lucyemma

Had a quick search and found this www.direct.gov.uk/en/Employment/Employees/Timeoffandholidays/DG_184563. Click on the section on holiday entitlement:- the basics. The example it gives is for someone who works part time for 4 days a week and the holiday entitlement is given as 22.4 days as a minimum entitlement and this can include bank holidays. If you've had a full week off (which would be 4 working days), 2 odd days and 8 bank holidays then that's only 14 days. Have a look at your employment contract and see what that says regarding holidays, then take a print out of that web page and see what your boss says. Hope that helps Lucy Hope the link works

The meeting will include the headteacher so it must be for the educational needs. Paed said she would arrange an appointment for us shortly after this meeting so I'm guessing we'll hear more about the diagnosis then. Thanks for clearing that up for me Justine

Thank you for your replies everyone. I have spent ages wondering why the headteacher told me the wrong information and just couldn't think why she had done it...but after reading Justine1 and baddads comments I totally agree with you both. Looking at it from that point of view I suppose the headteacher was in a bit of an awkward position as to what to answer. She wasn't actually in school today so I haven't spoken to her about the meeting yet but I will do that as soon as I can. Ds has told me a few more bits about what happened in the numeracy class in which he was assessed. Apparently they had to work in pairs and this is something he really struggles with as he can't understand that people have different ideas to him. They tried to get him to work with a partner but he refused. He said he told his teacher that he had counted 25 children in the class, divided it by 2 which left 12 pairs and 1 left over which was him so he didn't have to do it!!!! When I mentioned about putting his hand up to answer the questions in maths classes, I should have said he will put his hand up and shout the answer out at the same time. This is in comparison to other subjects where the teacher says he won't interact much but sits there with a vacant expression. I suppose all i can do is wait until 26th when we see the ed psych and see what she says. After our last visit to the paediatrician she wrote and advised that she believed his problems were likely to be ADHD and/or Aspergers related so I'm hoping that soon someone will decide what the problem is so some support can be put in place for him. Nearly forgot...what actually happens at a multi-agency meeting?

Hello, I've got a few questions about Educational Psychologists (and headteachers) that I'm hoping someone might have the answer to?!! A bit of background first, ds is 7 and year 3 (on school action, no statement) we were referred by our paediatrician to a private psychiatrist earlier this year as she thought it might help speed up the diagnosis process (she said SALT, Ed Psych take forever in our area). Psychiatrist diagnosed Aspergers and ADHD. Headteacher/senco has told us in no uncertain terms this diagnosis isn't worth the paper it's written on. We are still plodding down the nhs route (after 1 and a half years of getting nowhere). Anyway, a year and a half after the paed requests an assessment the Ed Psych finally saw him yesterday!! However, I doubt very much she will get a true picture of his behaviour from what she saw yesterday and I'm worried how much this will affect her report. Last week ds was not at school (we were abroad as hubbie has been offered a relocation opportunity and they had organised a familiarisation visit for us to look round schools, houses etc). When we got back on Friday headteacher had sent a parental request form regarding the ED Psych for me to sign. Thought this was odd as she could have asked me on Monday morning as she's always in the playground. Went in on Monday and gave her the form and asked if an appointment had been made yet. She said "everything is up in the air at the moment. It could be today it could be sometime soon, we really don't know. We'll let you know when she's been". i thought this was odd so I got home and rang the Ed Psychs office and was told she'd ring back. Later on Ed Psych rang and told me she had seen him first thing that morning . She advised she had arranged it all with headteacher personally last Wednesday and that the headteacher was all prepared with paperwork etc for her arrival at school. She was lost for words when I told her of the conversation I'd had minutes before her arrival. Anyway, she told me she had seen him in a numeracy class, which headteacher often takes and knows very well that he loves this subject and loves being the first to put his hand up and work out sums (his mental arithmetic is amazing). I also know that having been away from school for a week he will always have a couple of good days until he gets back into the swing of things. Ed Psych saw him in playground too and typically he played with a group of kids (first time in a VERY long time) he usually plays on his own. Ed Psych will be coming to our house in a few weeks to discuss things but do they pay more attention to their own observations and school opinion than what we have to say? I'm really worried as I guess their report plays a big part in the diagnosis process.DS also said that Ed Psych did lots of memory games with him (remembering numbers etc). Now his memory is brilliant it's the comprehension and social side that's the problem so I'm hoping she's aware of that. Headteacher has filled out reports of her own observations of him and given them to Ed Psych. This also worries me as headteacher thinks he's "just a manipulative little boy who has clearly never been shown any boundaries". I spoke to her about 3 or 4 weeks ago and she said everything was "fine". I expressed concern that he was still telling me he played on his own at break time and was told "he's fine". I rephrased the question and again was told "he's fine" Asked his teacher the same question the following week and was told he rarely plays with anyone else and she thinks it's because he lacks the social skills to do so. What am I supposed to do when his teachers say one thing yet the person with overall responsibility for the school and special needs doesn't want to acknowledge it? The paed has requested (in August) that headteacher contact her and arrange a suitable appointment for a multi-agency meeting which I guess is where they decide on the diagnosis(????) SALT will be assessing him mid-November so logically this could be arranged for the end of November. However, headteacher refuses to have the meeting till after the annual review of his IEP in February I'm sick of this woman putting a spanner in the works all the time. She wouldn't spend 5 minutes filling out forms for the psychiatrist for 2 months until the psychiatrist rang her and somehow talked her into it and so delayed things there. I haven't seen headteacher since yesterday morning but when I do I'll ask her why she gave me the wrong info. I'm also going to ask for the meeting to be sorted out. If she refuses again can I complain and who to? Don't want to go down this route as I believe it's in everyone's interest to get along and do the best for ds..... Thanks for reading and sorry to rant!!! didn't realise I'd written that much!! Lucy

