How (would?) you confront this person?

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I'd like some advice how how to confront a colleague about something she said today.

I work with a boy every week in a school, and as it's half term (one week's holiday in the middle of the school term) I was working at a play centre he attends today, rather than the school. He has autism as well as some kind of learning disability. He's non verbal but incredibly bright. He understands most of what is said to him. He can be very impulsive and recently has been violent due to his teacher at school changing and his class mates changing, although he's on medication which has improved his behaviour, but sadly has made him a bit like a zombie.

I wasn't working with him today but I was with another child in the same room. He went over to the art table and seemed to be taking an interest (I was excited to see this, because he's usually a nightmare to get to do anything art related at school). This woman who was running the art table grabbed his hand away from it and said to his 1:1 worker "He can't do this. He doesn't have the capacity to understand how to do it and he'll get glue all over the place." (the activity was papier mache) His 1:1 worker took him away, but rolled her eyes at me, indicating this woman was in the wrong.

I took issue with what she said because:
1. The fact he showed an interest is a massive thing and he should be encouraged to try new things.
2. It's a play centre for children, many of whom have a learning disability. There were other children there doing the same thing. The 1:1 worker is there to help him do whatever he wants to do. Glue was already all over the place.
3. He's exceptionally intelligent. Of course he can understand how to. The only problem is attention span. Now that he's on meds he's got the attention span to do an activity like this.
4. She said it in front of everyone, in a really patronising manner. There's kids who are mainstream there who we sometimes struggle to make show respect to the 1:1 children. A staff member pointing out how a child can't do something is really, really bad and will make them feel like they can do this to him.

I didn't say anything, because I don't like confrontation, but I did mention it to my manager. He said he'd like to "catch her in the act" saying something like that so he can bring it up with her. He said I should say something to her if I notice it again. She's done lots of things like this in the past. Another manager tried to speak to her about it and she acted as though he knew nothing because she's older than him and has been working with disabled children longer. I think she's worked with physically disabled children before (she used to be an Occupational Therapist) but she obviously has no idea about learning disabilities. She also cried once about how "sad" it was that the children were the way they were. It's so patronising and her attitude to learning disabilities is so wrong. There's nothing sad or wrong about them.

How would you confront her??

Personally i think she doesn't have any business in that kind of employment and would respond with the sole intention of getting her out of the job. Harsh to her, but it will improve the lives of many who she will do a similar thing to over her career. I would probably bring up the possibility of a discrimination lawsuit with the parents, get video/audio evidence of how she is there to ensure the disabled kids don't get the same opportunities by using their disability as the reason for their exclusion (unless papier mache has claimed an exemption from the equality act?) and convince the parents of all those kids to think of legal action.

Bingo. You can try raising issues with her and explaining why she's wrong...but it doesn't sound like she responds to that at all. Certainly though, I think it is important to, at least, try to give her your opinion (I think you were right to not confront her right away though, doing it in front of everyone would of just made a bad situation worse). She needs to be fired, and the sooner the better. What I would love to do in that situation is to absolutely tear her a new one (in private, of course) but that could just make matters worse. Best thing is to just start telling the people in charge about everything you see, whether it involves this particular child or another one...start trying to put pressure on them to do something about her. Quite frankly, given that the managers are already aware to some extent, and she already responded negatively to one of them bringing up the issue, I'm kind of surprised they've still kept her around. She needs to find a new line of work.

For now, though, your best bet is probably just to keep him away from her as much as possible. While you may like him to be involved in different things, I don't think being involved in anything she's doing can do him any good. Just hearing someone say that can push him away from ever trying anything related to it again.

It sounds like she's older and claims some authority from that. If you are in a subordinate position you have limitations from that. You could drop names of people higher up the ladder who support the boy and agree he can do more things.

I wouldn't confront her or go to my manager about it. This creates instant conflict. Better to have a coffee with her and become friends with the enemy.

You need to be prepared with some responses and then catch her in the act. If she says he can't do an activity be a bit bolder and say "he's quite capable let's give him a go - I'll help supervise him."

if she flips out then you have that to talk about later when the kids aren't around. The bigger the flip out the better is is for you.

If you have credentials use them appropriately.

hope this helps....

Unless you work in some kind of utopia workplace, be careful what you do. People who act like her sometimes do so because they know there's a reason why they're "untouchable". It's also not rare to have your manager try to send you to the battlefront to wage his wars for him, then side with the other person when matters could get sticky for him, and leave you out in the cold as the "bad" one.

Aspies tend to go with the truth and logic and justice, mindless of and blind to the hidden politics. You could very well end up being the one called unethical and unsuitable to deal with children with special needs, and fired with very negative references.

Unless you've been there for years and know all the powers at play very well, and know you're in a stronger position than her, it might be better to earn her respect for your kids on a social level - eg she owing you a couple personal favors that are very meaningful to her. This is the NT way of moving things. This is at the basis of business lunches and golf clubs. Sadly, as an aspie, I'm not able to gain influence and power through social relating, so I'm not able to bring in much positive change into the workplace.

Yeah, have a talk with this person. She may have formed a stereotype of this kid that says "can't be expected to work with glue"--she doesn't know what you know about him. Perhaps you could explain some things you've seen him do in the past which are about as complex as the art project they were working on, as evidence that he could probably try this without becoming unduly frustrated.

Don't be confrontational. Just explain to them that you'd like him to have a try, with his 1:1 worker there with him to help out, and that you don't think it particularly matters whether he becomes a papier-mache expert or just sticks globs of paper together; you'd like him to just have some fun, since he's been stressed out lately.

BTW, is she worried about mess in general? Is she overworked? Are there enough janitors hired for enough hours to clean up properly? If that's the case, it might not be about the kid at all. She might just be worried that she'll end up going into overtime scrubbing the place down if he spills glue or something. If that's the case, offer to help out with any extra cleaning. Sometimes, teachers have to stick together to take up the slack when there isn't enough (supplies/time/manpower) to go around.

It would seem there's a reason why she can put down even managers and they shut up to her. I don't buy it too quickly that your manager has never "caught her in the act." This is sometimes used by managers as an excuse not to take action.

I think that's probably what I would have said if I was his 1:1 that day. Fortunately/unfortunately (?) we're not working together again this holiday. The next time I'll see her will be in the spring, unless I have the misfortune of her coming to work with us during term time which she has done a couple of times in the past.




I don't think that will happen. He agreed what she said was out of order, and he said "off the record" that there have been other similar incidents. He said he needed to do a supervision with her soon, but I think he wants to be able to say "I have noticed you doing this" rather than "Other people have told me about you doing this". The fact he hasn't "caught her in the act" is reasonable - he's very busy and is usually based in the office upstairs unless he's leading group games or dealing with a situation.




That's not what she's worried about - we all help clean up at the end of the day, but she was only working a half day, so wouldn't have had to clean anything.