God what do I do with my poor DS?

[inappropriatelyemployed]

He couldn't get to school at all today. He has only been going in for part of the day with me. He was wailing and crying about putting his uniform on and how he can't cope.

Where do we go from here? His third school. One period of HE already. School will do whatever they can but he can't cope and I worry I am damaging his mental health.

He finds it so hard to explain how he feels but he can';t cope with kids at school. We went to a special school to look around yesterday and he wouldn't look in the classes and got visibly stressed out at a glimpse of a child in a far off corridor.

What do you do?? CAMHS? HE? This can't go on.

So I just had a conversation with an Independent SALT that goes into ds' school now and then. She said she had observed him and that he is working at capacity and there is nothing I can add to his learning there.

Sorry. I'd contacted her with a view to perhaps setting some targets for us to work on at home/in the holidays etc, as I do a mini-programme and know HOW to teach but struggle with WHAT to teach for a child with a language disorder.

That was the answer I got. She's extremely well respected.

I think it's worth asking the question, Polter. We tend to just roll down an expected path and I expect our children do too, and unless it's asked we wouldn't know if they'd prefer anything different, or even have an opinion.

Most children just respond with what they know. Children who've never been in school think it's completely bizarre that some children go to school, because HE is all they've known - that's their normality and anything else is considered to be a bit deviant. Both sides of the same coin, really.

Children do just often follow the order of things too. DS has never asked to stay off and not go to school. The OT said months ago 'he only goes to please you' and this has proved to be the case.

We went to the library this morning and sat chatting and he said it was such a stress pretending to be like everyone else all of the time.

I think friends can get you through. DS had times when he had friends but this has become harder as he has got older. Once he had no one to trust - adult or child - it was just exhausting.

But this is what I have pieced together. The reality is I feel it has been so hard fighting DS's corner all these years that I have tried not to respond to every singly stress episode and have tried to inform staff about his needs gently. When people are pulling in one direction - he needs to be in class all the time - and you know that is wrong, it is hard to stand against it without losing 'hearts and minds'.

However, this is the logical conclusion of those times spent cramming the square peg into a round hole and I am horrified at how much worse it would have been if I had blithely followed the ABA consultant's 'normalisation' agenda.

Star...sorry, I am a bit confused.
Is she saying that she can't help him anymore in school? Or that you can't add to his learning?

She's saying that I can't add to his learning.

She's brought in by the school at a general consultancy level to give ideas about class teaching rather than individual.

She's pretty well-known and I have contacted her in the past but we lived too far away then. She says she has seen ds a while ago, and now, and he has made a huge amount of progress, he's in the right setting and working at capacity and so nothing I can do outside of that will add, but simply be a waste of money.

zzzzz

Yes. Truth is I'll do it with or without her or anyone elses help. I always have.

I don't know how she can make the judgement she has without seeing him at home or having seen him learning in other environments iyswim.

The school are good, but at parents the Music Teacher telling us that he found that lesson especially difficult, which was surprise to us because after a term of 10min lessons he is not only playing all fingers on the piano but composing his own 2 hand pieces. She didn't know this.

I'm not sure they know he can read either, because he's unenthustic about Kipper and doesn't focus or pay attention, but reads avidly from a couple of technical birth preparation books we have lying about.

Anyway, I told her it was going to happen anyway so she's going to think. I'm pretty disappointed tbh.

Unless the school SALT has got to her (very bad relationship, which is partly why I have approached her and NOT the school SALT).

Anyway, - that discipline issue I have, it tends to disappear when I have someone to prove wrong!!!!

Ahh, good idea. Phone and language of maths.

DS can tell the time but has no clue what an hour earlier that 9'Oclock is.

Or 3 more than 6, despite being able to do complication sequencing of numbers (his way of getting round me telling him he can't make a tape measure).

Thank you zzzzz. this is what I wanted. Cheque is in the post. Do you do money back guarantee?

zzzzz you are good. hats off to you for coming up with such brilliant stuff. I am storing it all for future use.

Well star, I think what she told you is a crock of shit.
IMO the secret is to find the hook for the individual child, whether that be maths, whatever.
I realise I am teaching my GM to suck eggs here :) but until he feels engaged in his learning he won't progress further.

...and I say that as the mother of a child who could barely read and write 18 months ago and who was crippled by anxiety and low self esteem.
His year 3 teacher told me that "you might have tomacceptmthat the bottom sets are where your ds belongs".
He has just come back from a 4 day residential trip with his class and his room won the award out of nearly 30 rooms for best behaviour and attitude. (I think he wore the same pants for 3 days, but you cant have everything)
He is now in the top reading group, is a level 4 for maths and we are working on his spelling.
I simply do not understand how anyone can write off a young child.
It is lazy and unacceptable.

I think she's seen the difference between how he was there the last time she saw him and this time and decided it is huge progress. I'd be inclined to agree with this, but I have seen him when he wasn't there at all iyswim. She hasn't.

That's AMAZING Bad, pants or not!!!

'IMO the secret is to find the hook for the individual'

Of course it is. I dunno what she thinks I'm doing. Other children do piano, karate whatever, after school where discipline and practice are expected of them as well as enjoyment. How is what I want to do different?