Email from my child’s infant school uk? I’m sorry but this all seems wrong?

[Frazzledmomma123]

Dear Families,

I wanted to address a concern that has understandably been raised regarding the use of a ‘safe word’ to move children out of the classroom. On reflection, we recognise that terms such as safe word and evacuation can raise anxiety and concern.

We agree that children should not have to leave their own classroom in order to feel safe. However, there are times, though not daily, when moving the class is the safest option for all children. This has happened a few times, and only when absolutely necessary. We fully accept having to go to such measures is a worry, but it is a system that schools are having to turn to more and more. I appreciate this provides little comfort, but hopefully helps you hear that supporting emotional regulation has become a real focus and factor for schools nationally.

The children themselves were involved in choosing the word, and the purpose was to minimise panic and keep the situation calm if it needed to be used. Our aim is always for every child to feel safe, happy, and able to learn in their classroom, as is their right. We are putting a range of steps and strategies in place to work towards this, and we do not intend this approach to become the “go‑to.”

We also want to reassure you that we are supporting children to understand that behaviour is a communication of feelings, but the way those feelings are shown must still be safe and appropriate. We do not condone unsafe behaviour, and we share parents’ concerns about children seeing this as “normal.” I have spoken with the class to reiterate that message and reminded them that they should always talk to a trusted adult if they feel unsure or worried. In school, children choose five trusted adults; it may be helpful to have a similar conversation at home about who your child feels they can talk to at school.

We are very aware that things are challenging at the moment. We do not want this to continue, and we are actively putting support in place to help all children feel safe and settled in their learning environment.

Thank you for reading, please keep speaking to us about your concerns.

We can’t be allies. Unless you have a ND child you’re not allowed an opinion.

Please please can I ask everyone to respond to the SEND consultation? You do not need to have a SEND child to respond - anyone can respond to it.

You can, honestly, please. If you tell the government what you think honestly (it can be anonymous) and that you want children with very high behaviour needs to at least have a realistic option of special schools- in my opinion you have helped our cause (even if I disagree with other aspects).

The theory of inclusion is lovely, the reality is an abject failure. We want more special schools. Of the hundreds of SEND families I have interacted with only a handful wanted their children in mainstream.

There needs to be a register of children that are unable to attend mainstream school and do not have a specialist school place. Homeschool should not automatically mean off the LA list for a school place.

Home school while waiting for a specialist place must be better than moving DC from school to school allthewhile failing everyone.

A register would allow LA, Government and the press to acess real figures and highlight the extend of the problem. At the moment these figures can be burried.

100% - that summarizes my response to the White Paper, and I have a SEND child.

If you feel strongly enough to post on here (as we all clearly do), please participate in the current process, and support the legal challenge to the abolition of parental rights without consultation that will likely follow.

I am autistic. Learning to preempt my meltdowns is why I have a job.

I have lots of skills, but there is a good reason that I did not go into teaching. I would suck at it. This is not any kind of solution to a failure by successive governments to fund all education (including SEND) adequately.

I would absolutely not sacrifice my career to play “out of sight, out of mind” games with a LA who already plays fast and loose with its statutory duties towards children.

Why isn’t the solution simply to require LA’s to comply with the existing law within a reasonable timeframe?

You don't even have to have a child. I filled it in based on my own recollections of being an undiagnosed and unsupported autistic child and wht helped and harmed me. I was absolutely adamant that mainstream is the wrong place for some children and we need more special school places.

It isn’t going to be better if the parent is struggling and can’t homeschool for whatever reason. No parent should be forced to homeschool.

I am so sorry, @selffellatingouroborosofhate - I completely misinterpreted your post and mistakenly thought it was advice of the “have you tried a visual timetable?” variety.

Mea culpa 💐

1. Parents aren't teachers.
2. Once a child is being forcibly homeschooled, they will disappear off the LA's “important" list.
3. Given the low numbers involved, how do you publish figures usefully (e.g. by age and need) without breaching the privacy of children?

It's also pretty obvious that this government when it says there will always be special schools for the "most complex" children it means children with learning disabilities/ severe learning difficulties. Fine for me personally, both my children will likely stay in their special schools. BUT, by taking this stance, in the coming years mainstream schools will be expected to keep the types of children who are currently in SEMH schools (and have been since they were like 8).

Some posters should be warned about the types of behaviours these children show - violence with makeshift weapons, extreme (and racialised) language, self harm in class, sometimes sexualised behaviours. Many of the SEMH special schools are independent schools - the government wants to restrict these. Alternative Provision? Limited to 12 weeks. There is going to be a completely unsafe level of risk in mainstream classes coming. This is not inclusion, it's a disaster.

