ajwilko Posted February 11, 2018 Share Posted February 11, 2018 Hi all. After a little advice. So my husband is getting rather desperate to move back to the uk from adelaide. Weve been here for 8 years and not enjoying it anymore. I really want to go back but i am terrified for our kids, having anxiety attacks about it. They are5 and 6 and in reception and year 1 here. My 6 year old is on the spectrum, high functioning. Im so worried they will both fall behind in school and struggle. Just wondering if anyone has been through it and can offer any advice? Thankyou Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted February 11, 2018 Share Posted February 11, 2018 I doubt very much you need to worry re schooling. There tends to be more special needs support in state schools in the UK (altho it can be area and funding dependant and not always certain). If they are close to the end of year cut off (in England its Aug as school year starts in Sept) you could consider holding them back a year as it were and asking for them to go into the year below. If they are older (say Oct/Nov/Dec born) then they should slot into their actual year ok. TBH in those early years kids all progress as such different rates I'd not get too hung up on falling behind or being ahead. It evens out more as they get older but at their ages, it really isn't something to be losing sleep over. Keep in mind the areas you are looking to settle and research carefully if the state schools are zoned etc and if there are good support services within those schools or if you need to look further afield. A friend of mine has a son who requires support and he was miserable in the local state school as there just wasn't enough support and it was too noisy for him to cope with. She had to argue her case for a long time before she could move schools to one outside the area that suited his needs better. Eventually she got him a place and hasn't looked back but for the time he was at the first school it was tough on all of them. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Toots Posted February 11, 2018 Share Posted February 11, 2018 No need to worry. Many people have moved back to the UK with young children and they were just fine. The most important thing is having a happy, relaxed Mum and Dad. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Marisawright Posted February 11, 2018 Share Posted February 11, 2018 It sounds like the perfect time to move back. The younger they are, the easier it is for them to adapt. If your husband is desperate to move now, you will have to move eventually, and it will be harder when they're older - so I'd advise you to bite the bullet. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LKC Posted February 11, 2018 Share Posted February 11, 2018 We moved back to the UK after almost nine years in Sydney, and we have two kids, the eldest with a diagnosis of Asperger's. They are a bit older than your children (9 and 11), but I was also very anxious about moving back. Eldest kid was in year 6 in Aus (last year of primary) and youngest was in year 4. We left Aus in September, so three quarters of the way through the academic year. Had we moved to England, the cut off date of 31st August would have meant that eldest went straight in to high school. However, we chose to move to Scotland, in part because the cut off date is the end of Feb (and partly because OH was offered a really good job opportunity). So, eldest went back to the start of her last year of primary (as one of the eldest in the class). Youngest could have gone up a year, but as her birthday is mid-Feb, we had the option to hold her back which we did (so she is the eldest too). Within about a month of starting school I had had a meeting with the school learning support teacher to see how best they could help/support her at school, they had written a referral for an OT, and the head of learning support from the high school she will be going to had come to meet us at school, to see how they can support her in making the transition to high school. She has already had her OT assessment, and they will be coming to the school to work with her on some things. In contrast, although I was generally happy with their primary school in Aus, eldest had absolutely no support in regards to her ASD. There was one teacher who was better than the others, but our daughter was subject to bullying on and off right through school, and because it was a big school, she kind of slipped through the net. We've had a completely different experience here in Scotland. i was worried that the changes in moving back would be hard for her, but she has handled it with no problems whatsoever. There have been a couple of tiny wobbles, but she is so much happier than she was at school in Australia. Part of that is the smaller school (100 kids instead of 850), but I think as a family we are just so happy to be back in the UK that there is this sort of positive vibe around all of the time. I was really unhappy for the last two or three years in Aus which dragged things down, but now we are home that shadow has lifted and we are all in a better place, if you get what I mean. If you do decide that you are going to give it a go, make sure that you pick where you go carefully, and don't think that you have to go back to exactly the same place. We lived in Suffolk before we moved over, just because that's where we'd ended up (from Kent and Birmingham originally), but decided we wanted to choose somewhere new. Australia changed us, and I don't think we'd have been happy just to go back to what we had before we went. We wanted to choose the right place for us for now, and thankfully that seems to have paid off and we are very happy with the place we chose. Life is good, and I am beyond happy that we made the leap back when and how we did. Good luck! 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ajwilko Posted February 11, 2018 Author Share Posted February 11, 2018 Thankyou all. We would be moving back to around the kings Lynn area in Norfolk. We are originally from hampshire and Northampton so completely different but still within reasonable distance to family closer than Australia anyways. My son who has asd is Aug 25birthday so I'm hoping we would have the chance to hold him back. My daughter will be in the same year in the uk as she is here. I think the problem for me is I love the school they are in now, they have been amazing for my son and I'm scared he won't be able to readjust. I go back and forth about moving so much I don't know where I am lol! