Reception auties 2018/19 - thread 2

[openupmyeagereyes]

Thanks to LightTripper for the thread title. This is the continuation of the thread for parents and carers of dc with autism in their reception year at school. Please join us if you can or, if you have dc due to start reception in 2019, feel free to drop by and ask us questions.

Thread 1

He's having about 4 different 1-1's a week, his Ta is often off sick, so he's being chucked to whoever will have him lately.

He has 2 different 1-1's a day as standard and now it's more like 4 different 1-1's.

Wow, he must find that so unsettling? I don't understand how there can be no plan (especially in the afternoon - presumably the person was either there or absent in the morning already, so they had time to make a plan and tell you about it if there was staff sickness or whatever?

Do you think they are trying to get you to take him away so they don't have to deal with having a SN kid - or are they just incompetent? Is it worth talking to your area EYFS SENCO at your Local Authority to see if they have any advice? Ours was fairly helpful (i.e. indiscreet) in flagging the schools/school SENCOs she rated and those she didn't.

It just doesn't seem a sustainable situation: particularly given what he's achieving with you at home, so you know he has lots of potential. Sending or or both.

danni did you find out what happened after you left? It must be so upsetting.

I agree, your ds is doing well at home being taught 1:1 by you. With an experienced TA he should be achieving at school too.

I would ask for a meeting with the SENco to discuss. When is his annual review?

Sorry, I didn’t mean he’s not achieving at school. I hope you can get regular 1:1 support agreed. Your ds needs to know who will be working with him and when. Autism 101 isn’t it - a regular schedule.

Oh Danni - it's not good enough is it. Have you had EHCP annual review or can you ask for an emergency one? Obviously it's always tricky when someone's off sick but they should have contingency plans.

@danni0509 that sounds really shitty. As if we don’t have enough challenges and hurdles to overcome with our kids. You shouldn’t have to be battling school as well.

Have you got sendiass involved? In our area they provide advocacy in SEN meetings and help keep schools accountable. Might help to have a third party weigh in on the meetings so school know they can’t bully you.

I've got a question and answer coffee morning with the LA senior educational phycologist at ds school, it starts at 8.45 when school starts, all SN parents have been invited, but I can't go until 9.20 when I've dropped ds off at school (they didn't offer for him to go in at the same time as the other kids as a one off and when I said I'm going to miss most of it I just got an awkward silence) so I'm going to have to casually stroll in half hour late and apologise I'm late and say that he's not allowed to start until 9.15, then when it finishes I'll say right best dash got to go home tidy up quick and come back to school for him in an hour as he's not allowed to have lunch at school etc.

Haha. Leary digs are at the ready! Doubt they'll invite me again.

I shall definitely mention tomorrow about his ehcp and the situation I'm having, after all she works for who's paying for it!

I've just been giving dh a mock of the questions I'm asking the EP that I need solutions for and dh said maybe leave that one off your list and that one too

Ds smashed all my ornaments on my windowsill at bedtime a nice little wooden candle box and some lovely little heart ornaments dh bought me then he tried to put the wooden candle box through my tv screen. He's had them off a few times and dh was supposed to have put them away but too late now.

My house looks like a hostel, I've got a sofa, a rug and a tv on the wall with a thick Thomas the tank quilt draped over it during ds waking hours to stop it getting smashed. Nothing else, no pictures no ornaments it's totally bare bcos ds has wrecked it all. Embarrassing it doesn't even look like a home. I've had no end of comments about the Thomas the tank quilt cover, it doesn't look like there's a tv behind it just looks like I'm a trendy fucker with a Thomas quilt up on the wall 😂

I've had to practically drag him up to bed tonight he wasn't co operating and he was doing really dangerous stuff, I've got a electric box thing on my wall in the living room like a trip switch box and ds decided to squirt water all over it while I was grabbing his pyjamas, then as I was taking him up he nearly knocked us both back down the stairs kicking off in my arms, then got him into his room and he threw a huge plastic minion toy straight at my face and laughed and pretended to make a crying noise and when I didn't cry he got angry that I didn't cry

You really do need the patience of a saint don't you. arrghh!