In fairness, I omitted an important piece of contextual information.

I'm really glad that you've got a great outcome for him.

Expelling from a school is rare, so pupils remain in a school which may not be the best educational environment for them. Parents may not want to home school, feel unable to do so and prefer to keep their jobs and earnings a salary. Loosing family income is hardly going to improve the family situation

Please read my post at 14:25. You absolutely can use the link I provided to make these points and tell the Government that removing the current support via EHCPs will be catastrophic, forcing more children for whom mainstream school is clearly inappropriate into mainstream schools will be catastrophic (you think it’s bad and disrupted now? If Phillipson’s proposals go ahead it will get many times worse) and tell the Government they are moving in completely the wrong direction, this will be harmful to ALL children not just those with SEN as they are proposing to double down on the failed “put everyone in mainstream” model, and you can tell them instead that they need to provide far MORE variety of different schools for children with different needs so that ALL children can learn.

This isn’t being an ally just to SEND children, it’s being an ally to ALL children, otherwise nobody will get an adequate education and it will be even worse than it is now. And, ironically, cost us all far more in the long run in higher health costs, lower productivity, lower tax revenue, higher welfare costs, higher justice costs. It’s a completely false economy: every £1 spent on SEND education benefits the UK economy by £3.

The voices of parents of disabled children won’t be enough to stop what the Government is trying to do and I promise you it will make precisely the problems you’ve described far, far worse. Anybody who cares about the education of all children in the UK should respond to this consultation and tell the Government this is the worst possible thing to do and to change course. They want MORE chair throwers in your child’s class, with no funding for specialist support to control their behaviour and no prospect at all of those children moving to specialist schools no matter what the parent or school says as there will be no right to appeal and being “inclusive” is apparently more important than anybody learning anything, or the distress of both the disabled children and their classmates and teachers.

Please respond and object and tell them instead that they must fund an appropriate range of different schools for different children so that everyone can learn in peace.

I literally and quite obviously don’t think that. In no way did my post imply that I think all kids who are physically disabled can’t go to school. I don’t know why you’ve even bothered trying to find offence there. Clearly i was saying if he had a PARTICULAR physical disability that THEREFORE meant he couldn’t go to school. I can’t believe im even having to bother explaining this.

and yes I also referenced the government and their ridiculous shitness. But frankly no, if your kid is causing distress that is NOT a justification. you shouldn’t fuck up other kids just because you’re trying to force the government to eventually do the right thing. That is sick and selfish. And even if he was moved to a school more suited to his needs, why should other kids there have to put up with his violence just because they have SEND too? why should any child have to be unsafe physically and emotionally at school - would you be happy being in the equivalent situation at work? No.

edited to add that there’s another option - because you say specialist provision is clearly what’s best for him - maybe being at home with his mum or dad is what’s best for him. Why is being somewhere where he is clearly unhappy better for him? Why are we trying to force square pegs into round holes all over this country. And I don’t just mean extreme cases like violence. Surely happiness should come first!

@Devonshiregal i think you’re missing the point about the child’s actions being involuntary - like a tic or a seizure I suppose - and only happening as a result of disregulation. These children are not 24/7 violent. It would be throwing the baby out with the bath water not to even attempt to meet their needs.

We absolutely need ND people in the workforce more than ever - and I say that with my HR hat on - so we have to find a system that can meet everyone’s needs. Often it just takes more staff, more space and a bit of sensory equipment. It’s rare as rocking horse shit for a child not to make any improvement once in a less demanding and overwhelming environment.

As I said, the law exists and the LA’s could simply adhere to it without being “forced” by parents. What other personal rights are you willing to disregard for the greater good? Any that benefit you personally, or is it just the ND families who have to take one for the team?

My father is ND. I’m ND. My children and partner too. 5 cousins with varying degrees of autism from can hold down a job to still in nappies as an adult. My children’s friends are 90% ND. I have two teacher friends who are ND themselves and teach in specialist schools dealing with these challenges. 90% of my friends are ND. Kids in my kids’ school have varying degrees of struggles. Some including violence. I am not unaware of the issue. And the reason you’re even having to try to convince me of ND people’s worth is because historically we’ve been forced through this awful education system that doesn’t suit us under the guise that we will fail if we do things even slightly differently.

