So 1/4 of kids schools deem to have SEN havent - what a shocker!!!!

[becaroo]

BBC Breakfast this morning.

Sorry for sarcastic op title, but honestly, I could have told them that!!!!

My ds1 was on the SEN register because he wasnt reading as well as the school thought he should. He was just 5 at the time!!!!!

He has the vocab of a teenager and is very clever but has been so truamtised by the schools efforts to "make" him read from age 4 that he really thinks he cant do it.

If his year 1 teacher had been better and if the school wasnt so obsessed with SATS results then half the kids on the SEN register wouldnt be there!

Ok, rant over

Special Educational Needs doesn't mean Special Needs=disability. It means "this child needs a bit of extra support at the moment". FOr whatever reason. If you just delete the names of any children who are not disabled/have learning disabilities, then you will take the support away from an awful lot of children who need support because of problems in their everyday life etc. My ds also struggled to learn to read at 5. I was very grateful that he got a bit of extra support rather than just being left to flounder. It never made me believe that he was disabled (actually, he is, but we didn't know at the time). It just meant that, he needs a bit of extra help. Which he did.

It seems very timely that Ofsted have come out with this statement. We have a government who want to make huge cuts to the education budget. They have stated that TAs are not required in classrooms, special schools places will not be increased when children who have profound difficulties have the extra support taken away from them in main stream, the training budget for support staff will be cut,and class sizes will have to rise.

I heard on the news that ofsted also stated that it was in part down to weak teaching.

Agree with OP.....too many kids on SEN lists. Obviously there are quite a few genuine cases, but I do think that what it really highlights is that the teaching isnt working! Still far too much emphasis on auditory learning, which is quite honestly inappropriate for early years. I do think that a more hands-on type of approach, and better differentiation, coupled with a realisation that most kids WILL learn to read & write when they are developmentally ready to, would reduce the shocking numbers of children on SEN lists.
Of course, allowing children to work at their own pace, just doesnt satisfy results driven/league table obsessives (state schools)!

All children have special educational needs IMO, and some are just lucky enough to be able to manage not having them met by the school system so they don't show up.

In my sons case it was weak teaching.

His year one teacher was rarely there (he was instigating a new IT system at the school and was also head of year 1 and I have since learnt he is now the SENCO!!!!!) and when I asked him what we could do to help our son when he informed us that ds1 was "struggling" we were met with a blank stare.

The full time TA left on mat leave 6 weeks inot the 1st term and then there were 2 TAs on job share which meant that there was no continuity and that things that should have been done werent.

His year 2 teacher was lovely but the damage had been done.

My sons school put him on the SEN register simply because he was not on level 5 ORT and effectively branded him and let his classmates make fun of him because he was getting extra "help". This "help" consisted of 10 mins 1-2-1 per day. In reality this didnt happen. As I say, a lot of the time there were supply teachers covering for the teacher and the TAs were useless.....they couldnt spell and their grammar was atrocious and they were telling me my son was not up to standard!!!!!

Grandson had only been at his school for about three weeks [mornings only] when there was an almighty row with the headmistress in the middle of the corridor in front of parent, pupils and announced to me that gradson was definitely NEVER going to be a high flyer and was sure to be School Action+.
Her reasoning was that because is classed as a 'looked after' child that he would almost certainly be SAP.
When I had my first LA inspection several months later, the inspector [an ex-teacher] stated that he was certainly not a candidate for SAP.

marjoriew Its awful isnt it?

When the LEA inspector came out to visit us in march this year ds1 had only been Home Ed for 10 weeks and when I told him that ds1 was on the SEN reg and was placed on an IEP (without our knowledge btw!) he just sighed and rolled his eyes....he is an ex-headmaster of an SEN school!!

He praised his hand writing and his vocabulary and was very happy with our educational provision.

Ds1's paediatrician (ds1 has asthma) also told me that ds1 would be much better off being HE as I could teach him much better than a teacher who is only worried about SATS results and timed assessments!!!

I used to have respect for the teaching profession.....no longer.

This is the first paragraph of the letter to e given to the LA at my next visit.
'C really is making very good intellectual progress. I understand he is schooled at home and considering the difficult times he has had early on in life, one can only admire his progress.'
I was also told by a LA official that school is not suitable for all children and that obviously grandson is one of those children.

