ELSA?

[Daisy3011]

Hello All,

My son started nursery in September, until now he hadn’t been to school. He turns 4 at the end of January, and his teacher has stopped me a few times with comments regarding his attention span and emotional wellbeing. She’s noticed he’s more sensitive compared to the other children, and that he is more “emotionally behind”.

She informed me that he’s been doing bucket time activity at school to try and help his attention, and my thoughts immediately went to SEN.

I have just seen that we have been scheduled for two meetings (parents evening) one with his teacher and the other one is with the ELSA. This is the first time I have heard of it - am I correct in thinking that if he was suspected of SEN it would be with the SENDco?

Does anyone here have any experience with ELSA and any information as to what I should expect? I understand everything will be answered when I attend the meeting but it’s in a few weeks time and I’d like to gain more of an idea.

Thank you.

Bump

It does sound to me too as though they are suspecting ASD maybe?

There are some things you can do before the meeting. There first one is this simple progress checker from Speech & Language UK. If it says that he needs some support, they should send you a link with some resources you could start trying.

Other things you could do are filling in both of these assessments:

4 year Ages & Stages

and the 4 year Social & Emotional Ages & Stages.

Let us know how you get on with all of those

Thank you for your post.

We recently had a meeting with our health visitor as it was a concern of mine, and this was her feedback:

“In regards to sons general development he is progressing well at this age and stage. No further action is required. He is a lovely little boy who played well and chatted extremely
well at the recent review.”

Surely if ASD was suspected a meeting would be arranged with SENDco and not ELSA?

Despite all this, he does need help regulating his emotions and will do whatever it takes to get him this help.

ELSA stands for emotional literacy support assistant.

ELSAs are typically teaching assistants who have received an intensive training course (and receive ongoing supervision from ed psychs) on how to support children who need a bit of extra support with their emotions, social interactions, feelings and so on. They are (hopefully!) very warm and nurturing staff members who can support those children when they need a bit of extra help.

You should have been made aware that your son was going to be having some sessions with the ELSA, so that you know the aim of the intervention and so that you could ask any questions. Perhaps that is what the meeting is for.

You are right that any discussions around a diagnostic pathway such as ASD would involve the SENCO.

From what your HV has said he sounds like a lovely little boy, so I wouldn’t be too concerned at this point about a diagnosis, I think you need to find out more about what work the ELSA has been doing and take it from there.

What tools did the HV use for her assessment @Daisy3011? Did she ask you to fill in those two assessments i linked to before she saw him?

Hi again,

Those were indeed the questionnaires I had to fill out prior to the meeting.

My 6 year old daughter has ELSA at school. She is very emotional (gets upset fast can’t let things go etc) and struggles to regulate her emotions i suspect ADHD as I have it my self. They play games obviously based around feelings I think from what she tells me.