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 have had plenty of SEN training and experience. In practice lots of the advice is extremely difficult to implement when you have limited TAs, very little time to plan and therefore adapt learning, limited resources, and a lot more children needing support/demanding more and more of your time.

My teacher training was woeful just on teaching, let alone SEND.

When I had ‘qualified’ I had an observed lesson on differentiation and had no clue what that even meant!

Every other week I had to work with a small class of 15 where they put all the children with SEN - from super bright quiet ones with dyslexia to DC who were developmentally years behind their peers and others who were disregulated and would run off. It was scary to think those dyslexic children were losing out on their potential so I aimed the teaching level at them and let the TA deal with the others (sorry if that offends anyone but it was just pure survival every day).

Needless to say I did not stay in teaching but I dread to think how people manage it now. I’m surprised whenever I hear anyone say they enjoy teaching. Everyone I know working in the classroom is miserable. It must be even worse for the poor kids.

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.

The more I read this, the more cross I get.

SEND training isn't the issue. The problem with 'very minor adjustments that inconvenience nobody' is that they don't exist. Take a fidget toy; for one child it aids their focus, for the child next to them it becomes a distraction. A leave early pass for one child per class sees 40 children on the corridor early every lesson changeover.

Came here to say something very similar. When a secondary teacher teaches upwards over 300 children over the course of a week, there is only so much they can plan for, to support the students with SEN. With all the genuine best will in the world (and I'm a mum with SEN DC).

Another perspective is, a lot of support in school IF your child is lucky enough to get it is great. But once they leave the school environment, that support will be minimal at best. An ex student of mine, who was supported well and as a result did OK in GCSEs is now struggling to pass his apprenticeship exams. Minimal additional support with this.

Any training that you get is general though. Like 'autistic children don't understand sarcasm' and then some autistic children can be wildly sarcastic. Or 'don't say things like pull your socks up, they won't understand' and yet some autistic children are perfectly capable of understanding. Kids with ADHD can present hugely differently (even the same kid depending on whether they've taken their medication or not).

So you can tick the training box and still not know about the kid that's actually in front of you.

I don't think it ever can be because SEN can be so variable.

My son has an EHCP and is in mainstream with 2:1 support and I'm very happy with the adjustments they've made and the care he receives. No complaints here.

Like @stargirl1701 I think we become truly effective practitioners when our lived experience overlaps with our professional expectations. I diligently sought independent CPD following a scant SEN syllabus as part of my 4-year teacher training and applied strategies in my classroom practice over the years. Sure, experience, curiosity and good will counts for a lot, but when I had an anxious and autistic child of my own with additional diagnoses, I was blown away by how much I'd 'missed', not only in terms of working effectively with neurodiverse pupils in particular, but also in terms of how I related to their parents and how my expectations of what the education system ought to be providing for all learners in terms of best possible outcomes.

Now, I really feel like I, their teacher, am the primary and most significant adjustment that a pupil needs to be their constant, every-day adaptation in my mainstream classroom: the way I perceive them, centre their needs, relate to them from a place of understanding and facilitate access to the curriculum and the social context of school life, advocating where necessary and modelling for and upskilling my team, is so important.

Teachers in both primary and secondary schools are SO stretched. Reading threads on the teaching and SEN boards is heartbreaking; really great colleagues feeling pushed beyond their limits of what they can reasonably be expected to achieve. We talk about inclusion being the key to bringing the SEND crisis under control -we need to resource schools appropriately with a huge emphasis on early intervention and generate a sense of a broader measure of success and best outcomes 'under the same roof' as opposed to the very narrow gauge through which we currently assess children's expected progress, and which leaves really quite young learners shredded by an unforgiving education system in which they can never measure up on their own terms.

Such a big thank you to all teachers, SENDCos, TAs, head teachers and parents who work tirelessly to advocate for children with additional needs to access learning in mainstream education.

Even less awareness on others like dyspraxia and dysgraphia.

They do exist, and I've heard plenty of examples of teaching staff thinking outside of the box. The schools that are really good at managing SEN alongside NT children are invariably the ones that approach SEN in more innovative ways - including behaviour management techniques, zones of regulation, uniform policy, sports days, non uniform days (the things that are often triggers for school avoidance among ND children).

The system for my younger high functioning Asperger’s ( high functioning) son, 34,:failed him then, I was appalled then.
Statementing as it was then, luckily he’s ok now, job, lives alone, and estranged from me and his brother, his choice

I would say it's not so much about lack of teacher training, it's not enough resource or staff.

Yes, I know that child X needs precision phonics teaching. But we have no one to teach that intervention. I know that Child Y needs social stories daily, but even if I had time to write them, when can I read them to the child? No one will cover me, and no one else is available. I know that Child Y also needs play support, but again... we have no one to deliver it.