Had to laugh when my husbands response was...."you'll do anything to get out of cleaning them!!"

Well, as of this morning looks like I'm going to be replacing the glass in my patio doors. I've been telling the kids all summer not to mess about with the gravel in the pots on the patio. When I came to mow the lawn today I didn't spot the scattered gravel on the lawn next to the patio and the lawnmower picked it up and threw it straight at my patio doors and shattered them both

Hi Tally, I'd be happy to have a look at it for you. I'm studying astrophysics at university and I've had plenty of experience of writing 3000 word essays for that!! Lucy

Congratulations!!!!!!

Just signed up!

Talk about Autism is a new campaign by autism charity TreeHouse, supported by TalkTalk. The campaign aims to increase public understanding of autism, so that children and young people with autism and their families do not have to feel isolated, excluded or judged. http://talkathon.talkaboutautism.org.uk/?ref=nf For each person that registers Talktalk will give the autism charity TreeHouse £1. Hope I've posted the link ok Lucy

Well today, that's an easy one....worst decision was to try and be a good employee and read the "accident awareness" posters that my company have decided to plaster all over the workplace. Unfortunately the ones I was reading were posted on the wall going all the way up the stairs (brilliant idea huh !!). I duly tripped up the stairs and was sprawled out everywhere. Picked myself up (in one piece!) and thanked my lucky stars no one else was around. Had to laugh at the irony of it all and carried on my way. When I got to reception I saw a whole bunch of security guards in hysterics. A few wise cracks later and they had seen the whole episode on the security cameras. I don't think I'll hear the end of this.....my poor pride has taken a bit of a battering today!!!!

Had a search and couldn't find anything already named. Did find this though http://www.countrygardenroses.co.uk/name_your_own_rose.php Hope it helps!! Lucy

Just wanted to share this....I'm feeling so proud of ds (6) after a visit to the supermarket yesterday. He hates going but decided he would go if he could take his purse with him as he'd saved up quite a bit of change. He was upset that he couldn't find anything he wanted and so I decided it was time we paid and left. At the till opposite us was a kid from his old school who he didn't get on with. The kid had a new toy in his hands and was showing off and pulling faces at ds. The boys father didn't say a word and my son was getting quite distressed and kept saying "mummy get him to stop" (he hates people staring at him). Just as we were about to leave the till ds stopped me and takes his purse out and puts a load of coins into the charity tin that they have at the side of the till. The cashier and the people who were behind us were all singing his praises and this other family clearly overheard. We've had people say so many negative things about ds in the last few months that it was great to hear people saying how kind he was. It was an absolutely fantastic moment!!!

