d/s has been allowed to use a laptop for longer writing tasks in Y10 (State secondary school with a good reputation) as his cursive handwriting is rubbish/illegible and his typing speed is fantastic. So far so good.
At KS3 (taken Summer 2012) He achieved an 8B in Maths,7A in Science (where he was placed 2nd in the year out of 210 pupils) and is in the top group for both subjects going into GCSE. (He prints rather than use cursive writing in these subjects, at least it's readable)
Also, a 7C each for both History and Geography. His English score at KS3 was 7C for reading/comprehension, 6B for writing, 6C for speaking and listening, overall a 6B was awarded.
We have found to our horror that now starting Year 10 he's been placed in an English class with the Special Educational Needs students, pupils who have a SEN assistant with them, many who barely scored a level 4 at KS3 going at a snails pace, kids with genuine learning difficulties. This class will never cover the curriculum in time.
We were never informed that he would be placed in this group, He's quite capable of getting a reasonable GCSE pass at Level C or above in English, he just can't write longer passages legibly. the school is completely mad!
Has anyone ever heard of this being done before? Do other schools do this?
We're having an angst ridden weekend before trying to tackle the Head of English on Monday.