If you teach, was your SEN training good enough?

[Whatafustercluck]

Inspired by a post from Bridget Phillipson about Labour investing in almost 3,000 more teachers. Many on that Facebook post highlighting SEN training as inadequate, so I'm curious about views from teachers.

My own experience (as a parent, not a teacher) has been very mixed. A senco who based her understanding of neurodivergence only on the traditional, mostly male presentation of autism and who therefore believed my then 6yo dd was 'fine at school'. A brilliant Y2 teacher (who had a partner with ADHD) who took the time to understand every child and knew how to get the best out of each of them - ND or not. A brilliant Y3 teacher, who has herself got one adult child with ADHD and a younger daughter with autism who just 'gets it'. A secondary school, in which some teachers excel in understanding ADHD and applying appropriate support and management strategies, and some that still appear to question whether it's even real, let alone try to understand/ support (despite a formal diagnosis).

EHCP applications have increased and that this is unsustainable. But my theory is that if SEN training for teachers was prioritised and was comprehensive enough, this may help stem the flow of EHCP applications from parents who currently feel unheard and unsupported. Many SEN children could thrive in mainstream, with very minor adjustments that inconvenience nobody, and attendance would also improve as a result.

I'm not a teacher, but I really value education and appreciate the two or three really excellent teachers who have supported my children to do well in mainstream schools. But it strikes me that those teachers, without exception, have personal lived experience of neurodivergence that only those dealing with it every day, as a parent or family member, really understand. The only thing I can think of that may improve this situation is improved SEN training for all teachers, yet I've heard from several teachers that they've had perhaps one day which has focused solely on autism.

I watched the Jamie Oliver doc on ch4 earlier this week, where he is petitioning MP's that teachers need more training on dyslexia specifically. Looking at my dd's experience, understanding is wildly varied even with dyslexia.

I have some experience of SEN with my kids.

I think training is an issue, but also that some kids with complex needs are still in mainstream (mine had to go to mainstream first and is now in a specialist placement) and there are a lack of specialist places. No amount of training is going to give you the right staff to child ratio to cope with a high level of need. Also there is the problem that children with SEN who are academically able tend to have their needs minimised because there just isn't enough support in place, possibly because of the lack of specialist places or SEN classes attached to mainstream.

Training is essential, but that is not enough to solve the issues in the SEN education system.

I think training is an issue too.

There still abounds stereoptypes IME.

In our experience, our DS was diagnosed with autism and his teacher announced brightly to us and the ed psych who was assessing him at the school 'Oh, there is something about autistic boys in the news today'. It was about a teen who had murdered another child and who apparently had autism. She then also whittered something along the lines of about how DS1 did not have any friends but it didn't matter because autistic children did not want friends.

I suspect that was not her finest teaching day tbh.

Oh, and when I told a different teacher that he could not swim (he has dyspraxia) she piped up with 'I think that's a parenting issue actually'.

Nope. He also at 15 can't tie his shoelaces, ride a bike or hold a pen.

Granted, anecdata. However.... does not inspire a sense of faith.

It never can be. The first two posts have mentioned ADHD, autism and dyslexia. If you make a list of all the conditions for which you feel teachers should receive specific training (then add on everyone else's lists), you will realise that there just isn't time for it. Especially when those kids are only going to make up say 20% of the class. It really is a case of suck it and see when you are presented with your new class in September.

For over half my teaching career, I specialised in SEND. I had post graduate qualifications in a range of ND areas, was an advisory teacher and a SENCO at different times.

It was apparent then, that teacher training for SEND was inadequate. As an advisory teacher, it could be difficult to encourage class teachers to use the strategies we recommended. As a SENCo, ensuring that colleagues had all the information they required on a range of need, was difficult.

The trouble is, teacher training is so pressured that it’s hard to fit everything in. Take into account that, in any classroom, you will find a range of ability as well as a number of different conditions requiring input of varying types and perhaps you can see how challenging it can be.

Yes, there should be more training. But training of what? And when? And for how many different needs.

I agree that all the training in the world will not resolve the crisis in SEND. I think most people recognise that proper funding, appropriate settings for a range of needs, collaborative work with specialists and proper admin are vital. But the system doesn’t work as it is.

In 2002 we had one lecture on SEND and SPELD We then paired up and each researched one particular aspect - adhd, dyslexia etc - which we presented to the whole group in another session. And we had copies of notes from everyone. But that was it.

I had and have plenty of SEND training. Most of it filled with generic strategies, and then "not all children with X are the same, get to know them" which I would do anyway.

There's very little in SEND training that's actually useful in practise imo unless you are a total dinosaur with no awareness. At secondary a lot of the strategies are things that teens don't want to engage with.

