Advice about SEN's

[tiglet]

My son, who's 8, has always had some problems with language. He had speech therapy from 2 years 7 months until he was 5. Nothing physically or mentally wrong with him, he just couldn't grasp language. Now, of course, he has a fantastic vocabulary and the teachers often have to tell him to shut up!

The problem is his reading and writing; as far as his school is concerned, it's his writing which is the mahor problem (but I'll get back to that). He is on the middle table of the bottom set for literacy and finds it incredibly difficult and frustrating to write and often loses concentration when doing so. His spelling of even simple words is, quite frankly, shocking for someone in year four and his teachers have tried various different methods to help him, all to no avail.

Last year, his teacher asked if he could be tested for dyslexia. I agreed and he was duly tested. the results came back negative, although it did show he was very much below the level of where he should be expected to be. His teacher and the school SEN said that it would obviously just come in time and as he was the youngest in the class, this could explain the difference to some degree. i went through all of the various teaching methods they suggested. at the end of year assessments, his results were 1A - 1 being the lowest level for achievement but A being the highest level for achievement. in other words, he hadn't improved, but couldn't possibly try any harder. I obviously rewarded him for this so that i could keep encouraging him and make him feel as if his efforts were not in vain.

Last week, i had parents evening with his new teacher. she asked if I would mind him being tested for dyslexia - I pointed out that he had been last year and she knew nothing about it! This teacher is older and more experienced and said there was definitely some form of language learning disability there as he is such a bright child (top of the top set for maths, on the top table for history & science etc.) that it just made no sense for him to be having this much difficulty. I agreed to the test and was given another way to teach him - again. i say again because every year it seems to be a new method. His teacher is more proactive and has agreed to meet me in a month's time to reassess the situation.

I ruminated on this for a day and then arranged an appointment with the SEN to discuss in more detail, as I am obviously concerned that things aren't just allowed to drift with the school as they seem to have done last year. I might as well have talked to the wall. As he isn't the bottom of the bottom set, she doesn't seem to worried. i pointed out that he is a very bright child and so can obviously compensate in some way and she gave me an incredibly patronising smile and said "Well, all children think their kids are bright".

I pointed out that he is top at maths and a fwe weeks ago, i was helping a friend's daughter who is sitting her 11 plus in january with her non-verbal reasoning paper and that my son could answer all of the questions correctly, past the point where myself, my friend or her 11 year old daughter could. Again, another faint, patronising smile.

I asked whether he should be also tested for dyspraxia, as he has poor hand to eye co-ordination and has always been clumsy (he's had assistance called "physy" during PE lessons). she agreed for him to be tested, but doesn't think so. Incredibly frustrated, i asked what will happen next if this dyslexia test comes back negative. She then proceeded to talk about the precision learning course she was doing for parents - AAAAARRRGGGHH!!!! have done the course, done the teaching at home - it just isn't working. I then asked about him seeing and educational psychologist and was told that as he was not at the bottom of the class, he wasn't considered sufficintly bad to justify this (justify the cost, more likely).

I'm not just being a blinkered Mum here - yes, he can read OK, although he is redaing books he should have been able to read 2 years ago. the point is that he has to focus so hard on what each word is, he doesn't understand what he is actually raeding - it's just a word that has to be got through, not a part of a sentence which aids understanding of that sentence, if you see what I mean. If I read a book to him, we could discuss and analyse the story. if he read the book, he couldn't tell you at the end what that book was about.

I'm getting to my wits end about this now because he is so understandably frustrated and now thinks he's thick. if anyone has any suggestions about how I can find out what is going on in his brain with regards to language and what I can do to get him properly assessed, i would be most grateful.

[Bookworm]

Well, you could ask for Statutory Assessment.

See here for explanation and template letters:

IPSEA: common problems and what you can do

You could also go to your GP and get your child referred to CAHMS so they try and establish whether there is an underlying undiagnosed condition.

A lot of the kids on the autistic spectrum, for example, often excel at one thing (science, maths) but are well below in literacy and writing. My 10 year old Asperger's son's handwriting and spelling is at the level you'd expect from a 6 year old, if that, and his reading is still well below his average age, but his maths and science skills are very good.

Don't forget that statutory assessment cost money to the local authority, so don't be surprised if they say no, they did for me, so get ready for a fight.

Keep us posted.

[tiglet]

Thanks Bookie - i'll get onto this tomorrow.

I've already been fighting, but I'll feel much better if I feel I'm at least fighting in the right direction.

[tiglet]

I managed to speak to the educational psychology department of the local council this afternoon, who advised that i write in and the board will amke a decision within 6 weeks as to whether my son needs assessment or not.