Thanks for your replies everyone....it's certainly given me some ideas to use when school restarts. Fingers crossed the headteacher is prepared to actually listen to me...not to optimistic on that one.

Hi, just wondering but is there a chance that maybe the guy with AS asked the director to do this? It could be the case, if he gets anxious about people approaching him then at least it will make it clear to the other workers what the problem is rather then the poor guy getting a reputation for being odd etc. Just a thought.

Forgot to mention....as ds is doing so well academically would he still be able to get a statement? I believe I've read somewhere that he would, but if this is right does anyone know would sort of support he could potentially get? Many thanks

Thanks for your reply. Ds doesn't have a statement but I think we will have to look into it if school can't provide the support he needs. Up to now the school have only kept him in for 5 minutes or so for other incidents as they realise he needs to be with other children to try and socialise. They also have a buddy bus stop but he won't use it as the other children have teased him for standing there. At the moment the school has a name and shame policy whereby if you are naughty at break times your name gets written in either green (warning) or red (to be punished) on a board in the school hall (a big board in a room approx 8 x 5 metres so it really stands out). Ds has no concept of shame as he can't imagine what other people must think of his behaviour. In his case it only seems to reinforce to the other kids (and the parents who regularly walk through there) that "X has been naughty again".

Hi, Just wondering if anyone can give me some advice regarding developing social skills at breaktimes. Ds is 6 and in year 2, he has AS, ADHD, SPLD and Dyspraxia. School say academically he is very bright and their only concern is his handwriting. His social skills on the other hand are at the other extreme. He has no friends and tends to become obsessed with different girls (currently the headteacher/senco's daughter who is in his class ) and won't leave them alone. He can't read expressions very well and when the girls get upset about his constant presence he thinks its all a game and that they are actually happy about him playing with them. He has no idea how to approach other children to play and desperately wants to have a friend. We removed him from his last school partly because they were so reluctant to help that he had got into a vicious circle that the only way he could get children to talk to him was if he called them names. He told me that he would rather have other children calling him nasty names than them ignoring him. At the moment ds keeps telling me he spends a lot of his breaktimes on his own. He does sometimes approach children and ask to play but they usually say no. He will then approach a dinnerlady who will ask on his behalf but the children soon leave him and he's on his own again. He also tends to loiter at the edge of other children's games, watching them and trying to join in if he can but often he is told to go away. He sometimes ends up spoiling other childrens games (I think as he wants the reaction rather than be ignored) Today, he had no-one to play with and asked a girl if he could join her group. She said no so he went to the dinnerlady who talked the girl round. Unfortunately after a short time they walked off and left him. Ds went to play on the slide as their were children there and still no-one would play with him. A stone had been left at the top of the slide so he picked it up and threw it at a group of girls. He just missed a girls head (according to the teacher...or according to ds it landed on a girls leg). He will lose his lunchtime tomorrow and has had a severe telling off by deputy head and also by me (playstation banned etc) but I get the impression that it all boils down to wanting someone to play with him. I'm worried that if nothing is done then one day that stone is going to hit someone's head and then what? Problem is headteacher will not accept his diagnosis and has told us (her exact words) "he is just a naughty boy who has clearly never been shown any boundaries". Ds is on school action and in his IEP (which was done in Feb) he has written: Objective - to improve his ability to talk to and listen to a peer. Current level - X is able to talk to an adult but is reluctant to talk to another child. Target - X will be able to take turns with a partner and will be observed doing this once a week Create opportunities for X to play with a peer in the sand area Create opportunities to play a simple game with a peer Create opportunities during talk time in numeracy and literacy for X to talk to a selected peer Headteacher has ruled out the Circle of Friends technique as she feels there is no way he would cope in a group. (Kind of says a lot about his social skills in my opinion). I think more needs to be done and would like to approach school but I'm not sure what to suggest. Has anyone been in a similar position and found anything that helped? Would be really, really grateful for any replies. Thanks Lucy

