How do I get my son 1/2 a day off school a week?

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Ive put this on the special needs area too as I dont know where the MN expertise lies. My son (in Y3 aged 8) has seen a developmental pedatrician, an Ed Psych, the school nurse and two Occupational therapist for a specific learning difficulty that he has. He is very bright (L3 in last yrs SATs) but cant write. We have been given an exercise prog from the OT lot (for bilateral integration)and told by everyone else that we must teach him to type. This would enable us to take writing out of his education. DS doesnt like school but we wouldnt home educate for social reasons. We thought an afternoon a week would give me some time to concentrate on the more time consuming OT exercises and on his IT skills (I was a secondary Technology Teacher before I had DS).
Any ideas about how to go about getting the time off? Do parents have any sort of rights etc?

Aloha, the OT people want to do a programme called writing without tears. Not sure what this involves yet but will get into it soon.
Christie, youd have thought so wouldnt you but no not really. They let him do work a couple of times a week on the computer and he gets other hit and miss sessions with the LSA.
Pfer - thanks.

Are you talking about Speed Up? That's by Lois Addy and I found it very helpful.

Speed up - is that an it package or a handwriting package?

It's a book - "A kinaesthetic programme to develop fluent handwriting". Ds thought it was great fun. I got it from here

Thanks sweedishmum, may have a go at that if I get the 1/2 day off with him. The OT bods still havent explained the "writing without tears" thing.
Our letter asking for the time off went in to school yesterday but no response yet. Did see the head in the playground this a.m but she just said goodmorning.

My daughter used to half a day off a week to go to a special exercise group for dyspraxic children. This was approved by the school. Have a talk with your schools Senco.

Just a thought, when I was doing a bit of flexi-schooling I phoned up the LEA to check if I needed any higher authority. They said it was simply an agreement between the school and me and was straightforward. Does he do WriteDance at school? Lots of people rate that. I bought a load of different textures in B and Q today (cheap carpet tiles, dodgy samples of textured wallpaper etc) for ds to practise his spellings on with his finger. The other one is a tray of sand or salt.

swedishmum,He did write dance with the entire class in reception and part of Y1. I think it stopped then.I like the texture idea. We do the sand/salt/rice tray thing.

mumeeee,Senco only in on Friday and as I said we dont have an especially good relationship but if weve not heard anything by Friday Ill ring her.

No reply to my letter yet. It upsets me actually,they must know its important to me. To make matters worse DS still hasnt been shown or signed his new IEP. He hasnt been doing some of the activities off the IEP either ie it says that X,Yor Z will happen daily and DS (reliable) says he hasnt done them. What would you do?

Ha! Don't talk to me about IEPs! I know ds's doesn't get looked at until the well-meaning but under-trained ta looks at it for the next review, I know because I've been involved in the process at his school. Questions to ask: in the support he gets, is it individual or small group, how many in the group, how often, how is success decided? Does SN teacher check on progress regularly or is it left to TA? Have sat in on a few TA sessions recently and it is obvious that skills are not up to date. Downloaded an ideal one as part of my course today - far removed from ds's.

Sad but True swedishmum.

I popped in to see the head today and asked her if she had had time to think about my letter. She wasnt amazingly keen to give us the half day off but has agreed with a review at Easter. I have said that Ill probably want to go on for the rest of the year (were nearly at the half way point now). She says that her main concern is that Im emotionally concerned with DS and that this may not be the best relationship for his learning. We`ll see. Thanks all of you who offered advice that enabled me to do this.