Asd question

[englishpigdog]

Just want to ask how many of you have children diagnosed asd but school refuse to see and say they are fine.

I am on the road to diagnosis for my ds but school are putting doubts in my mind as they refuse to acknowledge he has any problems, I think as he is high functioning they don't support my concerns and have beeen very unhelpfull all the way and it honestly feels like i am going mad at times lol

DS1 has fairly severe AS, however his first school (which he left part way through year 1) told me he was fine day in, day out. Turns out when I went to parent's evening in March of reception that he spent every day hidden either under a table or inside the whiteboard, but that was apparently completely normal. The Community Paed went into school couple of months after that and said along lines of "Wow, loads of odd behaviour there", school said "If she had only come even a week earlier she would have seen lots of odd behaviour, but he was fine when she came in"

New school - DS is very sensitive but definitely not AS - he isn't violent/in trouble enough to be , yep that is because he is very rule driven and gets very stressed if someone else is breaking a rule let alone himself, but have you actually seen him meltdown on the way home from school from the stress of it all? After dx, "actually DS isn't achieving to his full potential, despite us telling you he was fine", year later and they have put him on an IEB for his anxiety...

Don't listen to the school .

Yes, this is normal. Schools, in the main, know shit all about ASD and are scared that they'll have to resource support if any need is found.

Safest thing for them is to deny!

Well ds and dd started nursery with statements and diagnoses so the schools "knew" they had autism. That's not to say that at ds's infants they considered him "just" naughty.
Dd's really lovely primary who are really supportive and inclusive still miss things though because as Star says their knowledge is really limited.
I think the best you can hope for is that you have a school that acknowledges you as the expert and which is happy to work with you to get the best outcomes.

Dd3 has been to 2 schools, the first couldnt or wouldnt see any issues. They made getting a dx for her very diificult.

She moved a year ago and within one term the staff had helped us to get a dx for her.

There are some really good schools out there, it is just such a shame that it is so hard to find them.

DD's school refused to accept we were even seeing CAMHS despite us having had 2 consultations - the SENCO was very obstructive at 1st, and still makes passing comments about how confident and verbal DD is .

can't wait to see her face when the SALT takes her into the social skills group

in our consultation last week, the Psych said she thought teachers didn't like to make comments about the typically Autistic traits/behaviour as they might be construed as 'picking on your child' as they are mostly negative observations. She may be right. I think she was being bloody generous and perhaps had a teacher as a DP

We were "lucky" that ds had a dx and statement when he started school, otherwise I am sure school would be denying there were any problems. Even with a dx they still say "he's fine", indistinguishable from peers, and (my favourite) "we have others in the class who are so much more trouble". Yes, that would be because ds is not aggressive or shouty, but internalises eveything. But he still has ASD!

Some children with ASD can be hard to pick out from the crowd, and in danger of slipping through the net because of this. School teachers generally are not experts in child development, let alone developmental disorders like ASD. Many people, incluidng teachers, think to have ASD you need to be non-verbal/violent/uncontrollable/rainman/maths genius/sit in a corner tapping.

Don't let them put you off.

Thank you everyone.

Unchartered - " in our consultation last week, the Psych said she thought teachers didn't like to make comments about the typically Autistic traits/behaviour as they might be construed as 'picking on your child' as they are mostly negative observations " I have wondered if this is why they always say everything is fine !

bialystockandbloom - We have been told " there are children with greater needs than your ds " and was even told on a scale of 1-10 he is only a 5 or so and they said the ed psych was not intersested in observing him, so we have gone through camhs

It's such a spurious argument - and so short-sighted. Yes there might be children in the class who have behavioural issues. But a) why compare, b) no behavioural problems does not mean the child has no need for support, and c) a child with behavioural problems at 5yo might not (with support) have them at 7yo, whereas ASD is lifelong.

Anyway, just remember that it's not up to the school to diagnose.

I think this explains your problems getting ABA into your ds' school bialy.

I don't think there are many 'forward-thinking' schools who accept or even tolerate ABA from the outset for a new child. I think the ones who do allow ABA into their school are for children that they have had for a while, with severe behavioural problems and everything they have tried themselves has failed. In that position they then become more amenable.

But, if you have a mild, complient child that hasn't started yet, their backs are up. How can they not be capable of meeting his needs without all this irritating ABA nonsense that they don't understand, that they can't control and that they have been encouraged to be highly suspicious of.

When dd (AS) was undergoing dx, I observed that younger ds had more pronounced traits than her and asked his GP to refer him for a dx. I told his school who hadn't noticed a thing and blamed his sister for his negativity. The senco said she would not have referred him for a dx.

When ds was diagosed, same senco said, "we have many years of experience with asd children and can fully meet their needs". Wonder why she didn't recognise ds' difficulties then.