Left on the playground

Hi there Ahhhh my heart goes out to her.could you approach the teacher and maybe when calling the class in to be standing near to her to have more time to respond.I know with my son Myself and the school lets him know five or ten minutes before change is about to happen it does work with him .It allows him time to pull away from what he’s doing ready to move on.I hope this helps nice to see you on board again!! I also now useADHD.com a really good board come over it’s great

I browsed it today and it looks great. Very active and the parents seem level-headed. You are Millermom if I recall properly.

Thanks for the advice on the playground. I’m not sure how responsive the teacher will be. I’m certain that Megan just wasn’t able to take in the teacher’s call to come in. She wasn’t misbehaving but I think the teacher might not be so sure of that. She’s a great teacher also, just young. They aren’t taught anything about ADHD in school and it is such a huge issue. It’s unfair to them and the kids.

It’s nice that you are able to see both sides— that this is a skill your child needs to learn eventually, not just the teacher’s responsibility. From what you wrote, at least she didn’t get in trouble for not going in— the teacher didn’t assume that she was being disobedient. This is a teacher you can work with! How about a watch that beeps— like a countdown stopwatch (I’m sure they don’t go in at the exact time everyday, so an alarm wouldn’t help)? My kid sets her alarm to remind her to go to the bus stop- once she’s ready for school she plays on the computer and it would be easy to get caught up in that and “forget” what time it was.

Rover, I like your style. I haven’t bought into Megan having to have a “coach” for the rest of her life. I know this is a real popular strategy but I would much-prefer that technology, order, or whatever can give her self-sufficiency. I’m seriously thinking of some sort of timing device. There should be an on-line ADHD shop to find creative supports. There should be kid-friendly vibrating timers so that a kids doesn’t have to explain herself when it the alarm goes off. I’ll start researching the issue tomorrow but I’m still open to suggestions.

needs to do a head count before leaving any place!!!!!!!!!!!! How unnaceptable! I feel terrible for your daughter.

Loves,
S

My son is ADD and I can so identify with what you’re going through. We often wonder what planet my son is on! He has a watch that is an alarm that beeps that has a backup beep 5 mimutes later and a timer. He also has an organizer than beeps for up to three alarms per day. He wouldn’t notice a vibration. It hasn’t been a problem for him to explain. He just tells the kids that he needs to know when it’s time to do things. He had a great deal of trouble transitioning from one thing to another and keeping track of time, but being able to set his watch and organizer tostructure his day has helped him to improve in that regard a lot.

Millermom on ADHD.com is Rebelmom here.

Just a little story of a fellow airhead. When I was in kindergarten, I once went to a birthday party for another class. All of us kids were outside on the playground when a teacher called for the kids to come inside, so I went inside, not noticing at all that it wasn’t my class. Short story, I was outside by myself after the party and my class was inside so a classmate had to come get me, punishment was to write numbers (maybe that’s why I hate math?). I am 40 and still remember that day.

On a different note, my younger son in 1st grade got on the wrong bus after school (he was talking to a classmate). Many phone calls later, the bus driver actually stopping the bus to ask the kids’ names, he was found and brought home. This was in November the day before Thanksgiving break so it wasn’t as if riding the bus was a new thing. What a nightmare!

Yes, its done on field trips, but, even at the kindy level, there is no head counting before going inside from recess. While kids may not “hear” the call to come in, they usually notice the movement.

She was REALLY hyperfocused.

I like the tech solutions and building towards selfsufficiency

Although Im sure the teacher will be checking on Megans whereabouts for the rest of the school year ;)

BIG THUMBS DOWN! I don’t see a huge difference between moving the children around during a field trip and moving them around school grounds. The teacher is clearly the one who was responsible. I wouldn’t be so quick to assume the teacher learned her lesson.
This is a classic case for the squeeky wheel approach. The louder you squeek, the more prevailent your daughter will be in their minds. I’d put on my hat and ride my broom up to the school for a little chat with the principal. I would be sure to mention how stressed and worried I will feel from now on, while she is at school. I wouldn’t quit until the school was embarressed and appologized to me and accepted responsiblitlity for their carelessness.