Here's what i have written - I would appreciate comments or thoughts:


Dear Ms XXX

I spoke to one of your colleagues today, who recommended that I write a letter to you regarding my son. My son’s full name is Xxx , his D.O.B. is 00/00/1999 and he attends Xxx Primary School.

I have been concerned, and there have been concerns raised, about my son since an early age in terms of his development. These concerns have been echoed by his Health Visitor, nursery and every year at school. However, despite working with all of these bodies, I feel the time has come for me to request a full assessment of Xxx in order to ascertain the best way to overcome his difficulties. I have been doing some research over the weekend as I spoke to both his teacher and SEN officer last week and I really feel strongly that more should be done in terms of assessment.

I am unsure how best to present the “symptoms”, if you wish to call them that, as it really has only come together in my mind over the last week as to how all of these things may be inter-related. I will list as chronologically as possible in order for you to get a view, whilst sub-dividing into appropriate categories.

Language

Xxx was referred to speech therapy at the age of two years and seven months after discussions between his GP, his health visitor and myself. Xxx continued this therapy up until the end of his reception year at Xxx School. He is now quite articulate, although he does sometimes have difficulty with common phrases which are not exact or abstract in their construct and sometimes seem disingenuous to him.

Xxx has a great deal of difficulty with literacy, which has been a problem right from the beginning of school. Although he very much enjoys being read to, he finds it difficult to read (he is currently on level 6 of the Oxford reading tree). He requires a special device which allows lines other than the one he is reading to be disguised as he can’t seem to concentrate on one line at a time and sometimes ends up reading words from a different line. Although he has made progress with his reading, I have discovered that this is more or less a mechanical exercise. Once he has read a book to you, he has little or no understanding about what happened in the story, so focused is he on each individual word.

Xxx has an even greater problem with writing. He was tested for Dyslexia last year, which came back negative, and is about to be tested again. After last year’s results, it was suggested that Xxx use a triangular pencil and a sloping board to assist with his writing. Unfortunately, his teacher and I both felt that this exacerbated the problem and so did not continue with this method. Xxx’s spelling is very poor as is his actual handwriting – both of which are being intensely worked on at school and at home. Various methods have been employed in both of these situations, but so far, none seem to be achieving any discernable result. His teacher and I are currently trying a new method which we will meet about during December to reassess then. Apart from writing, Xxx had difficulty with using scissors and still finds it very hard not to colour outside of the lines etc.


Motor

This is an area Xxx has had difficulty with from an early age. He did not crawl, but “bottom-shuffled” and then started to walk at 11 months without going through the crawling stage at all. He always has had difficulty with games involving shape-sorting, including jigsaws, and has never shown any real interest in this sort of activity.

Xxx has had “fizzy” in PE lessons from an early age due to his poor hand to eye co-ordination. He has always seemed a rather clumsy child, often spilling drinks or knocking food off his plate, and he usually comes home from, or goes to school with, bruises where he has fallen over, banged into something or has taken insufficient care when negotiating stairs or jumping from something which is too high etc. He has visited the hospital on two occasions to have deep cuts treated after he has been jumping from high objects such as the back of the sofa onto the floor. His awareness of why these sorts of activities can be dangerous has always alarmed me to the extent that a baby-gate remained on his bedroom door until he was six.

Finer motor skills also seem to be a problem (please see above for pencil control etc.). Xxx finds it very difficult to co-ordinate a knife and fork, is unable to tie his shoe laces, cannot manage to pedal a bike etc. Xxx attends a stage school in an effort to improve all of his issues and when he has thoroughly learned a dance routine, can cope with it reasonably well – however, this is very much down to hard work on his part and is not something which comes easily to him.


Emotional

Xxx is a very sweet, loving child, who has a great deal of kindness and fondness for others. He is generally well behaved in so far that he is not a malicious child. However, from nursery onwards, his educational establishments have brought various emotional problems to my attention and there are some which I have identified at home. The primary one at the moment is temper tantrums, which I believe in part to be frustration at his literacy skills and partly because he feels he cannot express himself properly. He has attended a course through Xxx to assist with expression of emotion and anger management, which I do believe has had some limited success.

Nursery believed Xxx to be “obsessive” because he always and only wanted to talk about dinosaurs, often “roaring” rather than speaking (although speech problems had been identified and he was receiving speech therapy). He still has a tendency to fixate on one thing (it’s transformers at the moment) and thus incorporates them into everything i.e. stories at school, any games he plays with others, books he wants to have read, TV programs/films he wants to watch etc. While he now seems to recognise that others don’t want to share the same interests as him all of the time, he does privately continue in this form of behaviour and will continue until something else captures his imagination, which will start the process again. While I recognise this may well be perfectly normal behaviour, as it has been pointed out to me, I thought I had better disclose it to you.