And no. I still do not think it is ok to allow a child to be violent in the classroom because they are ND. If they weren’t, would you be ok with it? The result is the same for other kids whatver causes the behaviour - they are damaged emotionally, psychologically and sometimes physically.

how can you expect an adult to walk away from an abusive partner when as a child you forced them to share a room five days a week with someone who could lash out? All over some kind of misguided ableist guilt?

and yes, exactly, people can get on great when they aren’t in an environment that doesn’t suit them - so why keep sending them into school in the hopes the government will do their job? During that time the kid (and the other kids) are getting more and more damaged. Do you really think this little boy who is being violent on a weekly basis isn’t suffering? You really think that when he isn’t having a meltdown he’s rubbing along happily? No. The other kids will be scared of him. Parents won’t be keen on inviting him for play dates or parties. His teachers will feel like prison guards and (in his mind) his mother is the one sending him there. It’s all wrong for everyone.

Exactly. The problem isn’t the law as it stands. The law doesn’t need changing, it needs enforcing properly like in every other sector. The 2014 laws have never been properly enforced. There is systemic, deliberate law breaking by Local Authorities evidenced by parents winning 98% of SEND tribunals. But that takes years and meanwhile schools and classes are left in chaos and educations destroyed, as well as family lives and parents’ finances, careers, marriages and health.

The parents should not be having to enforce the law as if these are individual isolated cases, the regulator should do it and there should be severe penalties for non-compliance like in all other regulated sectors to remove the financial incentive for LAs to behave like this: personal and organisational fines, removal from post, removal of qualifications, prison sentences for severe or repeat offences.

And frankly the LAs shouldn’t be dealing with it at all, the Dept for Education should fund it all centrally and fund it properly. It’s been convenient for LAs to blame the Government and vice versa and now they’ve decided to work together to screw over schools, disabled children and all children to try to save money rather than fix the system and attempt to sell this to everyone as being for the benefit of children. It’s Kafkaesque and shows they think all parents and teachers are utterly stupid and gullible.

Anybody who cares about any child in state education being able to learn, or indeed about our future economy or their tax bills will be lobbying the Government extremely hard to prevent them making what is already an unacceptable and dire situation ten times worse just for a short-term saving that will cost us all dearly in the long run. Aside from being utterly stupid and immoral the economic cost of not funding and structuring education properly will be hundreds of billions of pounds.

"so why keep sending them into school in the hopes the government will do their job?" @Devonshiregal some families have pretty much no choice. The suggestion to keep them home is not fair, just, or practical (and in some cases, if they can't offer a suitable home education would be illegal).

No one chooses to have a disabled child. So easy to say "if my child was violent, I'd just do xyz", you have no idea what you would do until you're actually in that situation yourself.

maybe being at home with his mum or dad is what’s best for him.

Or maybe that would lead to an even worse situation. You would increase the likelihood of carer burnout, which would not be in the child’s best interests. Even if the parents don’t reach burnout, many parents use the time DC are at school to sleep, eat, shower, complete paperwork, make/take phone calls, attend meetings, etc. If parents can’t do these because the child is home 24/7, that isn’t in the child’s best interests. You increase the likelihood of the family living in poverty. Again, not in the child’s best interests. It would mean the child didn’t receive support from professionals such as teachers, TA/LSA, SALT, OT, EP, physio, CP… which wouldn’t be in the child’s best interests. It would also increase the cost to the state longer term, something many object to.

I think some forget there is more to SEN than ND conditions.

That’s why there need to be specific schools for children with violent behaviour with specially trained staff and appropriate environments without physical dangers and high enough staff ratios.

There also need to be schools for academic and calm autistic children who cannot be in loud environments in a class of 30 but want to learn. Not one such state school exists in the entire country.

There need to be schools for children with learning disabilities who could never access the mainstream state curriculum.

There need to be schools focused far more on practical talents like music and sport but with core subjects also for children who aren’t particularly academic but have other skills.

The nonsense of pretending that we can pretend any environment exists where all of these children can learn adequately together in the same room and that any teacher could possibly facilitate this has been exposed very clearly as nonsense so why is the Government doubling down on it and insisting almost all children should be shoved together in a one-size-fits-all school where NOBODY can learn properly?

Restraint and/or removal from a violent/disregulated classroom situation is not "manhandling" when carried out by trained education professionals.

Not to mention how are parents meant to provide financially if they’re expected to home school their children?! Utterly ridiculous. The state has an obligation to provide education to all children. This has been established in UK and international law for many decades. We expect developing countries to comply with this globally acknowledged fundamental legal obligation so posters suggesting the UK should not do so is abhorrent.

It’s perfectly possible to do so. We simply need to drop the absurd idea that we can treat all children like clones and it’s “inclusive” to force all children into a mainstream state school environment which is not appropriate for a significant minority of children for a variety of reasons, and set up an appropriate range of schools for children with different abilities and needs. It’s not rocket science.

Don’t worry, parents would be ‘financially supported’ . Because LAs are going to be so willing to do that. And the general public is going to like the higher costs.