A survey of Teacher Predjudice?

[StarlightMcKenzee]

My new blog: :-)

starlightmckenzie.wordpress.com/2017/02/24/a-survey-of-teacher-prejudice/

That is a great blog.

I am a primary school teacher and I have a son with SEN. I wish I could have attended that conference.

Thank you HumphreyCobbler, I appreciate it.

Ed Timpson was there talking about meeting the needs of all children, not just those of agitators. I wonder whether there is some media message being crafted to drive further rifts between parents and teachers and get them blaming each other for the failure of the reforms!?

It is interesting. I am currently doing an MA in SpLD. The suspicion with which some teachers greet a privately acquired dyslexia diagnosis is unbelievable.

Yes, it IS that likely that three kids in your class have dyslexia..

I am in Wales so it is a bit different to England, the reforms are not the same and are further back. They were waiting to see what happened in England.

I remember now that we both spoke on a thread worrying about our dc's language delay, years ago. I have followed your posts with interest through the years, so thank you. (It is a different child that turned out to have sen).

Did you use the same name? I recognise it but phew, - there's been a lot. :-)

A different child? I'm assuming dyslexia/SpLD?

Did you click on the DriverYouthTrust link? Great resources for schools and parents there.

BTW I'm doing an MEd in Inclusive Practice!!!! :-)

bump?

Hello, - nearly the same name! My third child has massive speech delay and is under investigation for asd, complicated by the fact he had glue ear. So not dyslexia, but I did realise how far behind he was in a lecture detailing normal communication development in infants. It was quite handy having lots of speech therapists around at that point.

The intersection between teacher, parents and children is fascinating. It has been an utter revelation for me to be on the other side, although I think I was much more clued in than most thanks to following the SEN boards on here.

I will click on that link, thank you. Is it ok to share your blog with my colleagues on the course?

Of course it is. I'm super flattered you might want to.

It is very pertinent to our training as specialist teachers.

Individual approach is key. But we are working one to one mostly!

I'd like to see many more practitioners actually ask the parents what they know or what training they have had........

I think it is hard being a teacher and then having to be a service user. But equally it is hard having spent 8 sessions 1:1 with a SALT, having attended NAS Earlybird courses to hand over your reception child to a NQT teacher who may have once done a 2 hour twilight on all SENs with an expectation that you treat them as the expert now.

One of the issues I see is where teachers tell parents 'you know your child best' and 'working together is key' but what they mean is 'you know what their preferences are'.

What a parent hears is 'I acknowledge that you have been on several training courses about your child's condition, have learned skills to teach them the skills that other children just learn and so have an insight into pedagogy and we will make sure that we learn as much as we can from you to safeguard your child's mental health and progress.'

The consequence of this contrast is frustration and a terrible relationship.

I couldn't agree more with both your posts.

I actually think it is being a teacher and THEN being a service user that has showed me the absolute truth of both your posts. I hope to god I wasn't as intransigent as some of the teachers I have read about on here. But I learned early on (after making a fool of myself in my confident assessment of a child's abilities) to actually LISTEN to parents. Because they actually do know their own child in a way I cannot, as a teacher who only spends a few hours a day with them.

At the first language course I went on I definitely knew more than the teacher of the course, who told me to turn off my phone and concentrate on my child for ten minutes a day. It was annoying for many reasons but the worst was the fact that this was the best they had to offer me.

In fact I am doing this course because I was inspired by a parent (not a teacher) who had done this course and had a child with specialist needs. She knew so much more than I did that she helped me design a useful IEP (it was a while ago now) before her child got moved to a more appropriate setting.