I can imagine this happening to my son, infact, wandering off into the woods behind the school is what finally brought an evaluation about for my son. But our school is responsible for him during the day, that is the bottom line. No matter what his problems, no matter what his shortcomings, no matter his personality. I hope they didn’t handle this like a behavior issue. Was she punished?

You bring up a good point about field trips. That teacher was negligent. Your daughter has a disability and she was not accomodated but I suppose in order for the teacher to accomodate your daughter they would have to include it in an IEP or something else equally ridiculous.

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Ah, but there is an online ADHD store. I believe it is called ADDwarehouse or something like that, probably “dot” com. I remember them selling a watch with multiple timers and a small amt. of text, you could program in such stuff as “take meds” and “remember homework”. They also had audiotapes to “train” attention— they had recorded beeps at random intervals, the child rewarded themselves with points or something if they were on-task when it beeped.

You are right, it is ultimately the teacher’s responsibility. The reality of most schools though is that one kid was picked up early for an appointment, two are at the reading tutor, 3 went to their English for Speakers of Other Languages class, one is in the office with a fever… oh, and I’ve got one of them in my office. Teachers usually learn pretty quickly which ones they really need to keep an eye on.

No, Megan wasn’t punished. I have a policy of always talking with the teacher first before going to the principal and Megan just told me that it happened 3 times. Apparently, this was the most embarassing situation since the class was well into another activity before Megan was discovered missing. If the playground wasn’t safe I would go right to the principal but there was another class out there still. Another thing, Megan is like a lot of ADHD kids and she can pick up on other peoples emotions. She said the teacher looked sad and frustrated at the same time. She also did not punish Megan probably because she understands that Megan has little control over this hyperfocusing and she could have been in deep trouble with me if she did punish her. I think that you are right that the Principal would not be happy that the teacher lost track of a student. Honestly, it could and probably will happen again, if not with this teacher, with another; so I’ve got to teach Megan to take care of herself.

The best piece of advice that I have ever received was from my alcoholic allgebra teacher who said, “no one in this world cares as much about you as much as yourself so you must not be dependant on others.”

Terry

You know what I’m talking about! Cute stories. We could be family!

I’ll bet when playing with a friend, she notices when the class goes in. Pray that she has a true friend in life.

By the by, my daughter used a timer in third grade. It was set to go off 5 or 10 minutes after an assignment was given. The teacher would check to see that my daughter knew what do to, was on task, etc. The teacher thanked us for providing it as there was another student who also needed a check-back. The teacher told us that timer was really for her and not for the kids. Maybe she was ADD, too. LOL

If you can handle this without climbing on the teacher-please do so. Yes, as Rebelmom points out, it is the teacher’s responsibility to ensure safety and supervision of all kids but as Rover points out you could heads and never have time to teach. I battle teh big things.

Hi Megan’s mum I’m Marley’s Mum the one from England.Remember!I talked about school issues over here.He’s just got funded for another year.I am so pleased as I feel without that one to one going on it would surely be disaster.Any progress at the school for Megan?More could really be done for these kids.I could write a letter to the Education auth.With many signitures to see if we can get them even one days training on there condition.It would be a start.I’ll let you all know how that goes.See ya!!

I’m so happy for you! You must be a fantastic advocate. Megan’s Mum

Megan has a cold and even had to have Benedryl one day this week for an insect bite so she hasn’t been up to par at school. In other words, the attention issues are at there worse. Daily Megan is hyperfocusing on the playground but the teacher is either sending another child after Megan or going to get her herself before going inside. She has not been punished and Megan says she doesn’t seem mad. I really think the teacher has a handle on this now but next year we will probably go through it again. I’m actually using this situation as an opportunity to teach Megan how to advocate for herself. I’m going to have Megan try to explain to the teacher that she has trouble hearing other things when she is really concentrating on something. I’m also going to try to get her to explain that she is not trying to misbehave. I think the teacher knows all this but Megan will have to learn to explain her behavior to many teachers over the years. I’m still looking for a timing device but there will be times when she won’t be using it. Thanks everybody for all your input. You really helped me through this.