choosing a mainstream school

[star]

what factors were important for you when choosing your childs school? In terms of education, special needs provision, school size and facilities.

 

I'm going to look around some schools with various styles - some large, others smaller village schools. My son is attending SALT and we are not sure whether his social skills will increase as his language gets better but I am planning for him maybe needing extra support.

 

Also, any good question to ask when I look around the schools.

 

Thanks for any info.

[jen]

you need to ask the school how ASD friendly they are. How can the child leave the classroom when they are distressed, is there a card system they use. Is there a quiet area the child can retreat to and is it available to be used at any time of day. What structure is in place for class room change over, going out to play etc.

What is there experience of ASD children.

 

Go and look at the school at change over times in the day e.g. going out to play etc so you get a real idea of how much confusion your child will have to cope with.

 

Phasid has also given some very good ideas on looking at schools in previous threads.

 

Jen

[lisa]

One of the most important things I think is that the school understand ASD. Ask them what sort of difficulties they think an ASD child would have in school and the way they answer is a good indication of their understanding. When we were looking I was quite surprised at the attitude of some schools and the one that had initially been top of my list ended up bottom after I'd visited and questioned them. I explained areas where I thought my son would have problems coping and asked how they would deal with it.

 

Ask about social skills groups, sometimes called circle of friends. Ask how many ASD kids they have and if they have regular ASD outreach visits.

 

I visited practically every school in our borough and the two neighbouring boroughs. We're really happy with our choice of secondary school (so far..) My son is even doing a life skills workshop in his mainstream school!! They took them on a field trip to the local cafe the other day where they each had to order a meal and drink, I was really impressed. It's these sort of things that normally get forgotten in mainstream, but which to our kids can be the most important lessons. He's doing so much better than he ever did in primary.

 

Lisa

[marshmallow]

Hi,

 

I have found the best school my DS has been at is one that is 'parent friendly', ie, listens to the parents, is open to discussion and accepts that parents do know their own children, and have feelings! Hope this makes sense! Good luck.

[Zemanski]

The feel of a place is more important than the reputation

 

we visited lots of schools and talked to both sencos and G&T coordinators, together where possible (in one school they had never met!)

 

we then narrowed it down to 3 and took Com in to look round. He wasn't too forthcoming about his opinions but we watched how he behaved and how staff and pupils spoke to him. The school we chose was the one where he sucked his thumb less

They also had the most experience of working with AS

 

it looked like a good choice for the first year but things went wrong later - you really can't tell that things like that are going to happen though

 

Zemanski

[lisa]

it looked like a good choice for the first year but things went wrong later

 

This happened to us with primary. We had no real problems until the SENCO left at the end of year 4. We then had the SENCO from hell who I'm positive spread the word that we were neurotic parents and there was nothing wrong with our son that a bit of disipline wouldn't solve!!

 

It can sometimes only take one teacher to decide that they're dealing with an awkward kid/parent for things to go downhill fast.

 

Lisa

[Jill]

Plenty of good advice here.

 

I'd also look at how secure the school is - we visited one that had wide open gates & hedges with gaps in around the playing field (no good for The Boy who would be off faster than you can say "where's he gone")

 

Be wary of schools that say "we'd take our guidance from you" to every question you ask too, that generally means they have no clue about AS or ASD and you'd end up telling them what to do ALL the time (and possibly being ignored due to lack of their understanding).

 

Best of luck mate. Keep the headache tablets handy - I'm so glad our school visits are over and done with (I hope)

[Karen A]

Thanks for asking the question.Ben our son age 8 has recently been Dx DCD and aspergers traits.We are in the process of getting a statement and need to decide whether to look at other schools so the info is useful .I think it is worth looking at OFSTED reports for the schools you are interested in to see what they say about SEN in particular[available on OFSTED WEBSITE]also get a copy of SEN policy.We also asked around among contacts at parent support group to find out where other cildren with ASD who are in mainsream are and what the parents thought about the support they recieve.Karen