(London) school options for highly gifted ASD son?

[Londonwriter]

Our autistic seven year old has an EHCP and a 1-to-1, and a measured sky-high non-verbal IQ, and is currently at a mainstream state primary who are moving earth and sky for him. It was slowly improving, but he's just started Year 3 and is melting down constantly again, including hitting staff members during meltdowns, mostly due to noise in the classroom while he's sick from minor viruses.

As he can't be in class right now, he's currently working in his own 'office' elsewhere in the building. He reports being extremely bored and "not learning anything", which isn't surprising because - at home - he's reading first-year undergraduate medical revision textbooks for pleasure.

I've looked at specialist ASD provision online and it doesn't seem appropriate for him because it's so focused on life skills. When he's not melting down, he's already managing his own pocket money and can navigate public transport better than I can. Some of the schools mention on their websites he might be able to do an A-level whereas, educationally, he's the sort of kid who'd breeze into an academically-selective school.

I just don't know what to do. As of yesterday, he's started displaying school refusing behaviour. He says school isn't worth the sensory and social hassle for how little he's learning, although he accepts it's probably the best place to access the national curriculum. He has no friends at school and only one friend generally, our babysitter's 11-year-old autistic brother, and attempts to get him to treat his classmates as humans (rather than a shrieking alien nuisance) have been a failure so far.

Just wondered if anyone had any success, or positive stories, or even any suggestions of schools?

I've looked up all the usual places like More House and Holmewood online, but they're either focused on communication difficulties (he's no difficulty communicating!) or he'd have to go elsewhere to study after a certain age, which seems to defeat the point. I'm worried about home schooling or EOTAS incase he becomes an under-socialised mess, as he's weird enough already, and taking him to SEN activities locally as a homeschool mum would run into the same problems as school (he's just not interested in 'kid' things).

EOTAS doesn’t have to mean ‘under-socialised mess’.

Have you looked at independent mainstream schools?

If you want to focus on SS, as well as Holmewood and More House, have you looked at Unsted Park? What they offer changes depending on their cohort. They can offer more than one A level and have sent pupils to university, including medical school. More House offer more than a dozen A levels and sends some DC to university btw.

Potential Plus might have advice.

This is tricky.

The very academic schools won't want to cope with the meltdowns and hitting people.

The schools that can cope with the meltdowns and hitting people will have limited academic provision.

You may be best looking at online schooling and working separately on his emotional regulation. Locally there may be activities he would be interested in such as a chess club or a go club; other possibilities include sports clubs which might help him physically - possibly parkrun or similar?

@SalmonWellington Potential Plus did a learning assessment for us and the school (which is how we know his non-verbal IQ) :) I’ve never spoken to them beyond that - possibly, I don’t know, due to embarrassment.

@EndlessLight We looked at the academically-selective secondary schools locally, in the hope that he’d learn to manage the violent meltdowns by age 11. I haven’t looked at independent schools at his current age as I assume they wouldn’t want him - he was expelled from an independent mainstream setting (small class sizes, individual attention) aged 4.

I don’t especially want him to go to SS. I know, whichever SS he went to, he’d be one of only two children (max.) like him - and he may as well be schooled at home. His current mainstream school has an unofficial DSP and he has individual provision right now.

I worry the problem is what @Octavia64 says. Very academic schools wouldn’t want to deal with the meltdowns and hitting people. Schools who can cope with the meltdowns and hitting people won’t have the academic provision. DS7 knows this, because we’ve talked about it, but he doesn’t feel he has the skills at his current age to manage his behaviour when he’s melting down. He feels his only option, right now, is to never have a meltdown.

For someone whose academic ability is so out of sync with their chronological age and has difficulties with emotional regulation, tuition often works better than online schools.

I think it is worth looking at independent schools. If the environment better meets DS’s needs the meltdowns may lessen and certainly become less violent. Sometimes DC who are violent in state mainstream because the sensory environment is overwhelming aren’t violent in a school that better meets their sensory needs.

What support focusing on emotional regulation is in the EHCP? What therapies?

I really would recommend joining Potential Plus as a member - they are best placed to offer support and advice, and there is a facebook group where you are likely find others in a similar situation.
If I were you, I'd be inclined to homeschool, and facilitate what social activities I could via e.g. music, chess, Potential Plus get-togethers.
Sadly there just doesn't seem to be a space for ultra-high-achieving / gifted kids with severe social and emotional difficulties.

There’s nothing about emotional regulation in the EHCP.

