Am I doing the right thing?

[eden263]

Hope someone who has had to take their child out of school can help. Will be a long one, sorry, but don't want to drip-feed.

DD is just turned 5, and started school in September. She kind of enjoys it, and is a very bright girl and a fast learner, but has been in trouble almost every day other than the first week and a half when they only had half the class in. School are being very unhelpful/negative/judgemental and ambiguous with me as to what exactly the problems are, just complaining most days that she's making 'inappropriate choices' with her behaviour, or that there have been 'a couple of/several incidents' that day. However, I was hauled in for a proper talking to on Thursday as one of her best friends is too scared to come to school and has had to be moved to a different class because she pushed him at playtime. She thought she was playing. Of course, I am horrified by this, that my child has caused such anguish to another child. She has always been bad at listening to instruction/fidgety/very lively but never naughty before, is a popular girl (lots of her peers spontaneously call out hello and goodbye to her every day in the playground), and she loves other children, to the point of always wanting to hug children including ones she doesn't even know. I have checked with her old nursery that they didn't have problems with her that they just didn't feel worth mentioning but no, they are as surprised as me about this.

I have always thought she is slightly autistic/Aspergers and since she started school I am even more convinced. (I have told school this, but they, like everyone else I have ever mentioned my concerns to, immediately dismissed it as she is so forward academically. To me, that is another indicator. But what would I know?!) It's not a good school for her, she doesn't understand why she's always in trouble as she's not good at understanding socially appropriate behaviour, and although she is trying so hard to take on board what they are asking her to do, with regard to not playing with or going near her other best friend, who eggs her on, sets her up and then tells tales on her (school told me this happens), and she is doing what they ask, they keep moving the goalposts so she is constantly in the wrong again. They are expecting her to take 100% responsibility for keeping away from both her best friends, both in and out of the classroom, and jump through all the behaviour hoops that she is clearly struggling with, bearing in mind she's only just turned 5 and is new to the school environment, unlike most of her classmates who came from the school's nursery class, so already know what is expected of them.

I think I need to get her out of school and home ed, at least while I try to get an assessment of her behaviour/possible condition, and then maybe try to find a smaller, more understanding school who will help and support her rather than just tell her off all the time. She very much lives in the moment (eg she instantly forgets about friends/family etc when they're not there, never asks about/to see anyone when she's not at school) so she would easily adapt to another school. I have discussed it all with her and although she doesn't want to leave school, she agrees that she doesn't like always being in trouble especially when she doesn't really understand why and is trying so hard to be good anyway, and is happy to try to find a different school (even though I would rather not, lol). She is obviously finding school stressful, even if she doesn't realise it, because her behaviour when she comes home is dreadful; rude, shouting at me, very difficult, but on weekends & school hols she's my old, happy, lovely company girl.

Do you agree that I'm going in the right direction with this? By just taking her out and educating her at home rather than trying to find a new school then move her? I have no worries about home ed; I qualified as a primary teacher not long before I had her, and should have stuck to my guns and done home ed anyway, which is what I wanted to do, but everyone kept telling me she would have no friends/be a social outcast etc and as she loves other children so much, I listened and gave in.

Hi Eden, I have been through what you are going through and went through hell as I kept my daughter at school. She is high functioning autistic, with a professional diagnosis, which until I got that she was dismissed as being bad/odd. I have removed my youngest son from school as he too is HFA and going through the same thing and the stress was too great and was causing harm to me, dh and DS. It is the most fantastic thing ever to home educate! It can be done in many different ways, to suit you and your dd. it is absolute rubbish that they don't have friends and don't socialise. The local home ed groups are very active and meet ups are always happening. Your daughter can still see her friends from school at other times, my son does. Just think of the relief when you no longer get the 'incident' phone calls from school or the beckoning finger of the teacher. Like you say it doesn't have to be a permanent thing, a way of giving yourself breathing space until you find a more suitable place for your dd. Many friends and relatives were sceptical of home ed and now I can honestly say they now agree that it is the best thing I could have done.

Could you post something to the SEN board too? If she was doing well at nursery and is popular with other kids despite her issues, it might be a shame to take her out until you've got more of an idea - does the school know how close you are to pulling her out, and do they have anyone who you can elevate this to?

Total non expert here on SEN, but have experience of home ed and while I'm overall very pro, it can be good to really explore other options first, especially if she and you will eventually require extra support.

Thanks for replying.

Yes, I spoke to the head on Friday (by phone). He said it was fine to take her out and home ed and gave the me the LEA's phone number so I could speak to their home schooling people, and said I could go in & talk to him tomorrow if I want. Don't know if I want, TBH. I was a little surprised that that was pretty much it, no 'let's talk about this and see what we can do' or 'oh goodness, I didn't realise things were so bad' or anything. Feel a bit disappointed TBH. Not that I wanted or asked for their help, but you would think they would make at least a token effort to help sort it. Though my main concern ATM is this poor boy who's apparently too scared to be in the same room as her and the damage it's doing to him. It would be very difficult to turn that around. I don't really understand what's happened there but I feel terrible. I guess they're just glad to get rid of the problem. The only reason I didn't just stop her going back on the spot is that she has the main part in the Xmas play on Thursday and if I pull her now, it will really cock it up for the teachers, & spoil it for all the other parents going to see it. I would happily never send her again, I feel they're letting her down and being unfairly harsh. My DS1 & 2 went there (long time ago) so both the teachers involved know me well, too, as I helped in school 2 days a week for about 6 years, including in both their classes, & was a governor back then. Makes it even more upsetting.

