<shout shout shout > Bloody bloody School

[WedgiesMum]

Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaargh!

DS (age 9 with AS demand avoidance poss ADD currently being assessed for a statement) has been excluded from school AGAIN! And again I feel that it is their fault and this time it's the bloody new head teacher.

In the line for lunch today his elbow is see sawing about and hitting those behind him. HT is there and demands 'why are you doing that' and gets a bit shirty with him. So he hits her and then runs off out of school and heads home I get a call to say he is off the premises and that the police have been called. I rush from work and find him on the road walking towards home.

Get to school and the new Head (who I have never met and has not made her self available on the playground at all since term started last week so no one knows who she is!!) very combative and unaware of DS's issues and hasn't even read his file, doesn't know he is being assessed, and says 'well I've handled autistic children before' . WTF 'handled'???? He is a child not a flippin animal! Her attitude through the entire meeting was that I am a bad parent with a hooligan child, pre-judged as naughty and completely undisciplined, and quite happy to threaten me with DS being excluded every lunchtime and said that as he is Y5 had we considered where he was to go in Y7 and implied he would go straight to the PRU or some young offenders institution!!!

I mean this is the first time I've met the witch lady and she is very in my face and not at all concilliatory or trying to have a team working approach. She does notevenseemtounderstand the difficulties of AS and communication issues and is looking at the behaviour rather than the cause of it. How can he answer 'why are you doing that?' how does he know what she means by that, how can he answer it other than by denying he did it cos that's what he always does? Why did she get shirty with him when she should understand that this will immediately put his back up? And WHY FFS are they sending him up to the dining hall when all last year he had his lunch in a classroom to calm down enough to be able to go out to the playground?

GRRRRRRRRRR!!!!!

He's not back til friday when I am taking DH with me for his return to school meeting so I can get cross without crying!

I HATE THEM!!!!!!!

...phew feel better for that rant.....

Oh, that's horrible. Lots of big hugs ...and I'll come and punch her with dd's stick if you like. Stupid woman.

what an awful day for your ds1 and you. Is there a sympathetic senco or something at school? It must be so unsettling for your ds to be off and so frustrating trhat you know if he was handled better he wouldn't have hit her.

Poor you and your ds, hope you manage to get cross without crying - that's where I always struggle! I'm not suprised your ds hit her, shame it didn't knock some sense into her.

i am for you hope ds is ok and you manage to sort things out x

Feel for you Wedgie, my lad has just gone back to school today after having an exclusion on Friday, again largely because the school didn't manage a situation correctly and he lashed out. Your Head sounds vile, wishing you luck in dealing with her (or should that be 'handling her'). Cheeky mare.

Do you have an autism outreach worker you can contact? They should be prepared to go into school and advise on specific management strategies if the school is not aware of how to work with such children, as the Head seems to be.

Thanks guys, just so frustrated!

The SENCO is just as bad, she was his teacher last year and was vile - she finds it difficult to accept his dx apparently! We have had all the services in and school still don't seem to manage him any differently!

Hope it went well for your DS streaky! Can't believe they have given DS 3.5 days exclusion for this, it seems a tad excessive! I know he hit the Head but even so.... she says it was with his bag but he says with a piece of paper he had in his hand - and a friends child who was there at the time says that it was definitely not his bag but a rolled up piece of paper! And other children were messing around at the time and didn't get into trouble

We had very similar when ds was in mainstream - the head gave me a very earnest talk about 'understanding that he didn't have behavioural problems and was just very frustrated'...and then excluded him. I tried to point out that any 5yr old, let alone one with communication problems, doesn't really get what exclusion is and that excluding him would just make everything worse but to no avail, they just excluded him again. We gave up in the end and de-camped to a special school. I hope you have more luck with your head!

Hope your DS is alright now. Doesn't sound right to me that she has worked with ASD kids before, she should have known the difference between ASD and bad behaviour. I've had this all along with my DD. Can't communicate, gets frustrated, then the inevitable happens. Things should improve when you get your statement, you get more power, they have to stick to whats in the statement. My best advice to you is to find a school nearby that has had more experience of SEN, that's what I have had to do. The more SEN pupils the better. Good luck XX

Wedgiesmum

Sorry to read this has happened to you. Not an uncommon scenario unfortunately although that is cold comfort to you.

PRU is certainly NOT the place for him to go to, he needs a more understanding school where they will also go some way to meet his additional support needs.

IPSEA have information on their website re exclusions - I'd take a look at that. Do speak to IPSEA as well as the NAS.

Go all out to get this Statement - how far are you along this process?. Longer term as well I'd look for another more understanding school as this one does seem particularly useless and not at all understanding as well as unhelpful (an extremely bad combo when ASD is an issue). It sounds to me like they do not want your son there at all, even with a Statement in place they may not change their tune.

Oh Wedgiesmum! So sorry this has happened - your DS must be so upset. This ht sounds just like the new ht at Ds old ms - even to her word selection! So much of a school depends on the ht attitude. I do hope that she will realise that she managed it badly, and gets to know the children! Is there an ASD support unit that can intervein?

She sounds like the head from ds's old school I agree that if the head and the senco are both that bad he'd be better off somewhere else. Changing schools made so much difference to ds. His old school would have been just as crap even if he'd had a statement when he was there. The school I moved him to were fab and would have helped him even without a statement giving them extra funding for him. Mostly I think because they saw him as a child who they could help and support to fulfill his potential rather than a problem they'd rather be rid of.

So sorry that you and your poor ds are going through this. When we went through everything with ds old school it was undoubtably the most stressful and difficult time of my life. {{{hugs}}}

Wishing you lots of luck for friday. I always find it hard not to cry too. I find making a list of notes helps so that if I feel myself getting emotional I can look down at them and swallow my tears before speaking again - plus that way I remember everything I want to say,

Once again fabulous help! Always there when I need you!

We are currently being assessed for a statement/note in lieu - the LA agreed over the summer to do so and their findings have to be reported by the end of November. We see the school doctor in 10 days and I am writing our list of concerns. Fortunately the paed, CAMHS, Behaviour Support are all on our side and prepared to fight alongside us.

I'm currently thinking about changing school but we did this in Y2 and am reluctant to move until we have the statement. Also have DD to think about. She has just gone into Y3 and loves it, so she would have to stay. I work as a TA and lots of the staff where I work have said to bring him there, but I'm wary as I did that before when I moved him to the current school because I thought they would treat him well!

Am still boiling mad today and had a hard time taking DD to school without shouting rude words in the playground!

DS has had a lovely day with his Dad, done some work I left for him, read, took the dog to the park and played on the computer. Now watching Mr Bean's Holiday with Dad and they are both giggling at the same things!

Thanks you lot!

ooooh and forgot to say. HT said categorically that DS had hit her with his bag which made it much worse in her opinion, he insisted he hadn't but had hit her with some paper in his hand and was quite upset that she had said that.

Two different parents have told me today that their children witnessed the incident and said that he hit her with paper in his hand and definitely not his bag, which was on his back at the time. Can't wait to go in Friday now and shout 'liar, liar pants on fire!!'

ha ha - I double dare you to do that!