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Is excluding children from school the answer?

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AB Asks | 10:59 Mon 05th Feb 2007 | News
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The case of a 13 year old girl who has been excluded from school for more than a year has again raised the issue of whether this is the correct approach to deal with disruptive children.
Instead of regular schooling, the teenager has been provided with just five hours of supervision a week in a community centre.
Many options have been suggested but no satisfactory solution has yet been proposed to help reintegrate her in the school system.
Do you think that simply excluding children from school is the most effective way of dealing with disruptive behavior?
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No definitely not! There is clearly an underlying problem and rather than just giving up on the child the authorities should intervene and assist the child AND THE FAMILY to discover what the issue is and deal with it. The main problem particuarly in the South East is the majority of schools which aren't mainstream have been closed thanks to the labour government insisting on inclusion. It doesn't work and the above example will back that up!!!!
Exclude every one of the little *******.

What about the kid who is attentive, and needs a teacher's help, but can't get it because the time is taken taking care of little darlings like the one you mention? What of their rights?

If the problem is the family, it's the family's responsibility. Why should my child or your child suffer?
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change of diet might help. these questions are always too long winded and cover too many questions within one topic. can you streamline them a bit please, you would still get a debate I suppose.
Having been a teacher, I know how unfair it is on attentive children to have disruptive children in their class. Definitely a need for special classes or schools - or sort the parents out!!!
whickerman, it is not as simple as that.

My son has a slight disability, called dyspraxia. It is in the autistic area. Many other children have "problems" like this that come out in disabilities called Aspurgers syndrome and so on.

These children have all sorts of learning difficulties (my son is very bright but cannot read or write very well). Many children with Autism have trouble coping with crowds, or noise, or dealing with other children.

Where I live provides schools for severely disabled children, and mainstream schools for "normal" children.

But what about the children in between, not disabled enough to go to a servely disabled school, but not really "normal" enough to go to a mainstream school.

Most children with Autism go to mainstream school, and schools are given money to provide extra support for them, but often choose to spend it elsewhere, so the autistic kids are left to fend for themselves.

Because my son was different he was picked on by other kids. He was punched (want to see pictures of the bruises?), his school bag was flushed down the loo or thrown over the wall, he was pushed in mud, or cornered in a room by other kids and threatened.

He was terrified by this and often lashed out to try to get away or stop them doing it. Sometime he was excluded for half a day or a day.

Do you suggest it was all his fault, that he should be permanently excluded?

Do you know what it is like to put your hand up and say you got none out of ten for a written test because the supply teacher had no idea he had a disability, and how the other kids laughed.

Before shooting at the hip try to understand some of the problems some children have at school.
I'm sorry vehelpfulguy, but yes, special needs pupils need special needs teachers & classes. It is incredibly unfair that a class of, say, 20 pupils sees their teacher spend a disproportionate amount of time on one pupil - the others suffer as a result. The issue there is one of resources - such classes should be available, but if not, their absence should never mean that other kids are disadvantaged too.

Your situation is probably not uncommon, and is a crying shame in this day and age, and I honestly sympathise, but try see the other side of that coin.

My initial point was that a disruptive child - as opposed to special needs - should be automatically taken out of the equation.
To contine from my append above, my wife works for a charity that deals with problems between autistic children and schools. Here is one story she told me.

One autistic boy had problems coping with a class full of kids and could be disruptive.

He was taught that when one of his feelings of panic came on that he was allowed to go outside into the hall to calm down.

His learning assitant who normally sat next to him even had an official letter from the headmaster to say the boy could leave the room now and again. This was shown to the teacher when it was needed.

One day the learning assistant was not there, and the boy felt a panic attack coming on. They had a supply teacher that day who knew nothing of his disability.

The boy asked to leave the room and was told no. He asked to go to toilet and was told no.

He felt so strongly that he had to leave the room that he went to walk out.

The teacher blocked the doorway to stop him going out.

The boy became desperate to get out, so he decided to jump out the window.

He ran over to the window, and in his panic to open it smashed the glass.

He was excluded for a week.

Whose fault was that ?

The boy ?, the supply teacher?, the learning assistant?, the headmaster?

