The quiet rooms

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I’m not a fan of these spaces. My kid is in a self contained program and lacks the skills to deescalate himself. Often the quiet room is the safest place for him for everyone involved.

Yes the school and his therapy teams are working to try and teach him the necessary skills, but in the moment of crisis is not the time to do it. My son needs to explode before he can begin to calm himself.

I get a minute by minute report any time he is in the quiet room. It doesn’t thrill me but in the moment, I’m not sure what alternatives the school has. When incidents happen at home, he goes to his room where he can scream and hit without harming any family members. My son has never told me that he was not let out of the quiet room when he was able to ask in a calm voice.

What does his medical team say? Medical doctors not psychologists

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So the article is missing the other part - if this doesn't work, what does? Where is a system or protocol that keeps everyone safe, de-escalates the situation, allows teachers and students to keep teaching and learning and is not detrimental to kids?

What is the solution?

Safe from ripping up a math paper? IDK.

The point is, and what is frustrating about stories like these, is that there are plenty of times when children legitimately need a solution when they are out of control. It sounds to me, and I wish there had been more interviews with staff and former staff, that teachers were abusing the use of these rooms so much because it solved some problems with not too much effort -- essentially "putting the kid away". Obviously this is a terrible outcome, but what were the other choices available for kids who do escalate to the level of violence and destruction? That's what I would like this story and others to address.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What's the alternative? I'm not being snarky. Restraining the child? Medicating the child? A lot of these kids are physically harming the teacher or other students. Obviously if they aren't a harm to others they shouldn't be in this room, but plenty of the kids are a harm to others.

If you read the article, it gets used a lot where that's not the issue.

And I would say how it is used is, if anything, likely to increase problem behavior in kids. Where's the functional behavioral assessment? Where's looking at the antecedents of behaviors? Where's the evaluating what level of service a particular child needs? Where's the positive behavioral support in holding the threat of the "blue room" over kids' heads?

How well would it work to raise your kids if from the moment they got up they were being reminded that one false step and they would be confided to an empty room?

It is astonishing that schools continue to get away with using these practices in the same manner that would get a residential treatment facility a failing accreditation grade and put into corrective action.

I also got the impression that in some of these cases you have staff that likes to pile on the punishment. Kid goes into seclusion. Somehow that just doesn't feel like enough punishment, so require a written apology/extend the time served/look for a reason to send him back in.

BTW I had a kid with behavioral issues, learned that restaining an confining him just made matters worse, and developed other responses. For a time he was in an RTC, where it turned out they were using seclusion but NOT documenting it as the law required; I brought the state and the accreditation people (JCAHO) down on them. I also found they had failed their previous accreditation in regard to seclusion and restraint. At least in those contexts there are standards which have the potential of an entity losing licensing and money.

I know what it feels like to be a parent and find out this has been happening.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’m not a fan of these spaces. My kid is in a self contained program and lacks the skills to deescalate himself. Often the quiet room is the safest place for him for everyone involved.

Yes the school and his therapy teams are working to try and teach him the necessary skills, but in the moment of crisis is not the time to do it. My son needs to explode before he can begin to calm himself.

I get a minute by minute report any time he is in the quiet room. It doesn’t thrill me but in the moment, I’m not sure what alternatives the school has. When incidents happen at home, he goes to his room where he can scream and hit without harming any family members. My son has never told me that he was not let out of the quiet room when he was able to ask in a calm voice.

What does his medical team say? Medical doctors not psychologists

The pediatrician referred me to a child psychiatrist who evaluated him and provided medication and a referral to a child psychologist. There is no blood work test that can be done to dx mental illness. “Tests” are just observations of behaviors. My son has been in and out of psychiatric hospitals to try and adjust his meds to help him regulate his emotions. I’m confident in the MDs that treated him in the child psychiatric hospital.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What's the alternative? I'm not being snarky. Restraining the child? Medicating the child? A lot of these kids are physically harming the teacher or other students. Obviously if they aren't a harm to others they shouldn't be in this room, but plenty of the kids are a harm to others.

