Some of you who are not teachers don't know how terrible it is for the REGULAR, well behaved kids in the classroom and just how disruptive one kid with BIG BIG behavior problems can disrupt learning in the classroom.
You don't get the other side of the story. WHen a child disrupts to the point that the other children are paying attention to what the disruptive kid is doing and not what the teacher is trying to teach.....no learning for the entire class is going on.
I agree that this teacher went to extremes. But just think of the other side of the story and how she was trying to make the behavior kid understand that the OTHER kids in the room wanted to LEARN and did not want to hear his constant rowdiness and problem behavior!!
No. I completely understand the other childrens' needs.
However,
no behavior justifies what that teacher did.
There are mechanisms in place, procedures, rules, etc. to handle situations with consistently disruptive children.
There was an informal IEP in place. She ignored it.
There was a behavioral modification plan in place. She ignored it.
Alex's behaviors include hiding under a table, eating paper and crayons, humming and spinning. While these behaviors are disruptive they are not deliberately so. Such behaviors are called "stimming" and are natural for the autistic person.
Autistic people can not help stimming. They can not stop doing it.
The only way to stop an autistic person from stimming behavior is to distract them, ie using behavior modification. Even that is sometimes not effective.
Humiliating them and castigating them in front of their peers, then manipulating their peers into condemning them is not going to change their behavior. It's going to ruin their self-esteem.
The teacher could have taught the children to help with Alex allowing them to learn about helping others. In other words, "if Alex starts hiding under the table then do this..."
Trust me, it works. I have three kids, one autistic and two typical. The other two kids learned how to read their brother at an early age. They are very capable of redirecting his behavior away from stimming.
The children could have learned valuable lessons about helping others, dealing with disabilities and compassion.
They learned how to gang up on someone and how to criticize.
Alex Barton could have learned to modify his behaviors, modeling his peers.
He learned that he was "annoying" and "disgusting".
And one last thing.
Given the choice, most parents would have their autistic kids placed in specialized schools and/or classrooms where the classes and staff are geared towards their needs.
The school districts are the ones that insist on mainstreaming.
The school districts are the ones that cut costs.
The school districts are the ones hire these a$$hole teachers.
Do you have any concept of what these school administrations are like?
They'll sit in an IEP meeting and agree to everything, then cut corners when your back is turned. They'll blatantly ignore the IEP, then lie to you about how they are in compliance.
The only watchdog on your child's education is you. Your only weapon as a watchdog is a lawyer and legal attacks.
Guess what? No money, no lawyer, no means to fight back. The school can do whatever they want and you're stuck. They'll walk into a meeting and call for a continuance, wasting your time, work-time and money. They play the drain-game, winning by attrition because they know your funds are limited.
They'll force you to put your kid into a public school and then try to do as little as possible for him.
Don't blame the parents for a situation they neither wanted nor created.