Picture the scene. You are a teacher with a class of 30 pupils in a mainstream school. The pupils are midway through a lesson when one of them, let’s call her Lucy, suddenly shouts at the child next to them to “f*** off! Just f*** off!” The class is working quietly, so everyone stops to look Lucy and then at you to see your response. The recipient of the outburst has tears in her eyes as some of the other kids are starting to giggle. You have to act fast because the other kids are becoming unsettled but you know that Lucy has autism and therefore this situation needs to be handled very carefully – your mind races back to her Individual Education Plan and the session on autism which your SENDCo delivered last year. Aside from all that, you know Lucy, you teach her and you know that she will just want to forget this happened – but you have to address it, don’t you? You walk calmly over to Lucy, who has her head in her hands. The Teaching Assistant (let’s be optimistic and assume there was TA support in the lesson) has already started to talk to Lucy, trying to encourage her to leave the lesson and take some time out. You realise that the best option might be just to deal with the rest of the class as the TA seems to be making progress, but on the way out Lucy shouts another sweary insult at a boy on the front row, before slamming the door.

“Miss, why is Lucy allowed to swear and we’re not? “

“I’d be in detention for a week if I said that in class, why can she say it and just get away with it?”

“I need to speak to the Headteacher, please. I believe that a child has sworn at my daughter in class today and nothing has been done about it.”

Firstly, we know that mainstream schools are incredibly difficult places for children with neurodiverse brains. The environment, the changes in routine, supply teachers, noise…the list of triggering factors is endless and, as teachers, there is only so much we can do to manage this and reduced the risk of sensory overload. Lucy will have been sat in the best seating position in class, there might – funding dependant- have been a teaching assistant in the room to help and she will very likely have had sensory breaks factored into her day. You can do everything ‘right’ and still not prevent a child being triggered by something and responding in a way which is going to raise the question of accountability. I find myself at the centre of these discussions very often and, whilst every individual case is different, I’m not sure there is ever a right answer. In this case, Lucy has loudly interrupted the learning of 29 other pupils by using extremely offensive language, causing upset and distress to the pupil sitting next to her. Should she be allowed to ‘get away’ with this?

Let’s look back at the lesson from Lucy’s perspective.

When Lucy got into the room it was warmer than usual, one of the blinds was open which is normally closed and that was letting a beam of light in which was bouncing off Lucy’s table. This was distracting her and made it hard for her to listen. Lucy could hear the tap dripping in the room next door and voices outside as two teachers walked past. When the work started, the light from the window kept moving across Lucy’s book and she found it hard to focus on the words. The TA came over to check on Lucy and she told her about the light so the TA went to close the blind, which helped, but Lucy had fallen behind with her work and she was now worried that she wouldn’t get finished. The tap was still dripping in the room next door and now someone was outside talking to a pupil about going to the dentist, Lucy was trying not to listen to the conversation but it was so hard to ignore it and the tap kept dripping so she was missing words. The girl next to Lucy was writing quickly and her pen started to make a noise. It was a squeaky sound like new shoes on the corridor floor, Lucy looked around to see if anyone else could hear it but they were all writing and the teacher kept looking at her watch and giving time checks. The TA came back and thought Lucy didn’t understand the question, which she did, but she couldn’t concentrate, so the TA started to explain, which made Lucy feel mad but she didn’t say anything she just listened to the tap dripping in the other room and the squeaking of the girl’s pen. Lucy smiled and nodded at the TA, who had finished talking, and tried to start writing again but the dripping and the squeaking got louder and louder and the teacher gave a time check and the girl with the squeaky pen reached into her bag to get something and knocked Lucy’s arm and the rest she can’t remember.

When Lucy’s TA and the SENDCo sat down with her later to discuss the incident, Lucy was calm but had no recollection of what had happened after the girl had reached into her bag. The Headteacher, SENDCo and teacher discuss what steps to take. The teacher is concerned about the impact on other pupils – they are questioning why Lucy is ‘allowed’ to get away with this, the SENDCo has received a concerned call from Lucy’s mum, who is worried that she is going to get a detention for swearing which she does not deserve and the Headteacher has had a phone call from other parents asking why swearing is being allowed in lessons and why this pupil hasn’t had a consequence when their children are put in detentions for forgetting homework?

Nobody has the answer. Lucy shouldn’t have used swear words in the classroom, this is against the school behaviour policy. But Lucy had been triggered and had lost control, so she was unable to stop the outburst once it started. Has Lucy got away with it? Well she spent the next hour coming down from the outburst, missing her lunchtime and part of one of her favourite lessons. She also didn’t sleep well that night as she was worried about going into that classroom again and hearing all those noises and what if the blind was open again? Lucy might not have sat in detention for an hour, but it would be hard to say that there were no consequences for what happened. But how do you explain that to a class of teenagers and their parents?

Added to this, there is then the factor of life beyond school. We have a responsibility to support our pupils with SEND to understand that behaviours have consequences so that they are able to function at college, work and in society in general. If we shield them from any consequence are we doing a disservice? It has, at times, been commented that I wrap ‘my’ pupils up in cotton wool, that I protect them too much from taking responsibility for their actions which then doesn’t help them in the future. I completely take this on board and understand why others might take this view – but I strongly question the morality in putting a sanction in place for a pupil when the behaviour in question is not a choice but rather a reaction completely out of their control. We sometimes agree on adapted sanctions, such as pupils with SEND completing detentions with a trusted adult rather than the main hall, but often it is very complex and there is no clear ‘right or wrong’.

In my own little corner of the SEND world, I often address the question of accountability by thinking about the different perspectives. When there has been an incident each person in the situation requires some kind of action to be taken in order for them to be at peace with it. It is, therefore, important to consider how the incident has impacted on each person as an individual and what their perspective on it is. For example, Lucy’s mum needs to know that her daughter’s needs are being supported, the pupil sitting next to Lucy needs to know the reason why Lucy reacted in the way that she did and that this was not her fault in any way and the other members of the class need to understand why Lucy reacted in this way. They will see this situation as unjust unless they can appreciate why this happened and, in an ideal world, they would then start to feel empowered to support Lucy when these outbursts happen, rather than feel that she is somehow ‘exempt’ from the rules which apply to them. This level of understanding comes from compassion for others, an inclusive whole-school approach and education about SEND. It’s not easy, but it’s a road worth taking so that these conversations around accountability become easier.

There is no right and wrong to this, only people and their individual battles and stories. I would love to hear your views and opinions on this topic, thank you so much for reading.

Caroline