Child excluded but parent wont collect him..

[propatria]

Can someone explain how this can happen.
A child at dd2 school attacked a teacher(he did it last year as well) Head excludes child for the day and rings up parent to collect child,parent refuses saying "Thats what the child wants,im not collecting him"
Result -Child goes back to class,
What message does this send out?

The child should not have gone back to class, they should have been internally excluded instead

Getting taken home every time you are naughty sends out a much worse message.

i can see the parents' point of view. They're right- sending him home teaches I'm how to get out of school. he needs to be excluded within the school, sat outside the heads office being bored for a whole day or something.

"naughty"-Throwing a chair at a teacher,giving her the finger and a liberal use of the f word,oh and I forgot to mention the child is 7...Are you suggesting that exclusion wasnt the correct course of action indigo?

How do you know all this? are yo a teacher? and if so wtf are you doing putting it all over the internet.

when my ds was in MS he would often behave in the manner you describe.
I often thought of doind just as this parent has done. The school were using my willingness to collect him as a way of not having to deal with his behaviour.
I also agree that if a child wants to go home and is playing up deliberatly then it is not helping the situation by sending him home.

Internal exclusions mean that he is stuck at school, in a room alone away from his friends doing the bog standard normal work rather than the fun stuff.

I think with some children (and some families) an external exclusion is not the right message- I've seen excluded children getting a take away and then wandering off to the park unsupervised (slightly older, admittedly).

But I think the parents were wrong not to collect the child- if they disagreed with the punishment they should have met with the head to discuss it but presented a united front to show the child that the behaviour was not acceptable.

Equally, the school acted in a ridiculous way to send the child back to class- that is basically saying 'If your parents don't agree with the punishment, you won't get punished at all'. |Should have been internally excluded, for at least a couple of days, if parents won't cooperate.

Propatria - yes I am saying external exclusion wasn't the right course of action. I agree with others that internal exclusion may have been better. Plus probably some help from external services like behaviour support team or ed psych.

The big question is why did this boy throw a chair and what can be done to prevent this anti social behaviour in the future.

Gigantaur,my intial post made it clear I was a concerned parent,the information comes direct from the "excluded" childs mother,she was rather pleased with herself.
My concern is that one parent has decided the schools punishment policy,that to me as a parent is not acceptable,if the excluded childs parents dont like the way hes been punished-remove him and go somewhere else .
The school has shown that its punishments can just be ignored,what message does that send out.

The school had already show that it basically has no behaviour code. External exclusion should come at the end of a long process, involving the parents and external agencies.

The only children I have know be excluded "out of the blue" are for some criminal behaviour, and even then the police were called before the exclusion took place.

The school is failing on so many levels (don't be surprised if its next OFSTED is rather bad).

But do you know that the child wasn't punished? The child may have been internally excluded or have had any number of punishments which were worse to the kid than exclusion.

The mum is right. Excluding the kid sends a very bad message to the kid. If school can't deal with this kid then they need to get him a statement - not just throw him back at his parents.

If you don't like how the school dealt with this why don't you remove your kid?

How old was the child. Presumably the school has a behaviour management policy, and this action was part of it. In which case parent should have supported school. Attacking a teacher is a serious matter. It has got to be taken seriously. It's a real shame but often the teacher is not seen as the victim, and is held responsible for the misbehaving student.

Indigo-Thats an interesting way of looking at,we should remove our child because another child behaves badly,mmm how about the badly behaved child gets removed and those children that want to get on with their education are allowed to.
mummytime-The school is "outstanding" ,it has tried to control the behaviour of this child ,the exclusion certainly wasnt out of the blue,but the childs parents clearly dont want to work with the school.

You really don't know the full story. You don't know what interactions there have been in the past between this parent and the school. You don't know what support the school is giving the parent. Don't be so quick to judge. Wait till you've walked a mile in their mocassins....

Internal exclusion is far worse to the kid than external exclusion. At home he'll be with his Mum, his telly, his computer etc. Sitting outside the headmasters office for a week is far worse.

Kids don't misbehave for no reason. It's not the teachers fault, nor the parents. But something is causing his behaviour.

Where do you want this badly behaved child to go? How do you know all the other kids in the class didn't deliberately wind this kid up so that they wouldn't have to get on with their work? Nothing is ever as black and white as it first appears.

"How do you know all the other kids in the class didnt delib etc etc" come on Indigo be relistic,did the teacher "wind this kid up" as well,
Sorry but strangely enough I have more concern for the children who have their education interrupted than I do for this child,why should the class suffer because of him,I and every other parent who knows about this doesnt want to "walk a mile in their mocassins" what they want is for their children to be allowed the education they are entitled to and for this childs parents to accept their duties as parents,not asking much is it...

