Teachers, how do you deal with this: exam Q in class

[IDK]

DS has recently been diagnosed with a Learning Difficulty which means that he will get 25% extra time in exams.
They did a exam question in class today. I asked DS if he got his extra time and he said no because the teacher couldn't wait, she had to carry on with the rest of what she had planned for the lesson.
What do you do? Is there a way to give extra time to one or two pupils if you are doing practice questions in class?

[Amerryscot]

It depends on how formal the lesson is. If it's a bit of teaching, followed by a practice question, then an evaluation period - then no, it wouldn't be practical to hold the rest of the class up.

If it's a test, they should get their extra time. They might have to take this over break, or the rest of the class could have a filler activity, or revision time before the start of the test so that everyone finishes at the same time.

It is good practice for schools to demonstrate that the access arrangements are a normal way of working, so they should build extra time into routine tests and document this in some way, eg by getting ET pupils to change pen colour at the end of regular time.

[FelicityWasSanta]

Just an exam question, no I wouldn't have expected him to get it- if he does this with everything he does then he will need to stay in school 25% longer (impractical!) or do 25% less work (major problem).

If it is a class test/coursework/controlled assessment/exam/mock he should get it and the school needs to be documenting this as his 'normal working practice' or he may not be allowed to keep the entitlement.

[RemusLupinsBiggestGroupie]

No - extra time in real exams and possibly in a mock but not really do-able in normal lessons ime.

[Indyteach]

This can be tricky to manage. With younger pupils, they take longer tests in the SEN teacher's room under their supervision. With shorter tests or older pupils, say year 11 upwards depending on maturity, we may let them take the test away to finish in the library at Break, or set aside time at the end of the day when they can come back. Even with 25% extra time, it's rare that this involves more than 5 or 10 minutes. If its a case of doing a question, then going over it straight away, this is trickier. I might go through the question as far as the pupil has reached, then ask the pupil to finish it whilst I go over the rest of the answers with the rest of the class (again the library can be useful here). I'll then meet the pupil later to go over the bit of the question they hadn't already had feedback on. I hope that makes sense. It's difficult to manage, but my feeling is that pupils should take all tests in the same conditions as they take their final exam, or as close to it as possible.

I sometimes find that extra time candidates don't want/use their extra time all the time and your son might find that he needs it more in longer exams than shorter tests/questions, depending on the subject and the nature of his requirements.

[TheFallenMadonna]

I always provide the appropriate exam arrangements (scribe, extra time, reader etc) for tests in class. But mostly I use practice exam questions as a way of improving exam technique, and my main focus is actually the discussion around the answer (how have they approached the question, why they included what they did, how they can improve) rather than recording the actual marks achieved. So no, I wouldn't usually give extra time. Particularly as we are generally talking less than 10 minutes for actually writing the answer in the first instance.

[IDK]

Interesting answers.
I am having trouble getting DS to swallow his pride and acknowledge that he is less than perfection personified he has a LD, so not having it recognised by the teachers either isn't helping.
In the past he has had problems with reading the question properly, with processing the information. I want him to get used to the idea of taking his time before he even lifts his pen.

[creamteas]

Two of my DC are entitled to a scribe and 25% extra time. If it is a practice question, then usually there is no extra time, but then they tend to go over it in class anyway.

If it is a class test that needs to be fitted into the lesson, then they don't get extra time, but they are usually marked on the % of paper they managed to complete rather than the whole thing. If a paper gets harder as you go through, they have been asked to work backwards before!

For more formal internal exams, they get the scribe and extra time as well.

[TheFallenMadonna]

I teach a lot of students with special exam arrangments, for all sorts of reasons. Depending on the problem, there are lots of things you can do. I would encourage someone who had problems processing the question to pick up their pen, and underline the key command words in the question, identify information given in the question, check their understanding before they attempt an answer. There are other ways, in a short practice question exercise, to support someone with a specific learning difficulty, apart from just extra time. It's not necessarily the teacher not acknowledging the problem.

[gillviola]

This can be difficult to organise if it is one question which is being fitted into a lesson. If you have a TA then this is fine as you can arrange that your extra time pupils can complete the question in another room. However, if this is not the case then what do you do with the rest of the class whilst the 1 or 2 pupils have their extra time. This can also be counter productive, as most pupils who have extra time do not like attention drawn to this. For a more formal exam, such as a mock exam, we make sure that our extra time pupils are together in a different room - so they are not disrupted when the majority of pupils leave the exam room.