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Cameron

Criteria For Co-ordinated support plan - need help please

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I was wondering if anyone has any advice. My daughter Erin 9yrs had her IEp meeting just before the break up of primary 4. I should add that we stay in scotland. Although erin has done really well in p4 ( she got her diagnosis at the end of p3), I am concerned that things are just drifting. She was supposed to be assessed by an educational psychologist ( this was from her IEP meeting in october 2011.) but this never happened. Then the speech therapist informed me that she was discharging erin, which i was very unhappy about and expressed this> so i wrote to the head teacher and asked to meet with her. I met her and two other teachers, i was there myself. I stated that i wished that erin to have a statutory assessment by the local education authority for a co-ordinated support plan as I was concerned that while P4 had been a good year for her as she has got older the differences between her and her peers have become more noticable and I was worried that she may smart to run into difficulties. additionally i wanted something in place well before she transitions to high school as i know that she will not cope without a high level of support ( moving from one class to another will totally stress her out). anyway the head teacher stated that erin did not meet the criteria for a co-ordinated support plan as she does not have any external agencies involved.( she statesd that educational psychologist and speech therapy are not external). Is this right ?. I feel as if iam being hoodwinked and just wanted to try and get as much info before she returns to school at then end of august

thanks

 

Cameron

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I'm not sure because Scotland is different to England regarding special educational needs.

 

But here the EP and the SALT would be considered external agencies unless they were employed full time as part of the school therapy team.

 

Regardless of where you are, I think it always helps to make sure that everything is always put in writing [not just conversations]. That meetings are always minuted. And that you have someone with you wherever possible for support and also to confirm what is discussed and agreed.

 

Have you contacted the National Autistic Society in Scotland for their advice.

 

In the UK the trigger for more support is always around proving that the child has not made progress. This can be proven via school reports, Individual Education Plan targets and whether they are being met. Academic results, is she keeping up with her peers.

 

In Scotland, do you have the equivalent of the Special Educational Needs Code of Practice? The reason I ask is that this document details the kind of special educational needs a child may have. These are grouped under the categories of speech and language and social communication; emotional and behavioural; sensory and physical; academic.

 

So for my own son he has difficulties in all those areas. A child with an ASD may have speech and language and/or social communication difficulties, difficulties with emotional literacy in themselves and others, behavioural issues due to not coping in the school environment, sensory issues or sensory processing disorder, and may also have dyspraxia, specific learning difficulties such as dyslexia, problems with handwriting etc.

 

So I would recommend you contact the NAS, and see what advice they can give you for where you live. And if the NAS are doing any seminars in your area I would recommend attending them as they give alot of useful advice regarding education.

 

I would also add that as you suspect, you should always check what you are being told because it is often not true, or half true.

 

In the UK you don't need anyone to agree that your child needs assessing towards a Statement. Once you request such an assessment from the local authority, they would then contact the school and ask various professionals [often including the EP and SALT] to see and assess the child. Ideally you need to have had at least two IEPs and it helps to have a diagnosis, but it is not essential.

 

The only other thing I would add is that a child's difficulties are best measured using standardised assessments. So check what assessments have been carried out and what the results of those were. When standardised assessments have been used you have a baseline from which you can measure progress eg. at age 7 years and 4 months xxx has a standard score of xx for comprehension where a score of xx is average.

 

That then allows you to measure progress. So next year has her standard score increased or remained the same. Is the gap between her and her peers widening and therefore she is falling further behind. These are the types of assessments you need.

 

Observations assessments have their place, but it is difficult to pin down an actual measure of ability and then compare it next academic year.

 

The NHS SALT and EP and OT should use standardised assessments, but they often don't. Because of the fact that proving lack of progress is what triggers additonal support/provision and therapy. So you may at some stage need to think about whether an independent assessment/report might achieve what you want.

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I too would be suspicious of a SALT discharging her. What evidence does she have of progress? On what grounds was her decision based. Has she used standardised assessments last year and found that your daughter has improved so much that she is now on a similar level as her peers. And finally how is that possible. To be on the spectrum means that it is a 'lifelong' disorder. There will be progress of course, but if she has improved to such an extent is she no longer on the spectrum?

 

Our SALT tried to reduce her hours of input on the grounds that my son had made progress on standardised assessments. However she had cherry picked the assessments that she knew he would do well on, and she did not explain that his high scores were due to his autistic abilities and not necessarily due to understanding. For example, she read my son a story [it turned out she read the same story as the previous year], and my son was able to repeat that story word for word. That was no surprise to me. He can repeat hours of TV and DVD dialogue. That does not mean he understands what each and every word means.