My mum phoned and said she's enrolling her puppy on a behavioural class, I said see if there's a spare place for ds will you 😆

My neighbours gone in to have her baby today, I watched her out my window earlier loading the car seat in and putting her bags in the car, her and her boyfriend looked so excited & happy.

That was me and dh 6 years ago, I wish I could go back to that very moment getting in the car and start everything fresh and do all I could from day 1 to make ds not be so affected.

If only.

Sorry, I know.... depress off!

danni it’s nothing that you’ve done, you know that

Your ds has some difficult behaviours and you cope with it so well. I have a friend who has two dc with autism. Her eldest is most severely affected and very destructive. I’ve not been to her house but she says that she doesn’t have any ornaments or anything either and her dd destroys a lot of furniture too. It’s like super extreme sensory seeking.

I don’t know what the answer is, I wish I did. I wonder if play therapy or similar would help. Can you speak to the GP or paed about whether anything is available?

In the meantime, offload here as much as you need to. I hope the session tomorrow is helpful. I think you should contact sendiass about school too, it really is unacceptable.

Easier said than done but try not to blame yourself. You can't change the way your son's brain works and you sound like such a conscientious parent.

Good luck tomorrow

Danni that sounds like such a tough day.
The school are doing you no favours at all. It makes me angry for you when I read about all the awful and illegal things they are doing to your ds.
I hope the meeting with the EP today does the trick.
I really feel for you about all the destruction and it's so hard been hit kicked and having things thrown at you. Ds does a lot when he anxious and I find it so frustrating that I can't explain to him how upsetting it is.
I hope you have a better day today.

Dimples I'm so glad ds's party went so well.

I hope your dd has a better time of it this week light. It's been a long school year for them so far!

Dh is away until next Tuesday, so far the kids don't seem to have noticed too much. Just hoping they stay relatively calm for the rest of the week!

Thanks liv. Still poo holding so we are probably running up to another tough day (last time she was holding from Tuesday to Saturday, so if she started again on Sunday I guess that means we hit peak-poo tomorrow or Thursday - joy). But not too bad in the scheme of things I guess. As our nanny said this morning, we've had a good few months. Hope your kids are on good form while DH is away!

Danni I don't know what to say except that I know you know it isn't what you've done. As others have said, that sensory stuff is hard. I feel so frustrated that you aren't getting more help and support from school. Apart from anything else, if they were looking after DS all day (which I understand is their legal obligation) it would give you so much more energy to be able to get prepared for bedtime and just give you enough spoons to deal with the difficult behaviour calmly if/when it comes. You do sound like a very calm person, which I'm sure is just the right way to deal with things.

I hope the meeting this morning went well and that you manage to get their attention about how the school is letting you and DS down, and all the abilities that DS does have when he has the right supports in place.

To cut a long story short, the EP asked me if I had any issues, she went around the group asking each person individually, I said I've got too many really but the one I'm most bothered by is his hours & so told her about it all, she's going back to her office at the LA pull ds ehcp with my permission, look into a few things and she will be phoning the school on my behalf.

She was really shocked at what I said and she told me so. She said I've heard of this as a short term solution but not for the full time the child has attended especially with an ehcp in place.

There were about 10 other parents there today and when I explained everything sat around the table they were looking at me like

(Ds spends the majority of his day outside away from the others to not disturb there learning and plays with balls bikes and bubbles a lot of the day, I go to school 4 times per day and every day he's outside each time. (I also mentioned this)

Walked out of the office at 10.15 with the other parents and what do you know, ds is sat outside with his ta going down the slide, while all of his class are indoors learning.

I just turned around looked at the parents and said I rest my case.

danni it’s great that the EP is going to get involved. I really think you need to call an urgent review of his EHCP. They need to discuss what the barriers are to his learning with the rest of the class (to the extent he can, my ds does not spend all day with the class). It really feels like this is not the right school for him - or at least the right group of individuals working with him which all but amounts to the same thing. Get in touch with Sendiass, they will help you too.

Ds did brilliantly at sports day, I’m so proud of him. Just like your ds danni, he got stuck into all the activities and had great fun, it was a lovely morning.

