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Wesnesday

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About Wesnesday

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    Norfolk Broads
  1. Thanks for reminding me! Of course! I've got loads of them. I'm really impressed with the level of support your son is getting from his school. My thoughts are with you regarding the LA's decision. Good luck!
  2. Thanks for your help, I really appreciate it. Nicky, have you been through the whole process? Does your son have a statement now? I'd be interested to know what they put in place, as I'm still unclear as to what the best way to meet my son's needs is. Sally44, I don't have that many reports from the school. I have an EP report exploring motivation and memory and an outreach worker report which didn't highlight any big problem. Other than that I've got a few IEPs, with always the goal of no physical violence against other students, which he consistently failed to reach. Outside of school I've got the reports from the psychologist from CAMHS who made his diagnosis of AS. Kathryn, I did point out the need to avoid excluding a SEN child when he started getting excluded last year. Their argument is that it is in their policy to exclude children who use violence toward other people. It is not discrimination because everybody is treated the same way. It would make sense, except that my son quite enjoys his exclusions, so as a deterrent it's not great. The ACE booklet is very helpful, very detailed, though it might take me a while to write the report. Does it make sense to write a short letter to start the assessment process and send them the detailed report in the following days/weeks when I'm finished writing it? Or should I wait until I'm finished writing it to send the request? Julia, best of luck in your search for answers. I wish I could help.
  3. Hi, Right now I'm trying to write a request for statutory assessment, after being advised to do so by an adviser from Partnership with Parents. I've got a model letter but I'm stumped as to how to present my case. There are two parts I'm supposed to fill in. The first one is "I believe that my child's needs are:" Isn't that what they are supposed to assess? All I can think of is what the problems are but the needs are much more difficult to pinpoint - or at least I find it difficult to express. The second part is "My reasons for believing that the school cannot meet his needs on its own resources are:" Should I then go back to each problem and detail why nothing worked? And also, just in how much detail am I supposed to go? Is it best to be quite short or to give as much information as possible? The school is willing to make the request, but they talked about it last month and we had a meeting last week where I learned that they hadn't done it and they were trying to convince us that it wouldn't help. So I'd rather make sure it's happening. But I'm struggling! In a nutshell, my 13 yo AS son doesn't know how to handle problems with other students and very easily resorts to insults and then violence, resulting in him being regularly excluded. He's had similar problems in primary school but they disappeared in Year 5 & 6, only to reappear when he moved to secondary school. Various strategies have been put in place, with intervention from various external people (he's at School Action Plus) but things have gone worse. He has been telling us since November that he doesn't want to go to school. It is also now apparent that he is being bullied though this has only become clear recently and I don't know it was part of the problem last term (and he can't identify the culprits because he can't recognise unfamiliar faces! ) He has been told to talk to an adult when he's got problems but he won't - I guess he doesn't trust them or doesn't feel confident enough, he will only talk to me - but honestly it's difficult to get information as his emotions get in the way. Intellectually he is very bright, so there are no obvious learning difficulties there. Though I have noticed that he doesn't do well with assignments that require an awareness of emotions and social skills (writing the introduction of a horror story comes to mind). He has come down a level in English in the last term, should I mention it or is it too recent to be considered significant? At the last IEP review meeting I raised the issue of his research skills and his essay planning being terrible, and he is now supposed to work on them in the learning support unit but I don't know if it's happening or if he's making progress. We agreed with the school that classes that cause him the most stress would be replaced by time in the learning support unit instead. Those are mainly classes with a less structured setting such as art and PE. He has stopped German completely, because he has taken a strong dislike to the language and it was felt that there was no point in forcing him to continue. He is supposed to work on French instead in the learning support unit (we are a French family and he can speak and read the language) but he doesn't know what he's supposed to do so he hasn't done anything. Now things are so bad that we need to negotiate with the school how to keep him educated during the statementing process. The assistant headteacher for SEN wants him to be started on an a live online teaching programme, from home. The psychologist from CAMHS tells me it's best instead to negotiate in-school provision as he would still be with his friends - maybe coming part-time, or having a learning assistant with him between classes (they won't do that without a statement, I've asked before). It makes sense to me but my son is so anxious now I don't know if it's a good solution anymore. He just wants to stay home and feel safe. ... Sorry if I got a bit carried away. I started the topic wanting advice about writing the request statement. Feel free to give me your thoughts on the rest as well.
  4. Wesnesday

    Hi

    Thanks for your welcome, all of you. Sorry I haven't posted on Education yet, I just haven't had the time! I've been sooo busy trying to contact various people and organisation and scouring the web for information. Things are getting a bit clearer now but I think I'll still post when I get the time. We're in this for a while.
  5. Wesnesday

    Hi

    Hi everybody, I am the mum of a 13 year old boy with Asperger syndrome and I also have a daughter aged 8. My son has been on the special needs register since age 4 (with a gap in Y5 and Y6 because he had stopped causing trouble at school) but has only been diagnosed recently, after being referred to CAMHS for depression and violent behaviour when he started secondary school. As for me, I used to be a software engineer but I haven't worked for 10 years. As my son was improving so much in the later years of primary school, I was hopeful that I would be able to return to work after he had settled in secondary school, but this seems rather unlikely now as it is obvious that he is not coping with the school environment. I'll post the details on the Education forum as I really need some advice as to what to do next.
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