Daughter flees when she sees anyone (esp. other kids) crying

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My son had an IEP in public school,but when he had an aide it was "off" IEP b/c they did not want to commit to having one, and wanted to be able to drop it easily without fuss. He got one because the teacher advocated for it to make her life easier. In this case, your daughter seems to have an ally in her teacher, which is great. Perhaps she can lobby for it prior to the IEP meeting, because she cares for your daughter (and cynically b/c she wants her free period back.)

My son was 2 years old when his little sister was born. Every time she cried, he would hold his hands over his ears. When he understood the fact that her "blankie" made her stop crying, it got to the point where he would frantically search for her blankie, every time she cried, and throw it at her--out of desperation.

He is 21 years old now. When we're out in public--and he hears a baby or child cry, he puts his hands over his ears and, if he is sitting, he rocks. If he is standing, he runs the opposite direction of the crying baby or child. Because of this, I avoid taking him anywhere the potential of crying children or babies exists...whenever possible. In fact, he "hates" babies and children--and refers to them as "little s**ts"--simply because of their tendency to cry.

When his niece (my granddaughter) visits, he puts his noise-cancelling headphones on, but he says those don't completely shut out the crying--so he has used both wax ear plugs and noise-cancelling headphones.

One time, when my granddaughter was visiting on a rainy day, she was crying so hard, he bolted out of the house, in the pouring rain--and ran for two blocks--then asked a total stranger for a ride. Crying is really completely unbearable for him.

Here is the solution that has worked best so far: We have put a stand-alone fan in his bedroom. When my granddaughter has to be here, I let him know she's coming over. He puts on his noise-canceling headphones AND turns on his fan--and he's good. In fact, he is even able to sleep through her visits if his fan is running.

Gentle Hugs to All of You,

Lisa

Thank you, Lisa. I think we can deal with the sensory part of the crying in this manner but the social aspect probably requires a lot of thought and support form the school to make it happen.

An update for everyone else : as expected, the school says that they cannot "provide" an aide without that being written into an IEP. They want to discuss these (and the results of her assessments) at the IEP meeting next month, but I am not holding my breath on that. I think I will just pull her out of the school the next time an incident involving the bully happens, and that's that. If they want her back at school, they can damned well pay for an aide for her.

Just a heads up for middle school..

My school district also requires an IEP, and the child either has to be pretty low (needs lots of prompts, has trouble verbalizing etc) or is a runner.

Middle school is when the district starts yanking the aides for kids who are fairly high functioning skills wise. In my district, your one problem (recess and not communicating to adults about problems in a social setting) wouldn't qualify for an 1:1 here.

My daughter's ASD friend went through similar crap last year (5th grade) with a group of girls. Because she is not below grade level in her academics, can interact in the classroom with no behavior problems (running, kicking, screaming, biting)...no aide. She had an IEP and was diagnosed before all this happened.

If you want the aide, you better come up with more reasons than the recess. The friend's mom was told aides are not body guards, and if her daughter needed that much help socializing, maybe she could be moved to self contained and they would give her an aide then.

Of course mom didn't do that. The daughter is not that low functioning.

I don't know how your child functions during the other times, but if there are issues, I would hype that up more than recess. Middle school here does not have recess, and lunch is only 35 minutes long.

And be prepared for some king size push back for the middle school aide. I know three ASD kids from my DD's grade who had aides last year, and do not have them now.

I feel for you. This crap sucks.

One last thing.

I was a noon aide/playground monitor for 10 years. Why the aides can't handle this is beyond me.

We had many situations like yours. What we did...

The children could not play together privately (1:1), but could play in a ground of child with that child there. (Like tag or basketball)

If that broke down, they could not contact at all. If it got really bad, opposite sides of the playground, and they could switch sides half way through.

The aides will whine they can't do that, but that is BS. We routinely had 4 sets of two we had to keep an eye out for.

We had lots of criers. Crying didn't work on me unless it was the first few times or a body part got injured. Crying Princess wouldn't have gotten any attention from me after the 4th time, because we would have said, "You are suppose to be away from her." I would watch, and usually the criers would bait the other kid. It didn't help when the kid had no impulse control (ADHD, FAS, ASD), so went made sure to observe what those two kids were doing.

1:1 is a crap shoot. We had aides on the playground who were absolutely worthless watching their one kid. One child was 2 grades behind, and at 5'3/120 lbs, towered over the classmates. The aide would stand against the wall and zone out. Since this wretch made $5/hrs more than me, I told her to move her ass and do her job when her kid derailed.

Hope this can give you some more ideas for your meeting.

Just because she can't get an aide doesn't mean that's the end of the story. The school must suggest another alternative. Surely there is a library or a classroom where this child can sit and read/color/play games during recess? Or a friendly child who could volunteer to keep your daughter company? Or, at the very least, the other girl could be told she's not allowed to approach your daughter at recess anymore? There are so many solutions that wouldn't cost the school a penny. Keep moving your complaints up the food chain - principal, superintendent, school board, county or regional school admin., etc.

Yippee,

I was a recess aide. My post above yours gave her suggestions to ask the school to implement.

The administration is lazy. The recess aides should and can handle this. This situation happens all.the.time on the playground.

I have no clue why this has morphed into a cluster f**k.

Due to union rules, our teachers did not have to watch kids during lunch recess in my district. The principal couldn't even offer that up as a suggestion. Our school library wouldn't have done it either (also union).

Where I worked noon aides/playground aides reported directly to the principal. If kids had issues at lunch, the teachers didn't deal with it, it was us and the principal.

I have a feeling the aides at her school are talking and not watching the kids. We were never allowed to stand and chat. If the principal (who would make daily rounds during lunch recess) caught us shooting the s**t with each other, we could be fired.

Our school had more problems with kids misbehaving during class recess, because the teacher would zone out or be talking to another teacher (socializing).

I probably needed an aide in elementary school but I didn't get one until 6th grade and she really did nothing and I didn't even want one anyway because it was humiliating and I felt like I was being babysat. But when I was going into 7th grade, my mom found out I wouldn't have an aide and I would be on my own because they also said I wouldn't need one. Her solution was we moved and I was given an aide and I had her until I graduated but I started to be on my own in classes when I was in the 11th grade because they were teaching me to be independent so I was in choir, Spanish, and drama alone.

But I think my son would probably need an aide because of his short attention span and behavior issues and difficulty with transition and he needs help with motor skills and he gets over stimulated from too many kids in class. You don't need to have an ASD to have an aide.

My school district calls it a "mother hen" because I guess here it is usually a girl who volunteers to do this It is not assigned. It is something that some kids who are nurturing types do naturally as part of their personalities and the child is pointed to a particular child who needs their help and they are given praise (and I don't know what else) for doing it. Basically, in the OP's case it would be more of a witness than a buddy and could tell the monitors what really happened.

A lot of times these monitors are parents and this could be a big part of the problem, I think, because they are plugged into the PTA mean girl's club.

Another possible, partial (but unlikely) possibility is to defang the monitors and have the admins there tell them they may report the "episodes" to your daughter's teacher, but are not allowed to punish her themselves. If the school would agree to this, and the monitors could be forced to follow it, then the teacher could you, know, not punish your child, and just keep track of the incidents.