I've had plenty of SEN training, I have a child with SEN, but from a secondary teacher's point of view, it's exhausting.

5 classes a day, that's 150 kids I see. Plus my tutor group. Then 15 classes in total so 450 different kids.

The lessons are only an hour long. I have 13 pupils with some sort of SEN in one class. I'm only human and cannot remember every little trait and need of every child, let alone meet every need every lesson.

Therefore from my point of view, the best thing to do is teaching a child to be self sufficient to the best of their ability where possible.

Given that the news is pretty much that aside from defence and the NHS, other government departments will need to cut budgets, I think it's a fantasy to expect more funding to materialise. And in any case, I don't think funding can keep pace. So I think they need to look at a root and branch overhaul of the whole system to ensure existing funds are better spent. If LAs were spending less money on EHCPs for children who could function well if properly supported, that money could be redirected into specialist settings for those who really cannot function in mainstream, additional training etc.

In terms of training, I accept the position that there are many types of neurodivergence. All have executive skills weaknesses in common though - so it's not beyond the realms of possibility for training to be focused on acknowledging those weaknesses and helping children develop those skills by utilising strategies that actually support the development of all children anyway. I.e. the range of abilities and neurodivergence you refer to.

I do think that there are many children currently in mainstream who simply should not be there. But equally, many others could do well in mainstream settings with a mindset change from government, local authorities and teaching associations with regards to curriculum and policies.

I can understand your perspective. In your experience, do SEN children fare better if their SEN is supported earlier and they receive better support at infant/ juniors to enable them to develop that self sufficiency? Obviously, parental engagement is the other piece of the puzzle here.

It's things like this that I want the government to consider - earlier identification of needs and more targeted investment in early years, leading to better outcomes at secondary stage. As parents, we have fought for early intervention (despite nobody else recognising issues in the early days) based on knowing that if our dc are not well supported across main settings with their additional needs, they are at higher risk of mental health problems, addiction, eating disorders and suicide etc later in life. Early intervention seems so crucial, but it's failing so many at the moment.

Early intervention needs to be done by the right person, after identifying the right need. A lot of the time, the need isn't identified properly, and the intervention is done by someone who is far from an expert.

Part of the problem is big class sizes. I simply have too many balls up in the air all the time for too many different reasons. And then lessons are back to back. Plus form tutor role, and duties and detention and clubs .....
There's only so much my brain can cope with never mind the time.

I’m a former teacher with postgraduate degrees in dyslexia and autism. My initial teacher training in the 1990s only included dyslexia, but I attended at least a hundred days of CPD about SEND. Initial teacher trainees now learn more about SEND as part of their training.

SEN training will make no difference if schools aren’t given the resources to be able to implement what they are taught, and that will be the biggest problem.

Training is only a small part of the issue. We didn’t spend much time on SEND when I did my teacher training, but that’s because there wasn’t enough time to fit everything in… but even if the training had been better, teachers lack time and resources.

The reduction in specialist provision places mean that there are many children who will not thrive in mainstream education. This is not because teachers are poorly trained (common reasons include the size and noise of many mainstream settings).

i’ve taught in secondary and FE and now work in HE. The expectations that educators at all levels are expected to meet are immense. Digital accessibility is a key facet of my work. I try to ensure that content created at my institution is as accessible as possible… but that involves checking that all videos have accurate captions (AI is good, but the auto captions aren’t perfect); checking that language is clear and inclusive; checking colour contrasts (for learners with visual differences); checking that all images have alternative text; making sure that link text is meaningful (please don’t use ‘click here’); checking the reading order when people use PowerPoint; and lots more. Very few people have the level of training to know how to do this (and they don’t necessarily know their work is inaccessible). How many people receive formal training in using Word. Many people use bold and underline for titles, instead of using heading styles, thereby making their document unable to be navigated by anyone using a screen reader. I could go on. How long would teacher training need to be cover all of this (which is purely in relation to resources) on top of everything else?!

Rant over ☺️

How can it be? Every child is unique.

However about 15 years ago schools had more TAs in every room and along came the tories and cut that. More TAs and SEN funding in every school will help.

After 20 plus years as a teacher, I am trained to the eyeballs and have excellent understanding of it all and all the strategies to use.

Unfortunately, I am unable to use them with all of the kids in.a class because there is only.one of me. That's the issue. It's nigh on impossible. Take my year 8 class today. I have to photocopy 4 different colours of the worksheets and this needs to be done in advance because teachers can't access the coloured paper,only reprographics canand it has to come off the SEND budget not my department. This means I need to organise this at least 48 hours in advance to get it done and this is the same for every class I have. This would be ok if we were not also meant to teach responsively- so I might not need that worksheet but another, based on the lesson the day before and so on.