Basically, the school put in place escalating interventions to keep DS7 in school and the other children safe (he was throwing chairs at one point!), and eventually hired a 1-to-1 and hired an educational psychologist to write a report - they have honestly been super. They put in an EHCP application to fund this support.

Trouble is, the council completely ignored their own educational psychologist and the Potential Plus report and just copy/pasted a load of standard autism interventions designed for children with high support needs (who are assumed to have co-associated S&L and significant learning disabilities).

The SENCO and I looked them up and they were so wildly inappropriate it was kinda funny. We’ve spent a year now trying to have the legal requirement to provide them removed, and to insert a note that he needs extension challenge work. ASD outreach have been worse than useless - DS7 has spent a lot of time carefully explaining to me (and the SENCO) why the stuff they recommend doesn’t help him.

To be honest, he’s slowly gotten more depressed and hopeless over time. He says no one outside the house understands or can help him.

The EHCP is poor. Have you appealed?

Personally, I wouldn’t EHE. Instead I would pursue EOTAS/EOTIS. That is because EOTAS/EOTIS can fund far more provision, including therapeutic provision, than the vast majority of parents can afford to fund themselves.

I haven’t appealed. Largely because, until the beginning of this year, he seemed to be improving at school. The SENCO (and staff) seem to absolutely adore him and are moving earth and sky for him. His teacher last year said (privately to us) that he was the highlight of her teaching career.

So, unlike in a lot of situations I’ve read about, we’ve been working hand-in-glove with the school and I’ve been following what the SENCO thought was appropriate - which was for both of us to keep writing letters to amend the EHCP while ignoring its provisions in practice.

If he leaves, it’ll be because the SENCO and I agree that it’s not working. I don’t know at what point she’ll give up.

You should request an early review whether DS remains at the current school or not. The EHCP needs improving because DS needs more support than a supportive school alone can provide. He needs more therapeutic provision targeted at the specific support he needs. You could also look to include some 1:1 tuition at DS’s academic level. IPSEA has a model letter you can use to request an early review. When you next have the right of appeal, you should appeal.

Yes, potential plus can help to find kids a bit like yours (we have one, so I get the loneliness). Could also be an idea to look at democratic or self-directed schools?

This sounds so messy, I’m sorry! I would add though that communication difficulties can include exactly what you describe which are the challenges your son presents - this is his “communication”. At 7 it simply isn’t acceptable to view this communication of boredom in this way, so actually looking at some of the schools suggested, from my understanding they also have a segment of very high functioning/high achieving children, you’d just need to drill past the marketing and find out….

I have PM'd you as have some experience (sadly not good at all) of one of the schools you mention. I would second a lot of the advice already given.

I'm a big advocate of homeschooling for autistic and gifted children. In an ideal world as a perfect EOTAS package, but otherwise there are always ways to make it work. DD (year 8) is twice exceptional with PDA and enjoys teaching herself and the control it gives her and needs the quiet/safety of home and the extra time to decompress. She is following an online course but prefers just learning from GCSE/A level revision books on her own. If your ds enjoys being taught/classroom discussions, there are many online schools that offer this, in the UK but also abroad. The US has e.g. several online programs for profoundly gifted autistic children. My dd is not profoundly gifted, just the 'normal' side of gifted, but your ds sounds rather exceptional, so a US program might be suitable where a wide range of APs (undergraduate degree courses) can be taken throughout the school program at any age.

I don’t know if this is what you meant to imply, but EOTAS/EOTIS isn’t homeschooling. It is an important distinction.

I said in an ideal world you want EOTAS as part of an EHCP but if you feel you can't waste your dc's life by keeping them in an unsuitable school environment, e.g. if they become suicidal, you just have to choose home schooling and come up with your own provision. Thousands of parents have to do it as battling schools and LAs can take years, often without happy endings. I felt I had 1 months to change the situation for my dd, as that was how long I hoped she'd be able to survive any longer as she'd stopped eating and drinking and I knew she wouldn't survive hospitalisation and a closed mental hospital. If OP is happy with her current school setting and there is no time pressure, going for an EHCP with EOTAS provision is definitely the way to go, but not everyone has the luxury of time. If provision for ASD children is difficult, EHCP provision for gifted children with ASD, especially if these children have been at private school and displayed examplary behaviour (dd was at a leading public boarding school with 2 scholarships and a bursary and she held it together in school so well that head and former tutor provided zero evidence for difficulties and only stated that she was their best student, exceptional, no problems, no needs, maybe a bit shy - at that stage she was a walking skelleton, spent all her brakes with matron, hadn't eaten for months and had started to grow fur across her body as she couldn't maintain bodytemperature). Luckily OPs son is hitting out, so there is something to record.