From his reception year onwards, it was again reported to me that Xxx was continuously touching/hugging other children too closely (and too often) and not picking up on when others didn’t want or like this, sometimes leading to Xxx getting into fights or being picked on. He still has difficulty understanding the social nuances of the playground and classroom. Xxx is easily upset because he doesn’t understand why he is being “rejected” or not included in specific games. He has taken to completely avoiding playing football, both because he was constantly getting involved in fights and didn’t know why; and also because he felt he was being laughed at because of his inabilities in the sport. Xxx does have a couple of close friends but it has been highlighted by last years’ teacher that he needs to pick his friends more carefully – I think this is because he doesn’t grasp the intricacies of friendships and appears emotionally immature when compared to his peers.

Xxx finds concentration very difficult. He is quite often unable to sit still or pay attention, with physical symptoms of this lack of concentration, such as feet swinging at mealtimes etc. School teachers have often reported he won’t sit still at carpet time, has difficulty concentrating and sitting still to do his work. His concentration in terms of tasks is also limited: he has difficulty understanding instructions if not broken down step by step. His reception teacher believed he had ADHD and he was assessed for this both by the school SEN and by his health visitor, with both deciding that this was not the case. His Health Visitor actually commented on his extraordinary knowledge of palaeontology and his intense concentration on this interest – again, this is what his nursery believed to be an obsession.

Referring back to obsessive behaviour, there have been other instances noted by myself and the school which may reinforce this hypothesis. Last academic year, Xxx could not seem to stop himself repeatedly licking his hands. We attempted various solutions, including being allowed to take his own soap into school as he did not want to use the school soap, but this did not appear to have any effect. It only stopped when Xxx replaced it with his new habit of biting his nails, which I am currently trying to find a solution for.

Xxx has always had difficulty with sleeping from being a baby. Despite set bedtimes and routines, he still frequently finds it difficult to go to sleep, wakes during the night or wakes early in the morning. This leads to some mornings when it is extremely difficult to get him out of bed.

Xxx is very excitable a lot of the time and always has been. This now seems to be tempered with bouts of what I would almost call depression, when Xxx feels very negative about thinks, including any intellectual capabilities, and is often quite down when walking to school. At other times, he is so excitable that it’s very hard to calm him. Over the last year, he has been reporting more headaches and feeling sick which I’m not convinced is not due to stress or an unacknowledged fear of failure. It only seems to happen when he has school or a big performance at drama school. His eyes have been tested and his eyesight is perfect, so there appears to be no physical reason for this which has been established.

I hope you understand from this letter the genuine concerns I now have about Xxx. He is a very intelligent child who is in the top set for his Maths and his teacher has remarked on his large general knowledge. He is encouraged at every turn, both at school and at home, but there appears to be some problem which is denying him the opportunity to achieve his potential.

Therefore, I hope you will consider my request for a full assessment of Xxx to establish whether there is any underlying cause for his problems and to determine what assistance is required, if any.

In order to assist with your enquiries, I shall provide the following information:

Class teacher:

Maths teacher:

SEN:

Drama school principals:

GP:

Health Visitor (until the age of five):

Previous Nursery –

Xxx has not ever been under the care of social services and so I have no contacted details to give you for them, although I understand you will need to contact them.

Many thanks in advance for your assistance on this matter

[Bookworm]

His awareness of why these sorts of activities can be dangerous has always alarmed me

His lack of awareness

The primary one at the moment is temper tantrums

Don't say that, or they'll try and catalogue him as EBD (Emotional and Behavioural Difficulties = it's all your fault, you bad parent you ). Use something like "outbursts under stress".

He has attended a course through Xxx to assist with expression of emotion and anger management, which I do believe has had some limited success.

Has it really? Forgive me if I read this wrong, it seems to me you are trying to make it sound more successful than it was. If it wasn't, now is the time to be brutally honest.

While I recognise this may well be perfectly normal behaviour, as it has been pointed out to me, I thought I had better disclose it to you.

Don't give them an in to turn you down, they'll find enough by themselves.

His reception teacher believed he had ADHD and he was assessed for this both by the school SEN and by his health visitor, with both deciding that this was not the case.

Neither of whom are able to diagnose correctly, i would take this out, as they'll use that against you.

Xxx has not ever been under the care of social services and so I have no contacted details to give you for them, although I understand you will need to contact them.

No, they bloody well don't need to contact them, and some Local Authorities have been known to use the threat of social services and to get children removed for "abuse" when parents pushed for the correct SEN provision for their children, it sounds too horrific to be true, yet it is. (See the IPSEA site for details)

Now then. Your letter is great, BUT it is not what you need at this stage. I have made comments as above because you will need it in the future, but at the moment, you just need to get the ball rolling with the formal request for Statutory Assessment. (template is given on the IPSEA site for which I gave you the link earlier)

If you send your letter the way you have written it, I pretty much guarantee they will ignore you or try to fob you off, as delays means savings. If you send the formal request for Stat Ass., they have 6 weeks BY LAW to reply.