Internal exclusion is v. difficult for the school, surely?

The child will have to be supervised, and a room found for them.

Not all schools have a plethora of adults hanging around able to do that, along with the spare, suitable, space.

And if the child is distressed, or angry, etc. ... is it suitable to pen them up in a room with a (possibly unfamiliar) adult, with ... how much training to deal with a child in that state? Would it be a teacher, or a T. A.? Do theyhave a spare teacher? Wouldn't they be teaching? Would a T.A. be suitable?

Schools run on tight budgets, and have a variety of needs, and a variety of children to provide for.

You don't think kids wind up other kids who have short fuses?

You have had very different experiences than I have.

The class shouldn't suffer. This boy should be internally excluded while he is being offered help.

The message the school sends out by sending the child home is " we can't cope" or can't be bothered to cope. The kid needs help, the school surely has some part to play in arranging this or advising the parents on this. Maybe it just wants to protect its "outstanding" status...

I don't think that sending the child home does say the school can't cope. I think it's saying that certain types of behaviour are incompatible with the school environment.

I have enormous sympathy with children who are finding things difficult socially, but the fact is this: schools are asked to deal with more than they have the budget for. And what is demanded of them is somewhat unclear. Education? Delivery of social services? Neither of those are incompatible, but remember, there is often a vast difference in the needs of children entering a school. And it is vastly unfair to demand of schools so many competing things without clarity, acknowledgement and the ££££ to go with them.

It also sounds as though the school had no choice, really, propatria, about rescinding the exclusion. so I don't think you can be too harsh on them. They basically came fact to face with the fact that they have to rely on the parents co-operating.

the parent in this case sounds ... interesting.

As a mother whos DS has been excluded for throwing a chair across the class room, I can see her point.

DS school refused, and at one point would do anything to be sent home from school. A couple of days at home with mum? Brilliant! He didn't notice that I spent the day in tears and in despair, wondering how I could possibly have a child who has been excluded.

IMO, the boy should have been collected from school immediately, or preferably given some cool off time, supervised one to one until the end of the day, and then had in internal exclusions. This does take up one whole member of staff though, and you can't just leave a child like this sitting with the secretary, they need a member of staff who is trained in dealing challenging behaviour.

He certainly should NOT have returned to class that day. It's not fair on the teacher or the other children.

We have a brilliant head at the school at them moment, and she wouldn't hesitate in excluding a child for this behaviour, but she would explain to the child why they are being excluded, and would have it followed up with an assessment/meeting with the ed spych.

The child is 7, you say? I really hope the school and his family can help him through this.

Assuming that your child is in this class, and knows that a child who would have been excluded was just sent back to the class instead, then I think it is reasonable for you to contact the school and ask what is being done to deal with the situation to ensure the safety of the teacher and the rest of the class, and avoid disruption to their education.

But the fact is you maybe don't have the full information about what has happened, even if the mother has spoken (boasted?) to you about it - you don't know what else has been done by the school.

Another parent aproached the school with those questions,was told school cant comment on individual cases but was doing all they could to ensure safety of children etc ..
Not sure Id say the parent was boasting,she just doesnt think theres a big problem,in her words her son is "misunderstood" and "a little headstrong" or my favourite"he just dont like school"

blimey. if ds were excluded for attacking someone, yes I wouldn't be pleased if it were a first resort punishment, but he'd be going home to sit in his room. I think both parents and school handled this v badly.

That poor teacher.

Well, they are right, they can't really comment on what happens with individual children. You can still "express your concern" about why a child would be back in class instead of some kind of internal exclusion. They may not be able to say much, but if they are aware there's a lot of concern then they may rethink their strategy.

Unfortunately there are parents who either think there isn't a problem, or think it's the school's problem not theirs. But there are also parents who are struggling and doing their best to deal with a situation without getting any useful help or support from the system, where sending the child back to them every time is just not going to improve anything.

If he just doesn't like school, then sending him home will only make him happy. The question should be why doesn't he like school? Unless you're in this boys class, it's difficult to know what is the correct proceedure. I have worked as a T.A. and I have literally watched the clock and pinpointed when a disruptive child - usually a child with some sort of SEN or long term professionally unmanaged behavioural difficulties - is sent outside, sent to sit idle in another class or sent home. I would say some children who fall into this bracket are sent out so often because the teachers can't, or won't, deal with the problem, that they do not receive a decent education. On the other hand sometimes things get so out of control that the child has to be sent home for everyone else's safety. It's difficult to judge unless you work in the schoool frankly.