issues with nursery, not sure how to help

[amy54321]

My son is 4 and has been in nursery for 1 year (council run, attached to a school).
The nursery are always pulling me aside to discuss concerns they have about him. He doesn't socialise much with the other children, barely talks to the adults, struggles to focus at circle time, stuggles to do his activity sheets/tasks, walks away from conflict instead of trying to resolve it, struggles to follow instructions and other things like that.
They have refered him to speech and language 3 times. The first 2 times we had a basic assessment and the therapist observed him once in nursery, she said she has no major concerns with his language and they couldn't do anything to help. We have just been discharged from his 3rd referall. She done a full language assesment and found that his language was slightly below what would be expected for his age but not enough to cause concern. She observed him in nursery twice and told me there wasn't anything concerning there, the only thing she did say was that he seems to follow visual clues better than verbal instruction. She said there wasn't anything she can do to help but did give the nursery some advice.
I dont have the same problems at home, so I am confused about the problems at nursery. He has 5 brothers and sisters and i babysit my 3 neices once a week so he is used to large groups. He will normally always join in the activities i do with the kids (sometimes takes a little coaxing though). He talks lots to family and friends (both adult and children). Has very little difficulty with following most instructions i give him. His pronunciation isn't great but most people we talk to can understand him well enough.
I'm starting to get pretty concerned that I'm just veiwing him with my "perfect little boy blinkers" and there is something more worrying going on. Over the last 2 months the discussions that i have had with the nursery staff are getting more concerning with them saying stuff like he is just babbling random sounds when they try to speak to him or he cant understand even a basic instruction they give him.
I keep asking the nursery what I can do to help but they just keep telling me they are waiting on speech and language getting back to them (for a year now despite being discarged 3 times)
Does anyone have any idea what i can do to help? I even considered taking him out of nursery at one point but he does really enjoy going to nursery.

[BackforGood]

Ask them what the SENCo thinks, or if the SENCo can get some advice from the area Inclusion officer or Area SENCo or whatever support is called in your area.

Ask them what strategies they are putting in place to support him. they should have a plan which records how they are differentiating to help him if they believe there are issues.

[Akire]

He still is young there is often a huge range for children from 3-5 it is good that he had been seen so far. He may be bit slower but at the moment he still in range of what considered "normal" I'm guessing in 6-12m if he isn't make a lot of progress they may well offer more support and tailored help for him.

There is often a long waiting least for speech assessment so it is good he is on the list. It could just be he is shyer at school and they find it harder to pick up words. Though if he is listening and responding at home it could be that he finds it harder to concentrate at school.

At 4 you should be doing all normal parent play things, if there are often lots of other children around and you can give him more time 1-1 that might help. If find games that he really likes and enjoyed talking about all good. It's to young really to "force" him to repeat words and the like or anything really formal. If you know what I mean!

[amy54321]

I've just had to google senco, never heard of it before. I'll speak to the nursery tomorrow to see if they have something like that.

They dont have any stratagies or support in place for him. I think that is whats frustrating me more than anything. The pull me aside atleast twice a week to tell me they are concerned about him and everytime i ask if they are trying any new stratagies to help him so that i can help. Everytime they just tell me that they dont have anything in place yet, that they are waiting on speech and language getting back to them.
I've tried suggesting a few stratagies to them but they haven't implemented any of them. And without knowing how he is in nursery I dont know what else to suggest to them. It's like they are describing a different child when they tell me about how he is at nursery.

[amy54321]

akire i'm not concerned about his language myself, i agree with what your saying about not forcing language tasks on him, i think it is just something that will improve with time. Its the nursery that are concerned. I think it is more of a social issue with him at nursery but the nursery are convinced it is a language issue. I dont have the same issues in the house with him. I dont think there is much of a problem with his language skills. Most of the reasons for the lower score weren't concerning to me e.g. he was told to point to the cat then the bears, he pointed to the cat and then 1 bear . The assesment was also rushed into 1 session as the nursery were desperate it to be done before christmas. I think he was just getting very bored after an hour on pointing to pictures and repeating phrases so by the secong hour he wasn't paying much attention

[BackforGood]

Ah - Sorry Amy54321

SENCo is 'Special Educational Needs Co-ordinator'.

All schools and all private nurseries must have one. It may be it is the SENCo who is responsible for the whole school, or it may be they have their own, separate one - it depends how 'attached' to the school it is - but either way, there MUST be a named person.
If they are reporting concerns to you, then staff are obliged to raise those concerns with the SENCO, and, if they are so inexperienced they can't think of any ideas to try themselves, then they can get advice from their SENCo.
That said - you said in your first post that the SaLT (Speech & Language Therapist) gave the Nursery some advice. So, if nothing else, at the bare minimum, this advice should be recorded, and they should be monitoring how they are implementing it every session he attends.
If it's possible it's more of a social or shyness issue, then they should be putting things in place to help him overcome that.

btw - LOTS of children are different at home from the way they present in Nursery - that is really common.

[Snossidge]

Was the speech assessment really 2 hours long? Did it happen at school or was it something you took him to?

Maybe ask for a meeting with the SENCo and nursery teacher/key person, ask them what advice the SaLT has given, what has been put into place, and what the outcome has been.

[HSMMaCM]

Has his hearing been tested? Just thinking about the poor speech and not responding to verbal instructions.