I have found that most teachers I've worked with have a good working knowledge of types of SEN. But knowing a child is dyslexic doesn't buy a talking pen, or a trained TA for precision teaching. It also doesn't make it a priority for the head.

More training is always welcome... but without any additional support and resources, it's just talk.

On this thread alone there have been at least 7 different SEND diagnosed needs. How is it possible for teachers to become experts in them all, and do their day job?

None of those things support a dyslexic child in a classroom.

Give some concrete examples of what you mean. What sort of behaviour management techniques?

It shows how little you know that you've included sports day and non uniform days as an example of SEND support.

We can't. You've got it in one.

Most of your list comes from the top.
If the SLT support it then fine but they also have to put up a united front with the teachers.
And I don't mean just supporting teachers I mean support the teachers fully in implementing the adjustments.
I have had so many training sessions were the implementations were small, for example don't chase the pupils for taking coats off on entry to the lesson, get them involved then get them to take off their coats. Only to have SLT come in and completely overrule the training from the day before.

SLT has to represent joined up thinking.

I agree the problem with education is bigger than just SEN, but something has gradually happened over the last 20 years (maybe longer, but I’ve had dc in the system for 20 years so that’s what I’ve observed) that has meant that thousands of children are too traumatised to attend school regularly enough, many have completely disengaged from it whilst still attending, happiness levels have plummeted, mental health crisis has taken hold (and this had started before children routinely had smart phones, although I’m sure they’re part of the problem now). We now have rising rates of SN.

Blaming parents is the current go-to knee jerk reaction, but that’s not solving anything. As far as I’ve seen the reaction from schools to this is doubling down on strategies that no longer work, tightening up rules to the point where in many schools draconian policies are the norm in a way that would not be imposed on adults in any way. What’s changed? Why could children in school have access to the toilets freely (with permission) but now they can’t? What’s happened? In the last 20 years I’ve seen a lot of changes in schools, in the way they teach, the rules, the increasing lack of respect towards pupils and parents, the increase in lying and gaslighting to parents of SN children (so much so that our local child autism assessment centre no longer involves schools in the assessments as their input was often dishonest and obstructive).

I don’t know what the problem is, but it’s bigger than SN training, even though that is shit, and it’s bigger than just being crappy children and their parents, as we’re constantly told right now. I’m certainly there is an element of the change in schools being responsible for the lack of thriving in lots of children. They are the canaries in the coal mine. Maybe Starmer will make decisions that push SN children out of schools, and I’m sure that will bring temporary relief to teachers and parents everywhere (I mean, unless you are the parents of the SN children…), but the rot is in there somehow, and it’s not going to stop at special needs.

We could take on a different approach, but we’re so stuck in what we do and following the guidelines that we won’t. Thank god my dc are approaching an age where they’ll be out of it, but it’s heartbreaking for the thousands stuck in it with few options and increasing hatred towards them. An interesting few years ahead I think. I predict more and more school woes, more authoritarian rules, more parents being fined, more unhappy teachers, and prisons even more full of unsupported undiagnosed SN young men.

Especially when sports days and non uniform days can be a major trigger for some pupils with SEND.

Uniform policy is important - cotton polo shirts and simple elasticated trousers are great for autistic children, dyspraxic (as was) children, children with ADHD - NOT ties and button-ups and stiff Teflon blazers. All heads know this. Plenty don't care.

You can train me all you like on sensory overload from uniform. I don't set the policy.

You can't just blame teachers or "schools" either respect is a two way street.

But one of the major changes is just how much slack teachers and schools are expected to pick up today.

And yet there are also loads of kids with autism who are fine wearing blazers and ties. There are also loads of ND kids who are fine with non-uniform days.

General sweeping statements about 'autistic children' or 'ND children' are really unhelpful.

There's a lot of 'that training on SEN was shit because it doesn't apply or didn't help' when actually there's never going to be a good training on SEN that applies to all kids with that SEN.

This thread has slipped from OPs original question.
Yes I did teacher training
No I did not get trained in neurodivergence.

I understood many things better after being trained in ADHD and ASD as a foster carer.

Threads develop and shift but this one is still very much about SEND.

And the big questions remain

What is good enough training?
And how can it be good enough if it is unusable in the classroom?

But some children will benefit from a uniform change. Some uniform is more inclusive, some less.

No one benefits from the blazer and tie. (More expensive, too.)

It's about making changes where you can.

Only some children benefit from the visual timetable and the colourful semantics stickers that I use to show sentence structure. But no one is harmed. It's a simple, low-cost change that is transformative for some and makes no odds to others.

One of the best SEND sessions we ever did was have big pieces of paper with names of children with SEND and circulate writing strategies we had tried that worked, and those we tried that hadn't worked with a particular child. By the end, you left with specific individualised and usable strategies for the specific child.

I did my PGCE in 2007 and we had two after sessions on SEN. It was a steep learning curve looking out for SEN on the job while I taught. I ended up learning more about SEN through studying it through other PG courses.