Maybe someone should have told the supply teacher of the boys problems. But nobody did.

Things like this are happening day after day after day in schools, and my wife visits two schools a day to sort out problems between a child and the school.

It is not as simple as just saying permanently exclude someone.
As Whickerman states, there should be a distinction between disruptive kids and those with special needs, but should it be the actual disruption itself, regardless of causes that is actioned upon? From a selfish perspective (and possibly uninformed as my kids wont be at school for another couple of years) if I saw my kids performing badly due to disruption in the class I wouldn't really have any sympathy as to whether it was a special needs child jumping out of a window or a 'normal needs?' child being a little s*** causing the problem. The problem should be removed for the benefit of everybody else and then appropriate measures put in place, whether this be exclusion, ensuring appropriate care facilities are always available or allowing teachers the power to offer some appropriate discipline. Ultimately it is a shame that the above mentioned girl has been out of school for a year but I'm sure the parents of the other kids at the school will be glad to see her gone, admittedly her future prospects are going to be in jeopardy but that's for her family to deal with, i'm sure there are issues that need to be addressed outside of the schooling system. As far as whether removal is an effective way of dealing with it, this could be measured by how much disruption is being caused when the child has been removed, If there is no disruption, then yes, it's very effective
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ditto naz
According to the BBC1 Programme Inside Out (south). This girl has slight learning dificulties, and her single mother is suffering from cancer. She is now attending a private special school at a cost of �30k per term, yes per term!! this is currently being funded by Southapton City Council.
I feel very sorry for her poor Mother, but in my humble opinion �30k per term would provide for a special needs class for several pupils not just one girl.
Southampton!!!
It was reported in the paper today that these kids are born with a gene malfunction and environment plays only a small part. The sooner the medical profession can master this by modifying these faulty genes the better for us all.
Totally agree with the whicker man.

The age of criminal responsibilty is 10 in England, so this age can transcribe to all modes of behavious insofar as the childs' "understanding" of right and wrong.

There is no hope for this girl. She will be bad all her life. No amount of wooley social workers will save people like this, they just molly coddle them into a false sense of security so when they appear at court they can so "I come from a bad background". HOGWASH!!!!

As said, teachers are a shortage, so they MUST give their attention to children who at least have some future to contribute to our economy.

I wouldn't even spend the 5 hours wages on her. She is doomed to fail. The odd one or two who to redeem themselves are not worth the money we waste on the millions who do not.

Take the girl to a heroin pit or a brothel. Tell her unless she bucks her ideas up, this is where she will end up and film her response.

When she ends up in court for a few years, let the film be shown and stress she had the chance.

I would also advocate sterilisingt he girl, by force if necessary so she doesn't breed future vermin for the tax payer to prop up.

There are far too many "Jeremy Kyle" types living in the UK already. We must take action and stop the scum reproducing!!!
Quite simply, when you have a group of people, be they adults or children, they can only progress as fast as the slowest.

I'm sorry if i'm at odds with some of you, but in my opinion, a child with special needs, needs a special needs school. the only problem with this, is funding, and goverment policy of closing some of these schools, thereby forcing them into 'normal' schools, to the detriment of the children already attending.
Joe the Lion - You have summed it up perfectly. Well said.
naz's freedom of speech has been taken away!!!!
If a child is disruptive it's most likely the fault of the parents/ TV. The solution is to send them to a specialist school and reduce the amount of time spent with the parents/ TV where they can learn how to behave. I realise this will get some parents backs up but until people work out how to raise their kids properly or stop being so selfish, having kids when they can't look after themselves, then this is the best way to deal with the problem. Perhaps if we spent less money on foreign wars and more on our own problems we could afford the solution to these problems. Who cares anyway , the planet's cooling systems broken and we're doing very little to fix it. The children rebel for just cause most of the time....
They should be taken out of mainstream school, but they should be put into a special needs schools not just left to stay at home or roam the streets. They need education but not at the expenses of other children that want to learn. This is why we are so short of teachers, no one wants to teach anymore. They have too many restriction, not allowed to touch the child or tell it off. They have to have so many of the disruptive children per class. No it is not fair on them or the other children. It also might be a good idea to educate some of the parents too, while they are at it.

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