To think excluding SEN child

[bronteemily]

From birthday parties is often reasonable?
Allow me to explain further.

I work in reception year in a primary school and there have been 2 party invites given out this October. One of the SEN children has not received an invitation to either and their mum has been in to complain. We cannot dictate that any child must be invited to something outside of school anyway however without revealing this to the parent, I completely understand why this child hasn’t been invited.

From the children’s perspective, SEN child is very disruptive. Climbs on tables and shouts swear words in the middle of learning time. They kick and hit out at anyone in reach when being removed from the classroom. They scream as loud as possible throughout the day and actively seek out to upset others by ruining their pictures, things they’ve built or just intentionally hitting unprovoked.

Whilst we are working on managing these behaviours and figuring out what strategies will work, the other children are experiencing all of this whilst being only a few months into their first ever school year.

AIBU to think that on their special party day they shouldn’t have to include a child they’re scared of and that unsettles them daily at school? Inclusion is forced upon them at school but they deserve a birthday without having to compromise. They are only 4.

As a parent you have to go small, just a few close friends doing a specific activity, or accept the chaos that comes with a bigger celebration

Nope.

In this scenario, as a parent I'd be happy to invite the whole class whilst excluding the violent and unpleasant child.

I don't have to accept any chaos that comes from a violent kid lashing out and neither does my child.

Children with diagnosed autism etc are different. Those children deserve to be invited as long as they aren’t physically hurting their classmates. If they are then nope. Not every parent has qualified mates on stand by to manage disruptive behaviour and nor should they have to.

We have found a way to do class parties which works for us.
We have ND children ourselves but not disruptive nor violent.

We teach children the concept of consent and then don’t let them make decisions about who they can invite to their own party?

Nonsense !!
GG leaders are not highly qualified and trained to handle SEN and brat kids ….
what training / qualifications are u referring to. and I’ll sign myself up on GO ??????

I can see why the child wouldn’t be invited and why on earth does the mum think complaining to the school will do anything.

I'll defend it.

I think this approach might have worked before the level of mainstreaming that is taking place in classrooms today. Now too many classrooms have too many children who will not / cannot behave and some of their behaviour is truly terrifying to other children: threatening and hurting others, scaring others, destroying their things, etc. We have had children who struggle to come to school because of children like this. And at the moment, there are too many of them in a lot of mainstream classes; the staff is outnumbered on a good day. Imagine what it's like when illnesses start taking out the staff and there's no one to try to support these children and keep them from hurting others.

Why on earth you think they should be included in non-school activities for events thrown by children who are exhausted and traumatised enough by them at school is baffling. It's not bullying. If anything, it's self-preservation. Homes are their safe place hopefully; they shouldn't have to invite the children who are hurting and scaring them into their homes.

We don't tell women to keep trying with their abusive bullying partners; we tell them to leave. But too many people expect children (children!) to put up with bullying and dangerous behaviours from other children day in and day out in classrooms ... primarily because we don't have enough school staff to accommodate them safely or non-mainstream school places for them.

Our son has been invited to maybe 4 parties in his whole 10 years.

In all honestly, we don’t always take him even when he is invited.

It depends which child, where it is, and what the set up of the party is.

All of those things can lead to either absolute birthday ruining disaster, or positive engagement, and if I have the slightest whiff he won’t cope and it’ll impact someone’s birthday, we politely decline.

I invited the whole class because I felt bad leaving one child out (SEN) and the whole party was ruined. He upended the place. It wasn't his fault, he could not help it but I learned my lesson.

Then who's fault was it sen isn't a free pass to do whatever you want

It was my fault. I knew he had behavioural problems but I din't want to exclude just one child because he had SEN.

My son is 7 and has autism. He moved schools in Y2 to nurturing private mainstream. At previous school he was frequently left out from midway through year R and I could understand why - he was in his own world and couldn’t follow the instructions. By Y2 in new school he was invited to most parties and crucially again invited this year which is so nice. His sister is in yR and is NT and we practice more inclusion than most at her parties but it comes at some cost to her experience - I am okay with that as I think it’s important to learn the grace of inclusion, but I wouldn’t invite someone who was frankly violent as ultimately behaviour is communication and I would reason they weren’t going to enjoy it?

Yanbu.

One of my best days was arranging a venue birthday party for many dc that attended my autistic ds's special school. It took a lot of organising of course! Having been the parent of a dc that hadn't been invited and excluded from so many mainstream school activities and birthday parties I knew how important it would be for the dc.

It was a resounding success, big smiles all round and no bad behaviour. The venue said they would be happy to do it again. And I'll never forget the parents who said their dc had never been invited to a party before as I too had been that parent. They got a big hug and understanding from me.

I'm welling up just thinking about it.

I don’t think children should invite anyone they’re afraid of , SEN or not to their parties. Not all children with SEN are the same, not all SENDs are the same, not all NT children are the same.

If someone is causing them distress, they should be able to say they don’t want them at their party.

You’re unreasonable to generalise and make this about kids with SEN.

Everyone's first duty and responsbility is to their own children. It's not at all complicated. Sometimes that can mean including disruptive children, and sometimes it doesn't.

A child's birthday is one of those "doesn't" occasions. A birthday party is for the birthday child and is not a teaching experience or learning opportunity for your child.

It doesn't actually matter, at all, why a birthday is ruined, or another child is disruptive, it matters that they are.

Not everything's for everyone is an excellent lesson to learn early in life.

If I, as an adult, was hit, sweared at, had an event ruined I would in no way tolerate it, would certainly not invite anyone I knew had a good chance of behaving like this, and decent people would not expect me to.

It's bizarre some people think children should have to tolerate intolerable behaviour, when adults in like for like situations could not and do not.

Why can't you reveal to parents that the school has no control over who is invited to parties? It's common sense anyway.

They are exposed to a school classroom five days a week and haven't learned to behave there.

Totally agree! So if there’s a child that would upset the DC on their birthday, definitely don’t invite them. But don’t then also invite every single person BUT them, as that’s just unnecessary cruelty. If an all class party wouldn’t suit your child because there are individuals in their class that they’d rather not see on their birthday, that’s fine. But you can’t in good conscience offer an all-class-except-that-one party. Or if you can, you’re the sort of parent I wouldn’t be spending too much time with.

100%

Well done @TheHateIsNotGood- that sounds like a you pulled a blinder

I think this is extremely important to be aware of. If anything alot of autistic children are extremely polite, and so black and white rigid thinking that they follow the rules to the letter. As pp said if it is known bad behaviour than that is different.

I am on both sides. I don't think invites should ever exclude just one or two children.
I would hope that the parents of these children would either politely decline the invite if they knew their child wouldn't cope or perhaps have a quiet word with the host to explain they will attend but will likely leave early or arrive late to avoid certain parts of the party.
Depending on the activity some children might be very different to how they act in the classroom.
Also outside of school they would have a parent who would hopefully parent, at school resources are so stretched they might not have a 1:1 so no one to help fix their behaviour.

Absolutely this.

Invite anyone you like, or don't, to your own kids' birthday party based on what your own child wants, not what some random wants. End.

Nobody wants to hang around with people who don't get that and try to interfere in other people's lives, so that's fine, your company would never be missed.