Admissions Meeting To Nursery

[numnum]

As I've discussed on here my son has been a handful and had some very worrying and odd behaviour since he was about 7 months. He does seem to be calming now and tantrums and behaviour seems normal

He's been attending a nursery for toddlers with similar behaviour problems. All though hes mellowed I've still put him to the nursery even though its for an hour a week and a 3 hour round trip just for the sake of an hour nursery but I have always thought he needs that time away from us and to be around other children so the trip is worth it for him

He is now 3 and due to start nursery but because he has been refered to this nursery the normal nursery has arranged an admissions meeting to discuss him starting.

It seems quite over the top as there is about 6 people as well as us going to be at this meeting to see if he can go to nursery. We think the best thing for him is to go then if there is any problems then have a huge meeting but we're not going to know anythign till hes there.

All I've heard is good things about him from his playgroup and nursery and we are now worrying that theres maybe more to his behaviour etc than they've told us since there such a huge meeting. Even the head master of the school is involved. Its great there is a lot of involvement but again we'll not know how he'll be till hes actually there

Has anyone had to have one of these meetings before?

[Meg888]

I had a meeting similar to this, but my daughter had only just started Year 1 at school, and she was really struggling in the classroom. The meeting was to discuss with us her parents, that they felt she had something else causing her problems; on checking it out several times over the years she was eventually diagnosed with dyspraxia, adhd & learning difficulties. The teachers may feel something else was causing your son's behaviour. If you feel he is being discriminated against, take some advice from your local Parent Partnership; if they can't help you, they'll advise who can. The school may want you to investigate further or indeed they may want to initiate a 'Statement' which will allow a team of professionals to check your son to see if he has some sort of disability causing his behaviour; if he does, then he will be entitled to further support in his education

[numnum]

He's alreayd been seen by the hosptial, health visitor and has his nursery to go to.

I had the HV ( a new lady that replaced the HV that refered him to the hospital) a while ago now and she seen him afer his first hospital appointment. THe first time she saw him he was as good as could be, the 2nd time she seemed very worried as he was just bouncing from one thing to another breaking things and there was nothing we could do. She even said if we ever needed a break as we dont have much family help then she could sort out social services to take our son for the day so we could have time with our daughter.

You could see in her face how she had chanced and seemed worried about him and she even said at our next hospital appointment I should ask for a diagnosis. Which I did but they didn't want to say anything at that time because of his age

From what everyone tells me he's the perfect child at his nursery and playgroup but I'm really wondering if I should ask at his nursery if there is anything more so I'm prepared for it before we have this meeting.

Where we stay the playgroup tend to put you off putting your child to nursery till their older even though they are entitled to go when there 3. It annoys a lot of parents

I'm very open about everything and they have said we're very pro active in helping them and discussing things and trying things with him. I would like to think they would just say to me if there was anything because I'm not like some parents who have problem children, that may be in denial that theres a problem.

[numnum]

Meg888 - did you have any idea there was anything wrong before she went to school or did it come out of the blue? We've noticed with our son since a young age so a lot of meetings have taken place

I do think this meeting will just be to see whats best for him, but they were speaking of a mix of playgroup and nursery when I was in earlier and I'm wanting him to focus on one thing now and see how he gets on with that.

I wonder if he will get diagnosed with something in a year or so when we can decided if he's just choosing to be like that or if its something more. I've got a feeling the hospital said something similar to me when I asked for a diagnosis, they couldn't make their mind up yet

[Meg888]

Yes Num; My daughter had been late reaching all her milestones. She presented very clumsy in every thing she did from being a few months old. So like you we had HV's, GP's etc etc looking at her - in particular physio & occupational therapy, everyone saying she'd improve with age; but it took until she was 11 before we got a diagnosis - (which is apparently the usual age of diagnosis) even though we'd had a Statement in place for 5 yrs. Some neurological conditions can take years to diagnose and it takes investigation by a number of medical professionals, therapists etc to come to a conclusion. You don't have to wait for the nursery to initiate a assessment of special needs, you could do this via your local educ authority; again, Parent Partnerships will support & advise you - and hopefully the nursery will support you. I tunnelled ahead for my daughters statement as I got sick of waiting for the school to get round to it, plus I knew who was getting involved every step of the way and what the next stage was, so I went round putting a rockett up their @ss if you like! The would have just sat it out waiting for a reply.

[Meg888]

PS that should say the 'school would have sat it out waiting for a reply'.

[numnum]

Hi Meg,

Did you take anything with you to your meetings? We're thinking of making some notes but really not sure as we dont know what to expect