Stessed by problem with DD's school

silvercar

Gingham_Ribbon wrote: »

I'm horrified to read that some people think refusing this child a school education is desirable.

She is not yet of compulsary school age.

The current situation is unmanageable. Either the child shouldn't be in school or there needs to be someone in school prepared to change her.

Phoning a parent to come to school, possibly 5 times in one morning and leaving the poor girl in poopy pants for half an hour each time is intolerable.

daska

Gingham_Ribbon wrote: »

I'm horrified to read that some people think refusing this child a school education is desirable.

School isn't compulsory, so home ed might have been something to consider if it were appropriate for the OP's family, but I agree with you, I don't think refusing the child the option of being educated at school on the basis of them not wanting to change a nappy is acceptable or desirable. Sorry, not sure if that reads quite right, I'm struggling to get the words right...

galvanizersbaby

Gingham_Ribbon wrote: »

I'm horrified to read that some people think refusing this child a school education is desirable.

It's nursery school we are talking about here though isn't it? - queue I get confused again!
She is starting actual proper school in Sept - yes?

Neither of my children went to a nursery within a school but I think if this particular nursery school aren't able to come up with a sensible solution/suggestion for the childs condition at this stage then how will it be dealt with when she actually starts proper school?

Nessynoo

Just a thought...is your daughter drinking enough water?

Mrs_Imp

Andrealm - just PMed you

HRV

I think you need to get back to your school and ask to speak to the SENCO (special needs coordinator) your daughter needs a care plan (this is a medical issue and she should be able to access the education in the school nursery)

I am a nursery teacher and often have children who are not fully toilet trained (not due to medical need) and we do advice parents to send without nappies and we will toilet train (invariably it rarely takes more than a month or so as all our kids are 3+ and fairly ready it's just that some of parent don't want to/know what to do). We just change them if they have accidents! Maybe if you sent her in pants they might be less inclined to leave her in a mess?? (not sure if this is viable as not sure about volume of leak)

However in this case the need is medical, but should not be too difficult for a school to cover, we have a child in our nursery with a care plan.

If you get no where with this I advice contacting the special needs department at the LEA and explaining her needs and the schools response.

hope this helps

andrealm

AnnaLicious wrote: »

That's shocking. If she wans't so close to graduating from nursery school I would suggest pulling her out. I am shocked they thought the council, via social services, would have funded extra support. That would have been Social Inclusion funding, which is for far more serious issues! What a waste of money that would have been - extra staff for a nappy change!
I would Strongly Suggest you get in touch with Ofsted. Tell them the situation and your concerns. There is nothing in the Ofsted guidelines that says a memeber of staff cannot leave to change a nappy. They seriously misunderstand the child/staff ratios and how they work if they believe this. Nurseries, especially council run nurseries, have a duty to support children with special needs. This is shocking behaviour.
After speaking to Ofsted, find out if they're council run or independent yet attached to a school. If they're council run, I would raise a complaint also.

Thanks, we're in Northern Ireland, we don't have OFSTED here, there is a separate Schools Inspections here. I've got in touch with our Dept of Ed. but haven't had a reply.

I discovered that the DDA doesn't apply here but there is a very similar law called SENDA which protects children in NI from discrimination in education. I also emailed got the Equality Commisison here, they asked me to phone them and I spoke to a very helpful lady. She said they will send me a letter advising me on what to write to the school. They said the school are expected to make reasonable adjustments for her condition. So I'm feeling a bit more hopeful about the situation now.:)

andrealm

deannatrois wrote: »

I didn't know anything about chronic childhood constipation.., and noticed from some of the posts others don't either. So I did a bit of googling.., and thought oh dear, this is not a good thing to have.

I found http://www.childhoodconstipation.com/Real/Tom.aspx.., and it seems it can be very long term in some cases. I wonder if your daughter's school has the same lack of understanding and if they are open to learning more about it to enable your DD to attend school and be comfortable as the condition/soiling could go on for some time.

It might be time to find someone like Parent Partnership/Parentline who can advise on who to contact to kind of 'push' the school into recognising that standard approaches aren't /won't work and to find ways to help your DD.

Thank you, clearly some people don't understand what chronic constipation is, it can be very difficult to overcome even though we are doing everything we can. We've tried to explain to the school that it's a medical condition, and our HV sent them a letter asking them if they could be more supportive but the Head very helpfully told me that "some parents had taken their children out for a couple of weeks to train them"

[Deleted User]

I'm so glad. I guess its an issue that schools find difficult to face.., its a medical need but because its seen as toilet trainiing.., they're not treating the situation with the sensitivity they need to.

I am sure u've seen threads on how to get schools to respond to various different types of special needs. Your school should not be reacting like this. Its hardly hard to clean someone up lol, and takes a couple of mins at most (even with the worst accidents). Your child should be enabled to attend school in comfort, psychologically and physically. The schools reaction is going to make it harder for your daughter to get better in my opinion. Please just grit your teeth and persist with them, getting help from the authorities u have found as necessary. Yes, this year its nursery and its not so terribly important she attends but she enjoys it, and the situation needs to be resolved so she can attend full time schooling. The school has to be forced to face the issue. The head would be my first target for educating (face to face) in a very matter of fact way as to what this condition is and how it needs to be dealt with.

andrealm

Bufger wrote: »

I think if you're having to change her 5 times a morning its not likely to be constipation!

Have you been back to the doctors? With it going on for this long i think something is either seriously wrong or the medical help she's currently getting is incorrect for her symptoms.

Schools have alot to do already, its hardly their fault if they're given next to no budget to work the many miracles or parenting and teaching they are now expected to do. Couple that with the fact that some political parties want to get rid of teaching assistants and you're very unlikely to have the school sort out all your problems for you.

Are you a teacher? I'm sure schools do have a lot to do already, I'm very sorry if my DD is just a nuisance to them. I see from your sig you have a baby on the way, maybe you would feel differently if it was your child who had a medical issue and their school weren't supportive.

I'm not asking the school to sort out all my problems for me. I just want them to look after my child properly while she's there,helping a child with toileting problems is not going to be the highlight of the teacher's day, but if it was me working there I'd rather just clean them up than leave them to sit there in their own poo for 20 minutes or more.

The nursery has a teacher and an assistant,on Thursdays they have a voluntary helper, they've has several students in for a few weeks at a time and this week they have a voluntary teacher doing 2 days a week. The nursery unit is next door to the 2 P.1 classrooms, each of which has a teacher and a TA. The school also has 2 units for children with moderate learning difficulties, I don't know how many TAs they have there, but according to the Head it's too much trouble for them to "move people about" for a few minutes a few times a week.