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BacktoDemocracy Posted February 11, 2018 Share Posted February 11, 2018 1 hour ago, ajwilko said: Thankyou all. We would be moving back to around the kings Lynn area in Norfolk. We are originally from hampshire and Northampton so completely different but still within reasonable distance to family closer than Australia anyways. My son who has asd is Aug 25birthday so I'm hoping we would have the chance to hold him back. My daughter will be in the same year in the uk as she is here. I think the problem for me is I love the school they are in now, they have been amazing for my son and I'm scared he won't be able to readjust. I go back and forth about moving so much I don't know where I am lol! I would really recommend reading Snifters post and absorbing its implications, I am in Ipswich and although have no children in school I am aware that money available to local authorities across the board have had funding slashed for the last 8 years and my feeling is that East Anglia started from a low base and is really feeling the affects of reduced local authority budgets and general economic decline, we are moving to W Midlands because of the general feel of decline here which we have noticed over the 4 years we have been here after returning from Brisbane. Also, we have long term friend in Cambridge with twin boys who unfortunately has had a bad experience with her senior Academy school, now I will emphasise this is not my experience and although I think it is happening elsewhere I have no personal experience so you need to investigate further, her twins, one boy brilliant, other son dyslexic, her dyslexic son has struggled, lack of support, lack of awareness, lots of discipline issues arising from his ability to keep up, culminating in threats to exclude him, mother fought against that successfully but was left with distinct impression that headteacher was doing academic cleansing in order to bump school up in academic tables as brilliant son was disruptive in some ways, minor tho, but was feted by school. I'm not arguing for or against but you do really need to do some in depth investigation because the country has changed significantly in the last 12 years and we were caught out by the changes socially and workwise, do some background reading of periodicals and press and I would guess there will be a support organisation in the UK for Aspergers sufferers and contacting them may help Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bristolman Posted February 11, 2018 Share Posted February 11, 2018 8 hours ago, ajwilko said: Hi all. After a little advice. So my husband is getting rather desperate to move back to the uk from adelaide. Weve been here for 8 years and not enjoying it anymore. I really want to go back but i am terrified for our kids, having anxiety attacks about it. They are5 and 6 and in reception and year 1 here. My 6 year old is on the spectrum, high functioning. Im so worried they will both fall behind in school and struggle. Just wondering if anyone has been through it and can offer any advice? Thankyou You really don't need to worry about schooling, we moved coming up to 6 years ago and our boys were a little older (10) and they took to it like ducks to water and are now in 6th Form and doing incredibly well. It's natural to worry I know but kids especially are amazingly adaptable. Things will have changed naturally, change happens everywhere but it's the same country you left. Good luck and I look forward to reading your updates. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Quoll Posted February 11, 2018 Share Posted February 11, 2018 In Cambridge too and with friends and relatives with kids and grandkids in schools, can’t say that I’ve heard much negativity of what is offered around here and given the general populace you’d think there would be more complaints if little things go wrong. Returnees have generally reported that their kids have been well supported on return and those with special needs seem to generally be very happy at better support structures than they’ve experienced in Australia. More than once I’ve heard of kids who had been effectively excluded from Aus schools absolutely thriving after the move. As long as you move before the GCSE merry go round starts kids will slot in quite nicely. Schools across the world continually whinge about reduced funding so nothing new there. 3 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LKC Posted February 11, 2018 Share Posted February 11, 2018 4 hours ago, Quoll said: In Cambridge too and with friends and relatives with kids and grandkids in schools, can’t say that I’ve heard much negativity of what is offered around here and given the general populace you’d think there would be more complaints if little things go wrong. Returnees have generally reported that their kids have been well supported on return and those with special needs seem to generally be very happy at better support structures than they’ve experienced in Australia. More than once I’ve heard of kids who had been effectively excluded from Aus schools absolutely thriving after the move. As long as you move before the GCSE merry go round starts kids will slot in quite nicely. Schools across the world continually whinge about reduced funding so nothing new there. Towards the end of year 5 eldest started having anxiety attacks occasionally, and school were always very quick to phone and ask me to fetch her. She spent a few weeks doing part-time school, because they wouldn't allow or support her with the coping strategies that her psychologist had taught her. It was easier for them to phone me to collect her than it was to allow her to go to a quiet place and use her meditation etc. The school she is at now is a complete breath of fresh air, and she is happier for it. In fact now I can see how happy she is here, it makes me realise just how unhappy she was in Australia. I hadn't fully realised at the time because it had just kind of crept up, if that makes sense. 5 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
deryans Posted February 12, 2018 Share Posted February 12, 2018 (edited) On 11/02/2018 at 14:37, LKC said: Towards the end of year 5 eldest started having anxiety attacks occasionally, and school were always very quick to phone and ask me to fetch her. She spent a few weeks doing part-time school, because they wouldn't allow or support her with the coping strategies that her psychologist had taught her. It was easier for them to phone me to collect her than it was to allow her to go to a quiet place and use her meditation etc. The school she is at now is a complete breath of fresh air, and she is happier for it. In fact now I can see how happy she is here, it makes me realise just how unhappy she was in Australia. I hadn't fully realised at the time because it had just kind of crept up, if that makes sense. LKC, crept up makes quite a bit of sense, when you have (as we do) a child with wonderful differences, as a family and a parent, you cope and "accomodate", often this masks the effort as parents or a family you are putting in and reduces the challenge the child has to overcome (not great either) , in some cases it eats into your capacity to cope, often causing stress and in extreme cases despair/illness. In hindsight we should have been much more direct and adversarial with our school in adelaide (exclude him because I can't think what else), they simply did not have the training, skills , nor the motivation and the will to help our son with his coping strategies, the competency simply was not there, it was a too-hard basket - which poses the question why are these people educators ? When we look at him now ,his achievements and his maturing even at aged 13, is such a delight (and I confess a relief) to watch. What I did learn from our poor engagement with education in adelaide, is to trust my spidey sense - I was on or close to the money from day one, preferring to gain consensus before acting, I now know what bad looks like, and I can inform and help other parents who are often bewildered in engaging educators to work for a successful outcome for the child. after all , it is about the child. Edited February 12, 2018 by deryans 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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