From now on, it's you on one side and them on the other. They have a budget, it's a very small one and they're more interested in that than your child's welfare. If they can give you the runaround for as long as they can, they will. Stark and cynical, but true.

{{{HUGS}}}

[dx100uk]

not had time to read everything,but, like bookworm, i think i have some knowledge having [now] a special needs teenager.
so sorry if the above already covers what i am saying.

the best thing that happened to me was by passing the LEA and getting in contact with the county council dept direct and getting my child statemented by them.

i made an appointment with there specialist and with in 6 weeks it was all sorted and the LEA had no choice, once the statement was done and dusted they HAD to help.
the benefit to this was funding came from them to the local area, not they had to beg for it. [which seemed to me to be the reluctance to do it from a local side as they had to make sure they ticked SO many boxes.]

to me it seems there is 'something' that needs to addressed and getting county on-board is your next move.

sorry if this is the process you are already trying, but as i said, i have only browsed this thread

dx100uk

[tiglet]

Thank for both of your replies - I will rework accordingly.

yes, dx100uk, it is the council i contaxted as my son's school wheere no real help.

I'll let you know how I get on - thanks for the PM bookie.

[tiglet]

The bit about social services is because on the phone they advised me they would be contacting social services to se if they have any knowledge of my son within their system- as far as I am aware, they don't, but I'll amend anyway.

[honey5]

what an emotional time for you, it really takes it out of you when trying to sort these things unfortunately, but do try to stay strong
i had both of the twins statemented one in reception and the other in yr 1
the youngest twin it was very obvious had problems from about 18 months of age, i had to write eventually when he was 5 to the house of commons to have him in education as the LEA wouldnt listen (she/his twin sister entered nursery at 4)
i was called every day into school as he was doing this that and the other, it was soul destroying
eventually they went to see their chest consultant and he kicked off in the waiting room, (i was sweating as usual!!!) he was actually the one who referred him to the childrens mental health unit, they recognised right away the lack of ability to concentrate, they took a video of him playing and it was all crashing and bangin things together, the top half of his body was quite still but when we played it back his legs were actually "running" under the table lol
he has ocd aswell as adhd, the ocd was normally all paper related, we used to have to ignore piles of it in the middle of the floor until he had gone to bed, he once took £140 from my husbands pocket and put it in the washer "for safe keeping"\! the money meant nothing too him it was the fact it was made from paper
he never slept apart from 20mins every 48 hours, hes a frail little fella but pulled doors off, radiators from walls etc........and tempertantrums grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr dont talk to me about those
it was the best thing to happen when he was assessed but for all i knew things werent right the diagnoses was devastating as hes my little boy
i requested whilst he was in mainstream school that he was held back a year, thus proving to them also that this child would not catch up with his peers
i left him in mainstream school until middle school was looming then asked for special needs education, mainstream taught him his manners etc and he had one to one teaching and help with socialising, therefore can now cope and help out with other children less fortunate than himself in special needs school
he does take huge doses of ritalin 20mg 8am 20mg at 11 am and 20mg at 2pm then risperdone and melatonin at night (on top of nebulisers and numerous inhalers) and setraline for his ocd (that was a new one to the cmhs) but after alot of research by myself i decided i would ask about it as it was available in canada at the time to help with treatment in children (guess what ITS CERTAINLY CURTALED THE OBSSESSIONS)
but i have my little boy back and hes so loving really he is
if you get no satisfaction with the LEA or council, write to the house of commons explaining the situation
good luck
honey x

[tiglet]

thanks honey. I'm sorry it's been such a struggle for you.
I have been to see my son's GP this morning who was very supportive (although he said parents come to see him when they are frustrated by the education system which should be helping them).

He is considering autism and/or dyspraxia and has arranged for him to see a paedeatrician in order to get a proper diagnosis. He is also writing to the school.

Hopefully this might move things forward a bit.

[honey5]

just try to keep your chin up its a rough ride emotionally but you will get there in the end
honey x

[tiglet]

Need a bit of advice as I'm feeling rather nervous.

I was in my son's school this morning sorting out stuff for the christmas fare, when the school SEN came up to me, not looking best pleased and said she wanted to discuss the letter I had sent to the council ed psych department. I was busy at the time judging a competition and said I would be in this afternoon.

I've heard from other parents now that she's given them a roasting for "going over her head" (although I spoke to his teacher on tuesday and she was very supportive and glad I had asked for a full assessment) and so am feeling nervous about speaking to her.

Any advice/suggestions about how I should handle this one? I am feeling worried that it's going to be put down to me being an overanxious mother or making mountains out of molehills.