I know what you said.

“I'm a big advocate of homeschooling for autistic and gifted children. In an ideal world as a perfect EOTAS package…”

^This bit made it sound like you thought EOTAS is homeschooling, when it isn’t.

One can pursue EOTAS without wasting ‘your dc's life by keeping them in an unsuitable school environment’. A child does not have to continue to attend a school if it isn’t appropriate whilst pursuing EOTAS. Not at all.

We are probably in violant agreement here. You say children don't need to stay in an unsuitable environment while pursuing EOTAS. But if you take them out of school in order to pursue EOTAS you obviously have to do something then? That's homeschooling then, and of course LAs turn it against you, as they then say you are already putting suitable provision in place. By the time an EHCP is finalised, some gifted pupils might have already sat their GCSEs and A levels, if they work several years ahead. But in the end, if it works better for the child and you can arrange it privately, that's imo still much better than being in the wrong school and it can, depending on the child's needs, be very affordable. We and dd are very happy with the freedom of just being out of a physical school environment and fully in charge of what we do. We have access to counselling and mentoring and very good music teaching. It would be nice for the state to pay for e.g. GCSE and A level exam fees and some online lessons, but most of what is really is important to my dd, being at home and safe, teaching herself advanced maths, doing maths olympiads, coding and music, doesn't cost anything. People are choosing private schools, mainstream or special schools, for their dc and I personally find private online schools/online programs work better for gifted and autistic children than bricks and mortar schools. My dh and I are also lucky to be very academic and can easily help with A level/undergraduate content in most subjects between us, so just muddling along at home works well for us.

That's homeschooling then

No, it doesn’t have to be. Not sending a child to school if they can’t attend does not mean a parent has to EHE (which is what you presumably mean by homeschooling?). Despite what many LAs would have parents believe. Although obviously parents can choose to EHE and that is a valid choice.

One can remain in the system and therefore have the LA retain responsibility but not force DC to attend school if it isn’t appropriate. Remaining in the system means LAs then have a duty under s19 of the Education Act 1996 to ensure CSA DC receives a suitable full-time education. This can be enforced if/when the LA isn’t forthcoming.

EOTAS packages can be completely child led and in charge of what they do.

A good comprehensive EOTAS package for a child with OP’s DS’s needs would include far more therapeutic provision and other provision than the vast majority of parents can afford to fund themselves. It is brilliant you can afford that or DD doesn’t require such provision. Many do.

@Londonwriter Hi there, did you end up choosing a new school for your son? My son is 3, and was also excluded from the (nursery) of an independent mainstream setting, who said that they wouldn't be able to meet his needs once Reception started. We're about to put him into state primary but deciding between mainstream and autism unit in mainstream with some integration. Not sure "how gifted" he is since we can't test his IQ at this age but he's definitely very advanced in reading, writing, maths. At him, he pores over a KS2 math textbook I got for my older son. My concern with the autism units is, as you say, they're all higher needs kids without his academic abilities so very curious where you ended up with your son. Thanks!

Unfortunately (or not), I'm now home educating him. Shortly after I originally posted, he burned out and, eventually, I deregistered him.

I'm sorry to hear that. He sounds like an absolutely amazing kid. I hope home education is working out.

@Londonwriter I imagined this would happen. I hope it goes well, it was a life safer in our house. If you would consider online classes, King's Interhigh takes children from year 3 but will let you choose which school year you would want them to join. Minerva starts in year 7, if he is ready for that. Many families have been successful in getting MVA (Minerva Virtual Academy) named in their EHCP, it is now fully OFSTEAD accredited. I don't know about KIH and EHCPs, I think they run a sister company called Academy21 that LAs use for alternative provision. And while my dd is not keen on people, especially 'children', she is not turning into an unsociable mess 😀 Well, she can be unsociable, of course, but like your ds, she likes to see the benefit in something. Like your ds, she finds sensory stimuli so draining, but we are using the flexibility that comes with learning at home to get her to engage with humans in activities that interest her, and now that she isn't so stressed, she can come across as rather charming.

It's very sad to see many kids that could be supported in mainsteam education with a bit more of understanding and kidness being pushed away from education and socialising like the rest. What annoys me more it's going through the schools SEND policies and websites advertising inclusivity and able to support children with ADHD/ASD and so one and in reality it's not the case.

I think home schooling probably is the best choice. The academic level between him and very selective mainstream schools are still very large.