School Refuser - The Blog

Tuesday 21 February 2012

School refusal Vs Truancy

School refusal differs from truancy in that children with school refusal feel anxiety or fear towards school, whereas truant children generally have no feelings of fear towards school, often feeling angry or bored with it instead. The Children's Hospital Boston has this chart to define the differences between truancy and school refusal

Do we agree?

Website design

I have been told that the forum can be difficult to read when you are crying. Now, I know that many of us do have tears in our eyes reading some of the messages that concerned parents write.

So, it seems that it needs to change.

The colour scheme was chosen, in part, because I felt that it was neutral and comforting.

I would welcome advice on an appropriate colour scheme from someone better qualified that I. Any suggestions would be very welcome.

Saturday 18 February 2012

Sarah's checklist

Sarah, one of our Forum members, has compiled a useful list of things that should help parents support their children. I have nicked it - and it is below:
  • Always keep a diary of everything no matter how small; you may need to refer to it at a later date.
  • Contact your local Parent Partnership for help.
  • Find out if your school has a Parent Support Worker - they are very good, but not all schools have one.
  • See your GP
  • Contact CAMHS - this is something schools expect parents to do and ask about CBT ( our life saver )
  • Read a great book called "Can't go won't go" by Mike Fortune Woods and that helped me to come to terms with it all and gave me a better understanding of my son's condition.
Does anyone have anything that they would like to add to the list?

I add that I think it important to make notes at every meeting - and put them into that diary.

Simon