If you read the article, it gets used a lot where that's not the issue.

And I would say how it is used is, if anything, likely to increase problem behavior in kids. Where's the functional behavioral assessment? Where's looking at the antecedents of behaviors? Where's the evaluating what level of service a particular child needs? Where's the positive behavioral support in holding the threat of the "blue room" over kids' heads?

How well would it work to raise your kids if from the moment they got up they were being reminded that one false step and they would be confided to an empty room?

It is astonishing that schools continue to get away with using these practices in the same manner that would get a residential treatment facility a failing accreditation grade and put into corrective action.

I also got the impression that in some of these cases you have staff that likes to pile on the punishment. Kid goes into seclusion. Somehow that just doesn't feel like enough punishment, so require a written apology/extend the time served/look for a reason to send him back in.

BTW I had a kid with behavioral issues, learned that restaining an confining him just made matters worse, and developed other responses. For a time he was in an RTC, where it turned out they were using seclusion but NOT documenting it as the law required; I brought the state and the accreditation people (JCAHO) down on them. I also found they had failed their previous accreditation in regard to seclusion and restraint. At least in those contexts there are standards which have the potential of an entity losing licensing and money.

I know what it feels like to be a parent and find out this has been happening.

I'm so sorry this happened to your son.

I don't think anyone here is condoning how schools abuse these rooms, rather trying to understand what best practices are for kids who do get out of control.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What's the alternative? I'm not being snarky. Restraining the child? Medicating the child? A lot of these kids are physically harming the teacher or other students. Obviously if they aren't a harm to others they shouldn't be in this room, but plenty of the kids are a harm to others.

If you read the article, it gets used a lot where that's not the issue.

And I would say how it is used is, if anything, likely to increase problem behavior in kids. Where's the functional behavioral assessment? Where's looking at the antecedents of behaviors? Where's the evaluating what level of service a particular child needs? Where's the positive behavioral support in holding the threat of the "blue room" over kids' heads?

How well would it work to raise your kids if from the moment they got up they were being reminded that one false step and they would be confided to an empty room?

It is astonishing that schools continue to get away with using these practices in the same manner that would get a residential treatment facility a failing accreditation grade and put into corrective action.

I also got the impression that in some of these cases you have staff that likes to pile on the punishment. Kid goes into seclusion. Somehow that just doesn't feel like enough punishment, so require a written apology/extend the time served/look for a reason to send him back in.

BTW I had a kid with behavioral issues, learned that restaining an confining him just made matters worse, and developed other responses. For a time he was in an RTC, where it turned out they were using seclusion but NOT documenting it as the law required; I brought the state and the accreditation people (JCAHO) down on them. I also found they had failed their previous accreditation in regard to seclusion and restraint. At least in those contexts there are standards which have the potential of an entity losing licensing and money.

I know what it feels like to be a parent and find out this has been happening.

I think for most kids that have trouble regulating their emotions, seclusion does not work. Much like a 2 yr old timeout, the idea is to take a break from the whatever is causing the behavior and give the child a chance to calm down. However if the child could do this, chances are pretty high that they would have developed this skill by 4 or 5 as other NT children do.

So now the school is left with an aggressive child that cannot calm down and is danger of harming himself and others. I agree, in many cases in the article the “punishment” did not fit the crime and seems to be being abused.

PP with the child in the RTC— what eventually helped your child learn to self regulate?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Wtf? One of the examples is a kid who wet his pants in the seclusion room and then pooped and was then left naked for almost an hour to run around swearing poop all over while the aide watched from outside and took notes.

This happened to a female student in my friend’s school. At one point, she was naked and covered in poop without so much as a blanket in the AC. My friend quit the next day.

[Anonymous]

This is a huge problem for my child. He has been put in this type of room in MCPS. For him, they escalate his behavior.

