To think that children with special needs should be included in mainstream schools where ever possible

[ReallyTired]

Before I get really stoned, I do work in a special school and I know and I know quite a few children with special needs. The school I work at is very good and the kids make fanastic progress.

I think its right that there are some special schools, for children who really cannot cope socially or academically with mainstream. Even then I think children at special schools/ special units should mix with mainstream children as much as possible.
However I think its a mistake to think that special schools are a pancera for everything wrong in state state education.

Children who attend special schools often spend quite a long time travelling to school. Their course choices at keystage 4 are often limited because a special school is very small. The very small number of children can make it hard to find a good friend. Especially for girls who are often out numbered by boys.

I think that for inclusion to work there has to be more than just extra funding. Secondary schools need to be smaller. Somehow schools need to achieve a more human scale, prehaps by splitting larger secondary schools into smaller units. Maybe we should have middle schools like Bedfordshire.

There are children like young carers or children in local authority care who get forgotten about. When you get to know an individual child you realise that they aren't a monster, in fact they are just like your child. Inclusion needs money and resources to work well.

i honestly don't see where one is better than the other, however, riven.

i truly don't.

FWIW, any local elections around here, i vote SNP.

There is a need for both special schools and integration into mainstream school.

The problem I have with Treloar is that the children have alot of specialist support at school within that community (great)but it isn't the community that they will live in when they finish if they are not going to uni. So really I think each area should have a range of options to cater for all children as best as they can.

At my comprehensive we had a special school attached and we often chatted over the fence to the children with special needs, one boy used to come into the sixth form common room on a regular basis, he was mobile and had severe learning disabilities. He could only say "what" over and over again. Eventually, either a teacher from the school would come and get him or we take him back.

I had to buy a portable oxygen machine for my dd as the nhs ones are the size and sound of a small fridge and are NOT portable unless you want a hernia. It cost £3,100 and I was told I should be grateful as it doesn't include VAT!!!

that's disgusting microwave.

Riven, I have worked for conservative councils and labour run councils and believe me the adaptations budgets for disabled people are in MUCH safer hands in a conservative run council!!!

i know plenty of folks who bought their own insulin pump for about that, MO, and then they have to buy their own replacements for it.

even though in the long run it saves the NHS a bomb, particularly when it comes to the nerve damage an insulin-dependent diabetic usually sustains from injecting for years and years and lost productivity to the government because the afflicted must tailor their work around their insulin storage/access.

2shoes on Thu 19-Jun-08 21:59:36
'that is what i don't like children "learning" because their dc has a child with sn in their school.
imo children with sn are not there to "teach" other people. their needs come first.'

Part of me agrees with you- but then it's the other children who are going to be the politicians/social workers/DLA officers when our children are grown up, the people they will need to have on their side if they are to get a decent deal in life.

As my dd told me the other day: 'I can't afford not to get on with other people. You can because you're not disabled, but I'm always going to depend on other people.' Something in that, I'm afraid. Disabled people do depend on their generation having an educated and enlightened attitude towards disabilities.

But of course, not every child should have to attend mainstream- there are children who plainly need something different. This is one area of education where we really do need that elusive concept Choice.

expat I was curious how much money sn parents have had to spend on their kids out of their own pocket..should I start a thread or can I hijack this one???

are insulin pumps those smart little boxes? I didn't realise they were not on the nhs, that technology has been around for ages!!!