Yes, it's causing me a lot of stress. I did wonder how school would possibly work for her, from a very early age. I thought she would be in trouble for being too lively, as she's not good at sitting still or concentrating for very long and is bad at listening, and I was worried she would be labelled as disruptive, but I didn't envisage it being like this. It's also spoiling our time together as I work evenings, so the half hour or so we used to have when we got home from school before I had to get tea & get ready for work, where I used to do her reading book and phonics homework etc and have a cuddle/watch telly/read stories/chill together is now mainly spent with me trying to talk her through 'school-friendly' behaviour when I know full well she has no real grasp of what I'm trying to tell her (and eye contact and assimilating things other than what she's focussing on in her head are also a bit of an issue) but I'm so desperate for her not to be in trouble every day, as she looks so wounded when I pick her up and they have to talk to me again, it breaks my heart. I don't want her to be thought of as 'naughty' because she isn't a naughty girl. Not anywhere else anyway. She usually tries to please people. She promises me every day that she's going to be good and try so hard to be the 'super star' that day, and I'm sure she genuinely means it, she just doesn't realise when she's doing something wrong.

She loves being at home with me, she always has, I think she would be entirely happy to stay home. She's said lots of times she wishes she had more time with Mummy, and always groans on Monday mornings because she wants to stay home with me. I did briefly mention the concept of home ed after her first month at school, when she wasn't really wanting to go to school, and she said she wanted to stay home with me and do learning, but as we'd already got to the school stage, I thought I'd persevere rather than give up without giving it a fair try. She goes to Rainbows (where they have told me she is well behaved and polite and not at all troublesome) so she already has a few friends and a social thing away from school, and I'm hoping to get her into some kind of drama class as she has really enjoyed the rehearsals for the play at school.

I guess with all that's going on, my natural response is to want to take her away from the bad stuff and protect her by doing her education at home.

It certainly sounds as if somehow she is not ready for school yet, at the very least.
why not deregister her and home educate, and see how you get on.
it doesn't have to be forever, lots of parents review things as they go along. Some HE until the child is seven and are then a little more able to fit in with school's 'sit still and be quiet' way of teaching.
It may be that school at the moment is too much sitting still and very little time to be free to run around...and her exuberance is bottled too long and bubbles over, when they finally get to play!
Find HE groups local to you to add to her social circle, as well as the after school clubs you are already considering/doing.

come and find us on the 'Mumsnet Home Education' FB page (send me a message here or there, so i know who you are) and we can talk more openly through some of your concerns.
there are FB pages for people who HE children with SEN (or who are interested in doing so) too...some with a diagnosis and some not.

And despite what the Head says about the LA, if you choose to deregister, you don't have to contact the LA, that's his job. You only have to respond to the LAs informal request for info about your HE, when they contact you. You get to choose how to do that too... You can choose to send written information and never meet with them, if you would prefer.
For up to date legal info about HE look at www.edyourself.org which is accurate (unlike many a LA website) and contains links to the Guidelines for LAs.

Of course it's your right to educate your child as you wish and clearly the head thinks this.

However remember he's been dealing with the " reverse AIBU" side- the parents of the child who is now so scared of your child he doesn't want to be in the same room. Did you read the "stabbed in ear with pencil" post? That case had no history of trouble...

Maybe this school isn't right for her but I wonder if just withdrawing her so she never has to learn to cope and behave in such situations is right longer term?

Why not keep her in school and push for asessment?

Thanks again, really appreciate your support and for putting both sides of the argument.

Yesterday I went in to talk with the head of the foundation stage and she agreed (for once, someone actually agrees!) that DD does indeed show some signs/behaviour consistent with autism. She acknowledged that DD isn't a 'naughty' girl and that she probably can't help herself and isn't doing it deliberately. She also said that the teacher/TAs shouldn't be reporting every single 'incident' at home time, only serious issues, and also that being ambiguous about 'incidents' and 'inappropriate choices' isn't helpful when DD doesn't know/understand what she's done wrong.

She was also quite surprised that nobody had mentioned to me that things were going on with this boy until it seemingly reached crisis point. However, with regard to that, she's actually quite sceptical, as the boy has been skipping into school quite happily and voluntarily approaching DD at playtimes to play with her! So she said not to worry any more about that. The 'problem' appears to be that DD has been a little over-zealous with trying to cuddle him (she is very tactile; again, poor grasp of social boundaries, despite my best efforts to get this across to her) and he's 'sensitive' and doesn't like it, which is fair enough, but it's not quite DD deliberately terrorising him as was implied last week. Also it transpires that other children are involved in this cuddling, whom he is also apparently scared of (yet also freely plays with) so I am far less concerned about that now. Just a little annoyed that I might have pulled DD from school over this because of several people scaremongering/not painting the full picture.

My daughter is seeing the SEN person at school today, to do 'some work' with her, and monitor her during lessons and at playtime, so I feel encouraged that now that the problem has come to a head they are at least doing something, and quickly. I have also made an appointment with our GP to push for an assessment and feel encouraged that school have acknowledged that there may be a genuine problem, as I feel this will back me up and I hopefully won't be laughed at/dismissed again. So I'm hanging fire for now, to give school a chance to help me and DD out on this. Mainly because DD has now said she doesn't want to leave school and I want to respect her wishes. However, I did discuss with her (before I had spoken to the head of FS yesterday and it became more positive) that she might, if things can't be resolved at the current school, find it easier and less over-stimulating at a smaller school with less pupils charging around (she gets giddy easily at the best of times and I think the noise/bustle etc of 180-odd infants running around in a fairly small playground just whips her into a frenzy and makes her less able to control herself) so I'll see how it goes.