Very few people would be able to calm down while stuck in a small room with someone holding the door shut on them and starting at them through a window. As an adult, I would just get angrier and angrier if I was asking for space and respect and the only thing I would get would be someone starting at me and writing down every word as I try to escape. This is how my son describes it. He wants to Deescalate but the scenario is one that makes him do the opposite. He’s so stressed and trying to escape that there of no calming down.

For my child, the reason a bedroom works for him at home is that he has the space to calm down. If he were being watched and stared at, her would not be able to effectively use that strategy. For my DS (11), he does much better with options such as being in a quiet corner and listening to music or pacing the school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’m not a fan of these spaces. My kid is in a self contained program and lacks the skills to deescalate himself. Often the quiet room is the safest place for him for everyone involved.

Yes the school and his therapy teams are working to try and teach him the necessary skills, but in the moment of crisis is not the time to do it. My son needs to explode before he can begin to calm himself.

I get a minute by minute report any time he is in the quiet room. It doesn’t thrill me but in the moment, I’m not sure what alternatives the school has. When incidents happen at home, he goes to his room where he can scream and hit without harming any family members. My son has never told me that he was not let out of the quiet room when he was able to ask in a calm voice.

What does his medical team say? Medical doctors not psychologists

The pediatrician referred me to a child psychiatrist who evaluated him and provided medication and a referral to a child psychologist. There is no blood work test that can be done to dx mental illness. “Tests” are just observations of behaviors. My son has been in and out of psychiatric hospitals to try and adjust his meds to help him regulate his emotions. I’m confident in the MDs that treated him in the child psychiatric hospital.

I am sorry you are going through this and I happy that he has a strong on top of it parent.

[Anonymous]

Ivymount uses these rooms too. It’s abusive.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Wtf? One of the examples is a kid who wet his pants in the seclusion room and then pooped and was then left naked for almost an hour to run around swearing poop all over while the aide watched from outside and took notes.

This happened to a female student in my friend’s school. At one point, she was naked and covered in poop without so much as a blanket in the AC. My friend quit the next day.

But what is the alternative? If you had gone to school for the purpose of educating children and were making maybe 60k/year, would YOU physically restrain a child who is running around smearing poop?

[Anonymous]

The question is- would the kids be defeating if not completely trapped with no escape? Does this happen at home? It has certainly never happened at my home. Kids under duress do things that they would never otherwise do.

[Anonymous]

I mean, parents advocated for their kids to be in inclusive mainstream schools and classes. Cake, meet eating it too.

What’s the alternative? Leave them in the classroom when having a meltdown where they could harm another student? Placing them in the hall won’t work, either. Trying to transport them to the office could cause big injuries because teachers cannot touch them. Honestly, while horrific sounding, these rooms seem like the best option.

My SIL has had her fingers and wrist broken on 3 separate occasions by out of control kids. Not many people outside of athletes can say that’s happened to them at work. There are absolutely kids who spend hours in these rooms because there is no other alternative according to her. Even the behavioral specialists cannot deescalate some kids.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I mean, parents advocated for their kids to be in inclusive mainstream schools and classes. Cake, meet eating it too.

What’s the alternative? Leave them in the classroom when having a meltdown where they could harm another student? Placing them in the hall won’t work, either. Trying to transport them to the office could cause big injuries because teachers cannot touch them. Honestly, while horrific sounding, these rooms seem like the best option.

My SIL has had her fingers and wrist broken on 3 separate occasions by out of control kids. Not many people outside of athletes can say that’s happened to them at work. There are absolutely kids who spend hours in these rooms because there is no other alternative according to her. Even the behavioral specialists cannot deescalate some kids.

I agree that the children need to be in the right environment but as there are no quiet rooms in general education classes, these are already children in more restrictive environments. They should be able to have better strategies and smaller classes in these situations.

[Anonymous]

I can accept the need for a safe space but leaving them in silence / being nonresponsive seems so damaging. As a PP said, it is the opposite of what would calm most people. For example, my NT six year old cannot handle a solitary time out and our pediatrician told us not to try because it's emotionally harmful.