school exclusion

[sugarandsweet]

what do they achieve? so I've picked my son up again today (2nd time) as he's been excluded. I've heard of nurture groups? are these for educational or behaviour challenging children?

Our school doesn't seem to have one. So instead he gets sent home. How many daily exclusions until they permantely exclude?

a very distressed and frustrated mother.

Mumtobe, I think if you have children who are sufficiently alarmed by the prospect of missing out on going to guides that they behave beautifully, then you can have no inkling of the problems OP is facing. May I respectfully suggest you step back and count your blessings, as your contribution is rather smug and not in any way helpful! You know, not all 'naughty' kids are the result of bad parenting.

My son (who has various relevant diagnoses) knee-ed a child in the groin last year, refused to leave the playground on request and then when a member of staff tried to remove him physically he kicked the staff member.

He was excluded for five school days. It was sheer hell - he then started self-harming and tried to commit suicide (part of his diagnosed issues is an inability to cope with rejection). When he went back, without saying anything to me, they kept him out of class, 1:1 with a TA for another week and it would have been more if I had not made a fuss.

So whomever was talking about 'coming down like a tonne of bricks' above, I think my son's school did just that. It didn't change the behaviour, because it's not really under his control beyond a certain point. It pushed him to the point of a suicide attempt - most unhelpful.

Since then: he has a PSP (see above), he has IEPs. I requested statutory assessment and he eventually was statemented. He has a designated 1:1. He has nurture (small group) sessions three afternoons a week and leaves school early one day a week for psychotherapy. He has a Safe Place at school, which he is supposed to bolt to if he is feeling stressed. Only certain - trained - members of staff are supposed to deal with him if he is heading for a meltdown. There has been and continues to be enormous amounts of work on emotional awareness/literacy with him. There is a daily home school book in place and I virtually have the HT on speed dial. He is still struggling and I am currently negotiating with the LEA about what is best for next year. He may need specialist schooling. But I think the current school really are trying for him, although I did not think so during the exclusion and it's aftermath.

Maybe some of that might be helpful for you OP. Good luck. I really do empathise.

Can I just ask those with dc with statements etc how they feel about how other children can help in these situations. I get the feeling my ds is confused, he's 5. His friend at school has hurt him every lunchtime this wk and as much as I feel sorry for him I don't want my ds to be hurt and end up with the situation escalating. My dn has aspergers so I know a bit about what's going on but I'm torn between telling him to stay away and wanting to be his friend. I've spoken to the teacher and they're trying to help him as they say the little boy is upset as no one wants to play with him. Which to me is heartbreaking! I've currently told my ds to tell him that he wants to be friends but only if he doesn't hurt him and if he does he can't play with him that day.
I'm so torn but I'm concerned too.
Any advice??

I think they are asking too much of your son and indeed of the other child. If he cannot manage to play safely on the playground, the school needs to up the supervision. On days when my son seems unlikely to manage they have had extra supervision for him on the playground or he has been 'allowed' to stay in and play inside. He gets to choose a couple of friends (my son does have friends) to stay with him and it is less volatile and one of his trusted members of staff supervises more or less closely.

Thanks 123, I'm speaking to the school again on Monday. My ds does say they are friends but he says he gets 'annoyed' because his friend tends to end up pushing or punching him in the tummy. I just feel bad for my ds as I think he wants to be friends with him but he's starting to distance himself which is understandable.
The teacher said his friend was hysterical today as he said he had no friends and he only wanted to play with my ds which I find really sad. I know when my ds has said he had no friends in the past I've been gutted but they need to handle this better or it's going to escalate.

The school should have a strategy for dealing with behaviour problems. This cannot be the first child to have exhibited them! Just to correct a few points - it is the Headteacher who excludes. It is not the Governors. The Governors' Panel can agree with the Headteacher or ask that the child be reinstated if the Headteacher has not performed the exclusion correctly. Asking for a child to be collected is not an exclusion in that the Headteacher will not have to inform the Governing Body and therefore you have no right to meet the Governing Body's Panel to discuss the "exclusion" or, more accurately, removal from the premises. You can have shorter exclusions where the child is removed from school and then, usually, a behaviour agreement is drawn up to facilitate reinstatement.

Children with dyslexia can be very challenging behaviourally as they are often struggling to express themselves and feel stupid. I would ask the school to get an appointment for your DS to see the school's educational psychologist who should work with the teachers on behaviour management strategies. Also, what are the lunchtime supervisors actually doing? When I worked in Education we realised, in some schools, it was not a lot! We started a course for them and they learnt about engaging with the children who had challenging behaviour and spotting the signs. If the school knows he has a problem they should have thought about how he is managed at break and lunchtime. Ask them how they intend to manage him? Also I suspect if you cannot pick him up they will exclude for a short period, so refusing to pick him up becomes a not so good decision. However, getting an exclusion usually bumps a child up the waiting list for the EP!

We have a similar experience to 123 in that we feel the exclusions really worsened the mental health of our ds's and probably worsened the frequency and ferocity of incidents at school. The children were behaving badly because they were stressed so increasing the stress levels understandably made things worse. It did give a three day breather to his teacher I guess but that is really the best that can be said. It was simply not an effective behaviour management plan in our experience.

ds1's fixed term exclusions rapidly led to a permanent exclusion about 3 months after his first fixed-term exclusion. He is now happily settled in a BESD school (where he behaves well) so it finally ended well but we wish there had been a less traumatic route for both him and the school to get his needs met.

