Early help for a child with special needs

[elliejjtiny]

Ds4 is 10 with multiple special needs including moderate learning disability and hearing loss. He is in mainstream school with an ehcp. I also have 4 other dc who also have various special needs.

We've been trying to get a teacher of the deaf for ds for years but have always been told he doesn't qualify. Ehcp review a couple of weeks ago and new senco asked if we had thought about getting ds a teacher of the deaf. I said we've been told he doesn't qualify but she thinks he does so I agree to her filling in the forms and asking for a referral.

So today I get a copy of the referral form that the senco has sent off and it's an early help form. To be fair she hasn't ticked any of the safeguarding boxes and just talks about ds learning and hearing on the form. I'm worried now that we are going to end up with an early help assessment and a load of pointless meetings. We have to be quite careful about what things like that we sign up for as with five dc with special needs we could end up with appointments and meetings 3 or 4 times a week if we're not careful.

Sorry, internet has been really dodgy so when I realised the post had got long I just pressed post quick before I lost it all. A couple of years ago I was just agreeing to any support that was offered because ds2 had attempted suicide and I was desperate. I ended up on a course that was explaining what autism was and suggesting things like weighted blankets. For me who had 13 years experience of parenting a child with autism it was a complete waste of time, although the other parents seemed to find it helpful and I'm sure I would have if I'd been on that course 13 years earlier. The lady doing the course then suggested early help for those parents who were still struggling and explained it would be one to one support sessions with her.

I really thought we were getting somewhere with ds and finally getting him help from a teacher of the deaf. Now i'm worried that I've accidentally signed up for some patronising advice instead or having every bit of my parenting scrutinised. Ds is quite complex and we have had several meetings when someone who is there for his education offer health advice about something they know nothing about. Being advised to cure his hydrocephalus by drinking less water was a particular highlight and telling us to try and reduce the number of operations he was having to improve his school attendance was another one.

Can anyone tell me if you can access a teacher of the deaf through an early help assessment or has the senco done the wrong referral?

When my daughter was in mainstream, she had input from a teacher of the deaf who went into school and advised on her hearing aid, the classroom set-up, a microphone for the teacher, etc.
It was the school SENCO who did the referral. Have you asked school if it can be done through them?

When dc needed referral for asd assessment it had to be requested on early help paperwork. It did mean a few meetings but I used it to our advantage (3 dc, two with disabilities) because if something is mentioned in the eha it has to be actioned by set dates. I also refused a few things like referral to young carers (because we'd been there, done that, it wasn't helpful).
It felt like a hoop we had to jump through to get an asd referral.

Often the early help form is just the universal cross service referral form. The aim is to reduce repetition between services. Practice is different obviously.

This totally depends which LA you are in. There isn’t an Early Help form at all in the LA I teach in. In the area I live in, the Early Help form gives you access to SaLT but nothing else. If I want to request a ToD, there’s an online form via the county hub. I think you’ll only get useful and accurate advice here if you’re specific about where you live.

Sorry, forgot location is important for these things. I live in Somerset. LA is something like Taunton and West Somerset I think, or that might be the health authority, I can never remember.

In both the LAs I’ve been a Senco in, all referrals were via an Early Help. The important thing is that you decide who will access the EH, so in your instance it will be whichever name the Teacher of the deaf service calls itself. Other services will not have access to the DH. It’s just a single point access service.

IME Early Help is the front door, so to speak, a hoop you have to jump through to get where you need to.

I am under early help for my Ds . Tbh different situation .. I don’t know what an earth our family support worker does . She suggests things then will tell me their aren’t run in a way that works for us … or doesn’t come because Ds is upset . That doesn’t mean it is everyone’s experience but mine

Thank you everyone that's reassuring to know that it's the normal way of doing things and that I can still choose to not use the services that I don't find helpful.