There is no suitable provision for DS, what now?

[MsNg]

DS is often violent at school and his present mainstream primary have said that they can't meet his needs. He's making very little progress there despite all the extra help. He has a full time statement for ASD but is still in the diagnostic process as far as the health service are concerned. He does have the 'triad of impairments' but he's not typically autistic; it looks a lot more like PDA than anything else.

We're in the middle of an emergency statement review because of the school's declaration that they can't manage DS and the local authority have said they can't transfer him to another mainstream school as if this one can't manage him, the others certainly can't and I can see what they mean. The LA are saying that they have no suitable provision available for him. None of the special schools are able to take a very bright child, there is one primary with an ASD resource base and they a) have no spaces and b) say that he's not suitable for their provision and I have to say I was a bit uncertain about it as the children in the provision are classically autistic and DS is not at all similar.

I've looked for independent schools and there are none until he's old enough to board but he's 6 and very immature so that will be out of the question for years. I've looked outside the LA area and there's nothing but one EBD school with an hour's travelling time that wouldn't be a good place for DS, there really is nothing I can find to aim for.

Has anyone else been up against this one? What do LA's do with DCs they don't have any provision for? What can I do?

Similar situation here (full time sm hours)and having to look for a school. Ds is a bit older but we have been told he is 'unique' in the county. The behaviour is worse when he is highly anxious and is probably the case with your ds. School should be looking at what is causing the anxiety and minimise it where possible. Does he have sensory issues? I know that my ds would be much better off with small class sizes and we have been advised to look at ms units but I don't feel that this would be a good fit really. Am told that a specially tailored package will have to be created so he can access mainstream - have your LA considered all the options available before saying there's nowhere suitable? What part of the country are you in?

I don't know what a specialist teaching team is, is that the same as outreach? They were trying to do ABA but they haven't had the training and it was provoking DS severely, other than that they have nice TAs who sort of use their intuition - he is in a small group of up to 4 rather than in the class most of the time. What works at home is jollying him along most of the time and building life around his needs with occasional moments when I make an unpopular decision and then have to ride out the storm - but he does need that sometimes or he becomes unbearable. I usually talk things through with him in advance and, honestly, don't try to do things like reading with him unless I want to deal with a tantrum. Home Ed would be horrible for me unless I didn't actually try to get him to learn as he's very dyslexic and I have no idea how to deal with that. He's Y2 and I don't think they had a clear idea of what they were working towards and they didn't believe it's an ASD until very recently.

What sorts of things might be possible HotheadPaisan?

Aparently the LA have one other child who is like DS but older and they are going to put me in touch with his parents but it looks like they're thinking in terms of putting together the right provision.

Just researching PDA and sharing that with the teachers might make a big difference. Hothead's links are great, print it all out and say 'enough with the Amateur ABA, try looking at him this way.'

Do you have any properly qualified ABA practices near you?

I'll look into ABA practices - no cities nearby so probably not local. Yes the reading I've done so far has helped me to suggest things so I'll check out all those recommendations. If we can just stop people getting hurt there's a fair chance of making this work, but the school won't tolerate the violence much longer. I've suggested that they make a little hidey hole for DS with a rule that nobody can try to take him out, as all of the violence has happened when he's run or climbed and they've tried to restrain him. This week they're trying it but if that doesn't work he will be permanently excluded quite quickly now.