Just wanted to totally agree with everything open said. So glad it sounds like somebody is seriously engaging with you at last xx

I'm glad someone is taking you seriously danni. I hope it changes something for you. Although I agree with Open that it doesn't seem like the right school for him.

Open fantastic about sports day! Well done to your ds.

Thanks light.

@danni0509 Well done for standing up for yourself and your ds. It sounds as if the school don’t know how to adapt the learning environment to enable him to learn and instead are just babysitting him. Which is totally unacceptable. He has an EHCP which means he should have detailed achievable goals/outcomes that they are working towards with details on how they plan to do this. If they’re not able to achieve these goals then it means they are either too hard and should be stepped down or they are not using the correct approach.

The SCERTS model of assessment can be really helpful in determining useful and functional goals - it looks at 3 areas “social communication” “emotional regulation” and “transactional support”. Ironically the last of these is where the educational setting looks at how they need to adapt their methods and support to better help the child. The assessment (observational usually) breaks down each area into very small steps which then can give some very clear directions for what goals are appropriate. It might be worth asking if the Ed psychs, speech therapists or advisory teachers are trained in this approach.

Another thing to look at is if they can use TEEACH methods of classroom adaptation to help get him doing adult lead activities, such as using a workstation to complete jobs at his level. There’s loads of information if you google either of these two terms, but as a professional, if I walked in to a school and saw that a child with Sen was being treated as your ds is then these are the avenues I’d go down. I hope that’s helpful, and not too much jargon!

Hi can I join please. I will read the full thread later on!
My ds has ASD and is due to start mainstream reception in September. He currently does afternoon sessions only at the pre school attached to the school. I have a SENCO meeting tomorrow and hope to find out who his 121 support will be. No EHCP yet but school are doing the costing work and 2 terms of intervention so hopefully will be applied for in September.
Ds has a complex medical history including Acute myeloid leukaemia (diagnosed at 16 months) and then diagnosed with ASD at 3 yo.

Welcome Jemimapuddleduk.

Leukaemia must have been absolutely harrowing for you, your poor ds . I hope the SENCO meeting goes well tomorrow.

Danni I am so glad that the EP is on board and hopefully can help get things sorted for you and your boy.

I agree with the others that all this toing and froing to school is not helping you

Great news on sports day Open

Welcome jpd

TA had a message from the cricket coach for me today - my heart sank. But no, it was that DS is great at throwing and bowled 4 classmates out! All that throwing ‘practice’ is paying off!

dimples that’s fab maybe Freddie Flintoff’s mother had similar issues...

For those of you struggling with car safely take a look at, " best vests" - not totally Houdini proof but deters most from escaping and certainly slows them down!!
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Welcome Jemima! Leukemia must have been horrific. I had to Google it and hadn't realised how rare that form is. What a nightmare. Glad you are through now, and hope all the school prep goes well. Does he enjoy the pre-school? DD went to a pre-school linked to her school and I think it really helped with transition.

DD had sports day yesterday. She didn't join in with anything (she was too worried about the cheering) but she says she enjoyed it and especially enjoyed the snack part (they gave them all medal-shaped bisuits at the end!) So glad to have got through that. Even though she didn't join in she obviously found it totally knackering and fell asleep on the bus home!

School summer fair this weekend which I always find a bit much (!) plus I've just remembered I promised to make some kind of bake and we have to dig out some donations ... always on to the next thing!

Great news on the cricket dimples - maybe it's going to be a new passion for DS??

Dimples well done ds! yes, all those holes in your walls have paid off lol. My ds is like a russian shot putter. He threw a metal plane up in the air that hard it bounced off the ceiling back down and split his scalp clean open a few months ago which needed a&e bcos it wouldn't stop bleeding his a nightmare with his throwing.

Light is your dd on any medication for withholding bless her, does she get stomach ache etc?

Open how's things going? Is ds still doing his homework? How's the early wake ups?

Jemima hello hope ds is ok and todays meeting goes well, sorry to hear about the leukaemia, is everything ok now?

Jeb hows ds? How's the pregnancy, Will you be finding out if girl / boy?

Liv hows it going with dh away? Are you away next?

Hi to Ilikesweetpeas & anyone else I've missed x