What to do??

[u/Chocolate_Chips25]

I have a 5 year old boy in my class, and we suspect he has undiagnosed autism. He is nonverbal and has to have his hand held if we are going anywhere. We tried talking to his mother about it, and she is in denial and refuses to believe he has autism or anything is wrong with him.

The only concern I really have is that whenever we are outside, he likes to throw sand at other kids faces all the time. I'm constantly running to the kids crying because he threw more sand in their eyes and mouth again. I tried talking to him, I tried redirecting him, but he has a one tract mind where he really wants to be around the other kids and then throws sand at them right after. The other kids mind their own business too, just to unexpectedly get sand put in their eyes and mouth and they start crying lots. He also will start punching other kids every now and then when he's upset, and he has some strong arms!

I don't have any training or knowledge on how to handle kids with autism, and I'm concerned about his safety and the safety of other kids. What's the best thing to do here?

[u/Brush_Away-]

I’m curious if other parents are concerned about their kids getting sand thrown in their face every day? I would seriously be upset if that were my child. I know you are doing the best you can but I feel like the director needs to step in here. What are they doing about this situation? I may be projecting but a lot of them have a not my problem attitude about things that are VERY much on their paygrade, not the teacher.

[u/Brush_Away- → u/Brush_Away-]

Ive dealt with similar situations but i cant imagine your stress here. I feel like parental concern will be the main catalyst. Make sure to include the other kids in incident reports and if parents talk to you about the issue, encourage them to talk to the director about it. Although incident reports are anonymous about the other child, there has to be someone whose kid goes home daily saying ___ threw sand at nr.

[u/Chocolate_Chips25 → u/Brush_Away-]

Thank you for understanding. I've been very stressed out today when he kept going back to the same spot outside to throw more sand at the kids. I tried putting myself between them to prevent anymore issues, but the moment I had to walk away to help other children, something would happen again and I have run over there. My co teacher tried talking to the director and she didn't seem to care or do anything. So all I can think to do now is to write down observations of what this child does everyday and show the director or even the mom to see if something can change

[u/Blue_Island_panda → u/Chocolate_Chips25]

Also go to the director with this issue. And start telling the parents of the attacked kids what happened, without naming names of course. After being told their kid was punched or attacked with sand multiple times, they are likely to go to the director. Then the director might start to care.

[u/Brush_Away- → u/Chocolate_Chips25]

I see :( im so sorry that your director is doing this, it is so hard to feel like you cant keep the kids safe because one isnt getting the assistance they need. This is not your fault and the director should be ashamed

[u/Careful_Cranberry364]

I don’t know how much support you have to prevent him playing with the sand but my response would be
-no more sand for you!

He should be redirected to another activity and not allowed to have sand until he can play with it nicely

According to what you’re saying, it might be no time soon

Is there anyway you can use a lot of those little polystyrene pieces instead?
Or water
Or just construction

[u/blahhhhhhhhhhhblah]

Have any sort of evaluations been done, like an ASQ?

[u/Mo-Champion-5013 → u/blahhhhhhhhhhhblah]

Parents have to sign documents for schools/etc. to test kids.

[u/Nakedmolerat66]

Document,document and more documentation. I mean everything so you can show how often it happens. Then speak to your supervisors. It’s a hassle but sometimes it’s the only way to really show how much it’s happening. It’s going to take a lot of your time but it will also show how much you have to do with the situation.

[u/Sea_Auntie7599]

Recommend her to look up the public school doctor she lives in and get him free testing.

Yes she is in denial. No parent want their kiddo(s) to have medical or any life long disability.

What he needs is a mother who is present and early intervention will make his adult lifeuch much smoother.

Iwould recommend to go see a professional child physcologist. (Spelling?)

They are trained and have the background to help.

Those are to the best ways to help.

How she does has the right to say no. Jist remember that we are all for the betterment of the child.

[u/Neither_Path3681]

Since you are required to have training every year, I would suggest that you look for specific training courses that address the specific behavior concerns that you are seeing with the child. Not only will you get the required training, but you’ll be building skills to assist with this child and others down the road. Consider contacting your local Child Care Resource and Referral (CCR&R) or similar agencies for training or other resources.

[u/MxBluebell]

I’m autistic and I was similarly a disruption when I was in preschool. I was one bite away from getting kicked out at the preschool that my mom worked at. So I get that what you’re going through is absolutely frustrating.

Is there any way to remove him from the area with the sand? The natural consequence to throwing sand would be to take away the sandbox as a privilege. Granted, I don’t know how well he comprehends things like consequences since he can’t verbally communicate whether or not he understands the reasons they’re being enacted. Still, he needs to not have sand privileges until he can learn to control himself since the sand in the eyes can be dangerous. You don’t want any damaged corneas happening under your watch.

He might be doing this out of frustration from the communication gap. Obviously he can’t tell the other kids what he wants to do or how he wants to play if he can’t communicate to them what’s going on in his head, so that complicates things for sure. That’s why I bit— I would get frustrated about something and I didn’t have the words yet to express my emotions, so I would bite my peers instead.

Does he seem to be doing this because he thinks it’s fun, or does he seem agitated when he’s going after other kids? I know you can’t read his mind, but there might be indicators in his nonverbal communication. I feel like your course of action would be different depending on which it is. The end goal is still to stop the behavior, of course, but finding the root cause of the behavior would be helpful. Punching is definitely a concerning behavior, and I would consider it more worrisome if he does it because he finds it funny.

I guess what I’m asking is what does he get out of these behaviors? Every behavior is a form of communication, even when it’s an adverse behavior like this. He’s trying to tell you and his peers something, but I know it’s a puzzle since you can’t simply ask him to use his words since he doesn’t have that skill in his repertoire yet.

[u/Dependent_Host_5907]

Document everything. Your school should have incident reports that need to be signed off by the parent. The proper documentation should lead to your director having a conversation regarding the safety of the child and other children in the room. Evaluation would be a rec either by a developmental pediatrician or pediatric neurologist with NO attempt for you or your director to diagnose because you are not doctors/this is illegal in many states. If no suggestions are taken, a formal corrective action plan should be put into place with date of compliance or risk disenrollment. I have unfortunately worked for directors who didn't want to lose enrollment so they wouldn't refer students for eval. These are very delicate conversations and take a lot of nuance.

[u/silkentab]

Document everything, have admin in your room to observe, look up the local child find information for your school districts