Then there's the different strategies. In some classes, I have kids with passes to go out, to have toys, to have the right to walk around, so on. All good but I also then have 2 or 3 kids wandering, sometimes bouncing balls, and the rest are meant to be getting on. It doesn't work, with the best will in the world. Smaller classes would help.

This week we are assessing. I've organised the voloured papers but i am also meant to read to 3 of them and scribe for another. The other 26 are just meant to ignore me reading and writing. And while I'm doing that I can't invigilate or answer questions. I've been told i might get a T a but its not guaranteed because of gcse exams and year 10 mocks.

I do what I can- all my work is in opendyslexic fonts, i put visual prompts alongside instruction and I have calming strategies in a box when needed. I have a son on the spectrum myself. But schools can't cope- it negatively impacts all students including them. I take the specialist SEND groups and have taught in an SEMH setting, so I know my stuff. It's the stress in the system. A child on the spectrum who requires quiet and order and lights low will be in a class with Adhd students who are loud, moving and disruptive. A SEMH kid will flip and a child with anxiety will be scared. And so on.

We need more settings,more provision, more space, more teachers, more money,not more bloody training because that's just a tick box chucked back at the teachers that doesn't solve the problem. Let's have small focused spectrum classes suited to spectrum, moving classes and short burst learning for adhd and outside learning. Therapeutic learning for SEMH. Low ability focused groups for developmental delay. Pay for that and I promise you dyslexia, dyspraxia and dyscalculia are easily dealt with within class.

You can give all the training you want, but there are some combinations of special educational needs and externally assessed courses that are not compatible. For example, it doesn’t matter how much I adapted for a girl with Downs who was in my GCSE class a few years ago, she wasn’t going to be able to take the exams. She had an intellectual ago of 6. She liked colours and writing lists. Another example is that some forms of ADHD are very disruptive. If you have more than one such person in the same class, it impairs learning opportunities for the other 30 children. We will cover the curriculum, but not necessarily in the way I think inspires most children or helps them develop other skills such as debating. There’s no escaping that. And, quite frankly, when there are conflicting needs that can’t be dealt with simultaneously, it’s not always my duty to prioritise the SEN need over the needs of the whole class. Over a series of lessons I am to meet all needs, but it can’t always be done in any given moment.

The evidence on coloured paper is scant at best. It should not impede teaching this way. It’s one thing to have a preference, another to demand it. Do they not have colour overlays to carry around? This should be the child’s responsibility by Y8.

Whilst ADHD and AUD SEn training could be better the absolute pits is the total ignorance of dyspraxia - had a teacher call it "clumsy child syndrome" and had no idea that it affected anything beyond co ordination despite the extensive work that has been done in the last 20 years to show that it is pretty all pervasive.

Totally agree.

We seem to forget that children need to be given tools to be successful, not have adults do everything for them.

The SEN code of practise doesn't help putting the responsibility on the classroom teachers. Children need to learn strategies to manage their own conditions as best they can. Eg use of loop ear buds, or carrying an overlay.

Yes, it would be lovely to have coloured overlays to give to the kids. I have my own set of small ones from my time as a SEND/SEMH teacher but the SEND department doesn't have the cash to buy them for that many kids. I heartily agree it should be their responsibility. But it isn't- no cash. And while some parents may pay up for an overlay, others won't.

@phlebasconsidered oh absolutely! No money, no interest from parents, and when there's a work round, it's more teacher pressure.

Early intervention is essential, but it needs to be teaching a child how they CAN learn, what they find difficult, and ways they can tackle these difficulties. They need to learn resilience and positive mindset by focusing on solutions rather than dwelling on problems.

Some primary schools DO teach this, and I have a class of A Level students (Physics), several with SEN (dyslexia, SPLD, MLD) but their resilience is brilliant. They don't see their SEN as a barrier and are very good at seeking the help they need.

Others, however, seem to see their SEN as an excuse for not being able to do things, then don't even try.

The coloured paper brigade - I had one pupil who used to whinge if her worksheet wasn't on green and refuse to do any work. I try to make sure I have all the correct colours, but I don't always have time, or I run out. After 9 months, I've managed to adapt her mindset, and instead of whinging, she now uses phrases like "I'll go and photocopy it on green", or I'll go to SEN and get some more green paper", or "Is there a green filter I can use?".

My youngest is autistic. I am working really hard to make him look for solutions not moan about problems. Rather than "My tablet has no battery", he needs to say "Where can I charge my tablet". And if he can't do something, to ask HOW he can do it. His communication isn't good when he is agitated so it's work in progress!