 

She also did not assess on other areas we knew he struggled with. So we eventually got an independent report. My sons scores ranged from 2 [where 3 is classed as severe] to 14/15 [where 8-13 is considered typical]. That is the whole point of what an ASD is about. It is about spiky profiles. Things they are good at, even exceptional at, and other things they struggle with or simply cannot do.

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Sally44, thanks for your prompt reply. I agree totally with what you were saying about being surprised about the SALT discharging her. She worked with Erin for a couple of months in order to help Erin construct a way of asking for help when she was stuck at something or didn't understand and she stated that she had not anywhere because the more she pushed Erin the more she shut. I was astonished at that as I have always stressed the importance of Not appearing annoyed as erin just clams up at that. I got the distinct impression that she was frustrated by the lack of progress and had effectively gave up by discharging her. On the subject of educational psychologist I had asked if Erin would have the various assessments you detailed in order to give a comprehensive idea of her skills profile, but never really got an answer. I was informed that the educational psychologist had visited Erin and as she seemed to be doing ok that no further assessment was required. I get the impression that Iam going to have to fight for everything. I plan to contact NASfor support and advice. Although I like to think I have a good understanding of Erin's need I find it frustrated by the schools vagueness and their assertion that everything is going fine. I think my best course of action would be to contact the local education authority myself rather than going through the school.

 

Thanks for the great advice

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"For Scotlands Disabled Children,"

 

http://www.fsdc.org.uk/

 

Also the NAS campaign on autistic children.

 

http://www.autism.org.uk/greatexpectations?sc_lang=en-GB

 

Provided your nation at the top left is set to Scotland then the informaton contained should apply to Scotland.

 

Another idea is to try and find a NAS parent/carer branch in your area they tend to focus on autistic children.

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You can get independent reports, both speech and language therapist and educational psychologist and occupational therapist. They would carry out standardised assessments and get identify all her needs and difficulties, making recommendations on how those should be supported in school and giving you baseline scores from which you can measure progress.

 

In England, if you had those reports done, you would have the findings and recommendations cut and pasted into the Statement. So whatever special educational needs document, report or educational plan you get in Scotland should take those independent reports into account.

 

In England LAs sometimes refuse to acknowledge them because they are been carried out by professionals that are not LA employees. However when the parent appeals to SEND, they do recognise these reports, as ALL evidence of SEN must be considered by the LA regardless of where it has come from. I don't know if that is the same in Scotland, and whether you can use the same arguments.

 

The Jim Rose report into Dyslexia commented on the same thing. Stating that LAs should give sound reasons as to why they rejected any outside professionals report and that not being a LA employee was not a good enough reason.

 

In England a Statement is a legally binding document. Does Scotland have any equivalent? I would ask the NAS about that.

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Independent/private reports. You can look on the professional website to find someone who specialises in the diagnosis your child has, and is in scotland.

 

You really need someone who is experienced in writing reports.

 

In England you would specifically ask that they had experience of writing reports for Educational Tribunals, as well as experience attending those tribunals as expert witnesses if required by the parent.

 

So you need to learn about Scotlands SEN procedures. What is your equivalent of a Statement. Can you appeal to any body at all. Is there decision legally binding on the LA etc.

 

Because these reports are expensive. A good one will typically be around £1500. So you want it to definately identify all your childs needs [which fall within that particular professional's remit], and for them to quantify and specify the provision/support your child needs. But you also need to have a SEN system whereby that information will be included into any educational plan/provision for your child, and for that to be legally binding on your LA and school to provide it. Otherwise you have an expensive report that maybe very accurate, but no way of making the LA or school deliver what that reports recommends.

 

In England each difficulty goes into section 2 of the statement. Then section 3 MUST detail how each and every need will be met, and part 4 names the school placement that can deliver it. If the LA do not recognise anything in part 2 or 3 or 4 you simply appeal to the educational tribunal and hope that you have enough evidence for them to Order the LA to provide it. And that order is legally binding on the LA ie. they have to provide it.

 

Typically the professionals that are usually required to asses and write a report and attend a tribunal are the Speech and Language Therapist, the Educational Psychologist and the Occupational Therapist.

 

So I would recommend you find out how Scotlands SEN system works so that you use your money wisely.

 

If you can afford for private reports and private therapy then that is something different because you can pay for whatever is recommended regardless of whether you can legally force the LA or school to provide it.

 

For example, you don't want to end with a scenario whereby the private SALT recommends 2 one hour sessions of speech therapist per week in school delivered by a speech therapist and the Local Authority just refuses to do it, and you cannot do anything via Scotland's SEN system to achieve a legally binding decision whereby the LA is ordered to provide it and fund it.

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