MO- we've spent a fortune. Thousands. Some on 'extras' that perhaps it's debatable should be provided, but lots on basic basic services and attempts to get diagnosed. Standard stuff that should have been paid for.

oh, we've spent loads already on our SN child.

may even ahve to move a few villages down asap for her schooling.

my folks have offered to fly her to the US for a paed to see her there, my sister researches treatments and help we can get for her during school holidays in the US.

she has dyspraxia and the catch-all 'developmental coordination disorder' - basically, she's had gross and fine motor skills delays from the get go.

i would have thought they'd cover it in all PCTs, too, MO, because it's for type I/juvenile diabetes which appears in childhood.

i worked with two university students who'd paid and were still paying for theirs and they pointed out all the benefits of having the pump v. standard injections, particularly for a young person which would save the health service so much over the years.

for one, they had to go into hozzie because of their diabetes so much less - the pump was much better at regulating their sugar, vital especially in a young person to avoid long-term kidney, nerve/sight damage. not to mention opening up more avenues of work to them.

riven are nhs wheelchairs really naff? or do they have trendy ones for kids?

The problem they have locally with the wheelchairs is that when a child outgrows one they can be waiting months for another. Effectively isolating them.

Wheelchair provision varies locally but is a very cinderella service, even WhizzKids a charity has a waiting list.

My friend has an insulin pump on the NHS - as I understand it in my area they are limited to a suitable group of people - I got the impression that the limits were with regard to compliance/ability to deal with the equipment rather than rationing per se.

Because of DS speech delay I put him in private nursery for a year - cost at least £1K. Obviously I got some free time, so some benefit from this, but the primary motivation was that supposedly being at nursery would improve his speech. Did it bollocks.

in Scotland, it can also include the age-old postcode lottery.

I am so glad I live where I do. there doesn't seem to be ths big delay in equiment. dd has just had a new manual and a new powered chair(with caps seat) only took jan-may so not mega bad.
I love ctc's we have been told we owe nearly £2000. I have said and how the hell are we supposed to pay that. they suggested a loan(dh was out of work!!!) the fight goes on.
if they stop out tax credis. I will make dh give up work

The issue re bright children being able to sit exams etc is a tricky one. Most of the local special schools cater specifically for children with severe/moderate learning difficulties as well as severe physical disabilities. Therefore, their resources are focussed mainly on teaching life skills/levels of independents that these children would never have in an ms environment. The problem comes about when there are a few children who, although do not have the physical ability, do have the intellectual ability, and need to be challenged.

Should that school then take resources away from the hundreds that need the life skill training in order to help the few achieve their GCSE?s? Or would it not be better that there be a couple of facilities in the country that cater for the severe physical but also the intellectual ability, thus ensuring that those with severe LD?s are with their peers, but also that those more intellectually able are with their peers also? This does unfortunately often mean that disabled children have to attend boarding school, but it does mean they are being educated in a suitable environment which meets their needs.

I went to a school for the visually impaired. First in Exeter as a weekly boarder, then in South Africa as first a weekly, then a term boarder. On the down side, we were all VI, so consequently when a lot of the kids leave school they have only ever mixed with VI kids and integration back into a society where the population doesn?t have that understanding of VI is difficult. I have friends who will only mix with blind people, who belong to blind social groups and have only blind friends, and who feel that they just are not comfortable with sighted people. But I?m not sure whether it?s a nature or nurture thing as I?m not like that and the majority of my friends are sighted and because society is not blind I don?t wish to join the blind-only social groups.

But on the plus side, being at a school where everyone was VI meant that no-one was treated differently. We were all just normal really, we all ran around in the playground, something which I?m sure would be nearly impossible for one blind child to do in amongst 300 sighted ones without needing some assistance or meeting with frequent accidents, and I learned independence which I don?t think I would have learned at home even though my parents never stopped me doing anything. (however much I slag off my mum for other reasons on here I give her credit for that at least ). And because it was a boarding school we were all like family really. And I have retained friends from my school days who I still consider to be some of my best friends ever, even though I haven?t seen them for years but we still remain in touch.

So although I think that there is of course place in ms for children with disabilities, I think that the benefit of the right special school should never be underestimated.

wannabe that's really lovely. I think to have similar kids around is important in that it builds their confidence. Once you have confidence you can do anything, even break away from these smal;l groups and deal with the 'normal' world.

As a mum I need to talk to other mum in the same situation cos they just "get it" and so it must be even more so for disabled kids surely?