The one thing we insisted on the ds's statement was adult playground support as many of the incidents started off there. The LA were a bit reluctant to give it but we did get something finally put in. I honestly don't know if this would have been sufficient to help as ds1 was out of mainstream by the time the statement was finalised.

MillyMollyMandy you are right in that the head teacher puts forward the exclusion but it does not become a permanent exclusion until the panel has decided.

Just to note that sending a child home is a temporary exclusion, and if not done correctly it is an illegal exclusion. They need to put this in writing. The school cannot simply say here take your son home.

I agree with oneineight in that exclusions can escalate situations due to increased the anxiety of the child.

My ds was subject to numerous unlawful exclusions, a fixed term exclusion and then permanent. Mind you, the permanent one was later withdrawn but he still was permanently excluded and not allowed back .

Ds's main difficulties were also at unstructured break and lunchtimes. I would be asking what additional support is in place at these times and what training staff have had in dealing with challenging behaviour/incidents.
I was frequently told that staff were 'fully trained' but their actions showed otherwise.

Sugarandsweet, smacking is not (yet) a crime in the UK. Try it and watch the amazing and immediate improvement in your child's behavior.

Because physical violence is always the answer....bloody hell.

Yep that helps with adults too doesn't it! Smacking solves all problems don't you know

SuzanneUK. Please read the "ThisIsMyChild" campaign.

"Try it and watch the amazing and immediate improvement in your child's behavior[sic]"

Or watch it increase the child's negative behaviour dramatically. It's a gamble!

FFS.

Many children grow up wonderfully well without physical discipline but if your child seems determined to take full advantage of non-violent parenting in order to become head of the household and make everybody else's life an absolute misery, it might be time for a return to traditional methods. Or you could just carry on being PC and hope he/she grows out of it before you're sectioned. It's a gamble. ;)

Non violent parenting! Never thought I'd read that written as an insult!

A gamble most rational parents are willing to take, I think.

But I'm guessing you've never dealt with a child who has challenging behaviour as a result of being physically abused, so that perhaps explains your viewpoint.

• it's not about being PC it's about not teaching a child (that already has behavioural problems) that you don't get what you want by violence.

Sometimes lately when DS is upset over some minor reprimand (scolded for spilling crumbs or doing something clumsy) he goes off and destroys something of his that he likes. Like a nice drawing or his favourite rubber. He's internalising the scolding we gave to hurt himself.

Or maybe, silly me, I should realise that he's crying out to be punished harder. He really wants firmer boundaries, we should slap him around and then the world will make sense. He'll get total confirmation that we hate him. Traditional methods are so perfect for that, aren't they?

I promised myself when I came back to this thread that I wouldn't rise to anything provocative . . .

I am breaking that promise now.

Suzanneuk, I am beyond appalled. What you seem to have missed is that our children (the ones whom you are advocating smacking) have genuine, diagnosed, emotional issues which underpin the behavioural. Lljk, oneineight and I have all given what I thought to be fairly compelling examples of how our children turn the hurt inwards and hurt themselves more . . . And certainly my son - can't speak for the others - really doesn't believe he deserves to live. This as a result of the appalling abuse inflicted on him in his birth family. And you think the answer is that I should hit him again . . .

Oh wait. Of course. If my son had killed himself jumping out of a first floor window onto a slate patio - as he wanted to - that would have solved all the problems and got him nicely out of the way, wouldn't it? Silly me . . .

It's clearly beyond the expertise of anyone on the Internet to diagnose or prescribe entirely accurately without detailed knowledge of the specific individual whose behaviour is under examination.

The best we can do is advise in respect of certain groups of which the child in question may or may not be a member.

When discussing violent children, the question I'd ask is 'When with other children outside the home, does he ever attack much bigger, much stronger, much tougher boys?' I mean the sort of boys he knows wouldn't hesitate to respond by knocking him through the nearest wall.

If the answer is 'Yes, he does that all the time', it seems that smacking him is indeed unlikely to curb his behaviour.

If the answer is 'No, he's never done that', then we might very usefully ask 'Why not?'

It's clearly beyond the expertise of anyone on the Internet to diagnose or prescribe entirely accurately without detailed knowledge of the specific individual whose behaviour is under examination.

A point that completely contradicts your earlier assertion that if the OP smacks her child there will be an amazing and immediate improvement in his behaviour. You don't have any idea whether that would be the case or not.

The OP has given enough information to suggest that the 'certain group' to which a child may be a member is children who have additional or special needs rather than no discipline and a lack of boundaries. Either way, I'm not sure 'it's fine to hit people as long as they are smaller than you' is a message we want to be giving children in either 'group'.

SuzanneUk - what tosh. Nasty, weasley posts advocating violence to stop violence.

Incidentally, the op's son lashed out at a presumably much larger and older teacher. There's no suggestion in theop or others' posts that their dc have sought out weaker targets.

Your ignorance is breathtaking.