SEND - children’s needs to be reassessed from year 6 2029?

[missbish]

Are they taking the piss? After the struggles parents have trying to secure support for their child, they’re then going to threaten to take it away once they’re due to go to secondary? Ds goes to secondary this year so I don’t think it will effect him but I am so angry for those it does effect.

Same here. But that’s also why and how we got the LA to pay for a specialist independent school without needing to go to a Tribunal.

Lots of non-sen children leave primary school unable to swim despite it being on the national curriculum. Most schools cannot afford to fund enough lessons for children to be taught to swim competently so what is provided is 'good enough' and most parents top up by paying for additional private lessons outside school. Some children's parents don't top up and they don't ever become good swimmers.

I agree with all that PLUS:

• kids and teens are on a global stage now - there’s no outgrowing your hometown and leaving it behind, your embarrassing teen haircut is immortalised. As a result they feel pressured and scared to fail. Learning comes from failing and trying again
• women / mothers working out of the home
• huge rise in blended families and unclear expectations across multiple settings
• parents don’t back or respect authority figures like teachers so why would kids
• lack of exercise

The amount of swimming lessons offered in the majority of schools wouldn’t teach any kid to swim. The ones who learn are the ones who go swimming with their family regularly outside of school.

Regardless of your views, absolutely no one is going to be happy when these kids with SEMH are back in mainstream classes, or very slightly smaller hubs.

In the SEMH schools I worked in kids gave each other black eyes, badly injured teachers, shouted the n word out in class, threw water at each other, made sex noises extremely loudly and for very long time while teacher is trying to teach. Some take their clothes off. It almost doesn't matter what caused these presentations, it's not safe to manage it in mainstream or SRP classrooms.

"Thankfully, laws can be changed. Which is what is going to happen, because it's been deemed the laws allowing this sort of thing are no longer appropriate."

It doesn't say that in the White Paper.

@Playingvideogames
ah I see.
Well my daughter has Arthrogryposis. But she is nonverbal which doesn’t fit with anything recorded about Arthrogryposis other than the early fatal cases. So, bit of a mystery there.

Now she goes to a specialist school- the reason being she has an unsafe swallow and because she can’t stand or walk so needs to be hoisted, is doubly incontinent, is PEG fed and needs to be suctioned rarely.

The school she attends is a very large school- probably the largest of the 3 special schools that can take physically disabled children in the county I live in.

I see the children who go there - and their parents.
Many of the children there have the syndromes and conditions I mentioned.
Many of the other children are autistic of the nonverbal and more extreme behaviour (trying to escape for instance).
I see virtually nothing on your list that could “cause” the children to be as they are.

I also work in a private school. Several children there are diagnosed with autism or ADHD. It’s evident which children are not NT. Those children are fortunate to have parents who can afford private education and don’t need EHCPs and they are all verbal and physically able bodied. It just takes a slight tweak in one of those key areas before no amount of money would make their private school unfeasible.

But I can assure you there’s the same “behaviour” issues that you attribute to lack of parenting with some (and by no means the majority) of those children despite young parents and strict school (if not home) structure. Because… that’s what autism and/or ADHD can and often does result in.

It’s extremely reductive and insulting to criticise parents with children with autism across the board.

As I said my daughter is nonverbal- possibly she has autism. A lot of her behaviour would suggest as much.

I can promise you I’d have parented her firmly … but there was and is nothing that can parent nonverbal frustration from her. i always say i I can’t parent away her anxiety about medical appointments because I don’t know what she understands. I can’t parent an interest into her in more than 1 toy (over 5 years) or of new books or even tv. She will watch the same few things endlessly or just ignore anything new. She pushes away new toys. Hates presents. Won’t do arts and crafts. She loves being outside and can’t understand how pissibg down rain isn’t great for a walk or that there aren’t places I can change her pads (as she’s doubly incontinent). Do you see what I’m getting at?

Sure, you watched a show about one girl and you probably know other parents etc. Have you ever actually been in a special school? You’d be 5 minutes in one before you would understand that when people try to articulate a need (rather than describing everything a child does or doesn’t do) as many on this thread are TRYING to do ( the former) that it’s not lazy old parents who can’t be fucked to say no that results in at least 99 percent of children being described as disabled and therefore needing extra provision to be educated.

In many cases it also isn't even about learning to swim, it's part of their physio.

My son's hydrotherapy is about getting him stronger, not teaching him how to swim.

Will these reforms actually save money in the long term?

It looks like there is more pressure on schools, as any child with SEN needs will qualify for an education support plan?

Are you suggesting taking away disabled children's rights to a full time education?

Autism is usually genetic. I doubt any of that is the reason for the rise in cases.

I don’t deny there’s a genetic component to it but am pointing out that environmental factors make a huge difference to its impact and the individual’s ability to function in society.

@PlayingvideogamesCan I ask what your job is, out of curiosity? Of course you don’t have to say if you don’t want to though

As well as the "lots of children weren't even IN school" that I posted above I'm also fairly sure that the modern world has done a number on a lot of children with specific learning disabilities. ASD - you can't get as many jobs that are outdoors and don't involve too many people. ADHD - very active jobs are less common, manual labour is less common. Dyslexia - if you are a plumber now you can't just be a plumber. You also have to be a social media expert, book keeper, letter writer, and invoice creater.

"I don’t deny there’s a genetic component to it but am pointing out that environmental factors make a huge difference to its impact and the individual’s ability to function in society."

So you are saying my son is severely autistic because of his upbringing?

On the genetic front, maybe they will eventually figure out how to spot ASD reliably genetically and in the next 20-30 years they will be sequencing most babies genes. There will eventually be progress.

Absolutely all of this

Wasn't me saying this but how your son is educated will help him (or not) function in society.
Oh look! We need better education for children with SEN, not worse! Who'd have thought it!

That's a stretch. You have no idea what any new legislation may say and since eotas is only available to those whose needs can't be met in any school, including specialist provisions, the criteria to access eotas is pretty unlikely to change.

Sorry if someone has already mentioned it but it has been made harder to train as an EP in recent years too. There used to be a conversion course that experienced teachers could do but no such thing exists any more!

I hope that changes. As a teacher with lots of SEND knowledge and over two decades experience, I'd love to train as an EP.

Massively ...the correct resources would massively help and save money across a lifetime

Plus taking private profit making providers out of the system

I haven’t read the posters posts so there may be more than the part you quoted but I agree societal changes/expectations have impacted on nd people . In some ways for the better for example online communities can be a positive for people who struggle with face to face communication. But in some ways it’s harder, the pressure of confirmation in school, needing qualifications/ further education even for jobs that in the past wouldn’t have required it.
Theres children who in the past would have not really have engaged in school but been able to learn a trade /work outdoors and found a way to live /provide for themselves that now have barriers to doing so.

Where does it say they're curtailing specialist schools and support for those with semh? In fact it can't say that as they're recategorising the areas of send need.

Haven’t tradespeople always communicated and done their own invoices?

Yes everything is a lot more competitive

in the past were there more funded schemes opportunities perhaps