My son, who was 5 at the time managed to get lost when the school didn't repair a broken fence on the playing field. Apparently the previous week another child had got out of school but they didn't fix it. It was a simple repair - just needed a bit of wire as someone had cut through it. Ds had no-one to play with and could see people on the other side (fields where a lot of teenagers hang out) so decided to see if someone would talk to him. He went through and at the end of lunch another child told a dinner lady that ds had gone through the gap and they had to send people to try and find him. It was another 5(!!!!) weeks before school fixed it. In this time we expressed concern to his teacher, caretaker, playground staff but were made to feel as if we were making a fuss about nothing. In the end we wrote a complaint letter to headteacher who never even acknoweldged the letter. He did acknowledge my husband storming into his office mind you it was only then that he assured us it would be fixed within a week. After this I lost all faith in the school. If they couldn't ensure my son's (or anyone elses childs) safety in the school environment then how could I even begin to consider school trips etc (that's another story!!). We changed schools a few months after this. Make sure that the school put something in place to ensure this does not happen again and make a complaint to the headteacher about it. It will certainly speak volumes about the school as to how they handle the situation. I would be extremely concerned if they try and brush it under the carpet as my son's school did.

So sorry to hear your news. <'> Take care Lucy

Thanks for that I've only had a quick look but it looks like those a whole load of things that will be useful for ds on there

Thanks for all your replies. Update on the situation is that psychiatrist has advised that the forms have still not arrived so ht obviously didn't post them like she told me just over a week ago. Psychiatrist has faxed some more to the school and posted some to us to hand over to them so they will be bombarded next week!! HT has been told several times that ds class teacher must fill out forms but she refuses and had filled them out herself so the forms that have apparently got lost or not posted would have been no good anyway. HT has little to do with teaching my son. I feel like it's such an awkward position to be in because we get on fine with his class teachers (there are 2 both part time) and we share advice and ideas. The teachers have done a fantastic job in trying to make class activities with a view to helping his social skills (although he often is not very responsive) and we make a point of telling them that we appreciate their hard work. The school itself is small and the only one that would suit ds (he has only been there 4 months after he went downhill so much at his last school) so changing schools is not an option. The only problem quite simply is the attitude of the headteacher. Since we first met her and she showed us round the school we put her frosty attitude down to "she's probably had a bad day". Now, she's either had a really bad 4 months or there's a bit more to it!!! Personally we would really like to work with her not against her...so we are not giving up just yet. The psychiatrist already has the necessary forms filled out by my sons old school so she is going to use those to base her report on for now. This headteacher has held everything up by a months now. We should get the report tomorrow or early next week so we'll see what happens then....see is she's still in denial. I think if she is rude again though we will have to take matters further because it's just not in my sons best interests. Is it Parent Partnership or something like that who will attend school meetings with you? Does anyone know what sort of input these people give to the conversation or how it works exactly?!?! I have a suspicion we are going to have to go done that route soon Thanks again Lucy -x- Oops forgot to mention saw the paed on Thursday. Well, saw paed but didn't see paed!!!!!!!!!! Not our usual one anyway....after 20 minutes of getting nowhere (he had no background of our case and the notes weren't of much help for him) he suggested to make another appt for when our usually paed is back off holiday....hopefully next month.

Hi, just a thought, but if there is a local university or college with a physics department nearby why don't you contact them and see if he could do some work experience there. It would be a subject he's interested in and it would also be in an academic environment if thats what he prefers. It might also be worth while seeing if he could maybe shadow someone who works there....at least he'd have the constant of having the same person on hand throughout the work experience. Lucy

Just read this post as I've been wondering for ages why my info section says Norfolk Broads!!!!! Looks like I'm joining the dippy club too!!!! Better not make too many posts as I'm terrified of heights!!

Hi Lynne, It's fantastic to hear that your son has started talking Not sure if I can be of much help, but one of my friends sons didn't talk until he was about to start school (he wasn't autistic). He never said a word and they couldn't work out what was wrong. Then suddenly he just decided to start talking and like you have described, there was no stopping him. Almost as if he had been taking it all in over the years and was making up for lost time!!!! Lucy -x-