP might make it harder to withdraw them from school. But it may have unlocked more support. I'm not sure as our local authority and GP were pretty crap on the whole. I felt very let down by the public authorities when we really needed help. Everything was so fragmented.

This is nonsense. I wasn't anxious at all about DD2 going to school and was excited. So was she, outwardly, but still couldn't manage it.