I do believe that there are many children who come under the category of 'Special Needs' warranting intervention on a professional level, but I do also think that it's a money grabber for schools to cover up for teachers who are just not up to the job.
A piece of paper with letters after a name is fine but that doesn't automatically make for a good teacher.

Absolutely marjoriew

Most of the people I was at sixth form with went into teaching as a fallback postion...i.e. they didnt get the grades to do anything else. Its something you hear alot in sixth form common rooms;
"well, if all else fails I'll go into teahing!"

Surely it should be a vocation????

My youngests godmother is a teacher (a very good one who is beloved of her pupils and got a first in her degree!) and she is very supportive of our decision to HE.

The TAs at my sons old school seemed to be doing the job because they had children themselves and they wanted a job to fit round school times. Not a good enough reason IMO.

Aren't you forgetting something?

The vast majority of children on the SEN register do not generate extra money for their schools as they are on the lowest level (Action, rather than Action+). This does not come with any outside funding. Most of them don't actually get any extra funding from the school either: the list is just a kind of "let's keep an eye on these children and make sure we check that they are meeting their targets".

It is only statemented children that attract extra funding, but that money is supposed to be tied to the child, so doesn't actually make the school any richer.

Ds is on the SEN register, but apart from 20 minute a week on touch typing lessons, the only aids he gets are the ones we pay for him: we send in the folder for him to write on, we bought the special pens for his sister, we provide the laptop he will need for his homework etc etc. I can't see that there is any shame in being branded: I'd rather my children got support when they need it than everybody trying to pretend they were doing fine for fear of branding them.

Cory you are right about the funding. All I was trying to point out really is that the numbers of children placed on school action on SEN registers is a sign that the classroom environment is just not inclusive enough. Rather than taking children out of the class (and this sometimes causes them to miss out on something in class), perhaps it is time teachers looked at WHY there are so many on school action.

Majoriew, what is a "looked-after child"? What did the head mean by that - a foster child?

I think it is people's outdated perception of 'special needs' that makes them struggle to believe that nearly a quarter of all children may have 'special needs'.

My son is only four, looks normal, is normal imo, but has special educational needs. He is on the spectrum, it would have slipped through the net in the "good old days" back when virtually no children had special needs; there were only good children and bad children. Let's go back to that?

Dyslexia is another special educational need.

I think this is just the government cashing in on people's outdated perceptions of what special needs really means. They should 're-brand' special needs, make people realise that those children are still with 'normal' ranges and just need extra support or tailored teaching to learn. They can learn, and will learn with the right support. But not if the government slashes the education budget and cynically takes advantage of people's outdated preconceptions of what sn means.

I am not opposed to SEN children recieving the help they need.

What I am opposed to is children who do not have SEN being put on the SEN register just because they do not tick a particular box on a particular form.

Schools make no distinction between individual childrens abilties...i.e. my son is a summer baby and some of his classmates were 9 months older than him yet ds1 was expected to be at the same developmental and educational level. He wasnt and so was put pn the SEN register. He was then ridiculed and made fun of for being on this register which has had catastrophic consequences for his confidence and self esteem.

I think that there are a lot of kids like my ds1 who have not got SEN yet are labelled as having SEN because schools have a one size fits all mentality wrt to teaching methods and kids who do not "fit" at a given age (my son was 5 at the time) are automatically labelled as having SEN. Its ridiculous.

I should also point put that my ds1 had no behavourial problems (never had a bad report in 3 years), had no trouble socially at school (apart form the bullying because of him being on the SEN register) and has no developmental issues.

His only "problem" was that he was not on ORT level 5 at the start of year 1.

Please, someone explain to me......how does that mean he has SEN????????????

On the other hand, a large percentage of children with either Special needs or "Children with disabilities" do not get an early diagnosis and do not get effective help and support from Social Services.

Sorry, ZZZenAgain - I must have missed your post.
A 'looked-after' child is any child who is either in the care of the local authority, fostered or in the permanent care of a family member [kinship carer].
I have a Residence Order for my grandson and therefore he comes under the category of a ;looked after' child.
Statistics for children who come under this category and who are in mainstream education are not very promising at all.

I wonder if a child who is a "ward of Court" but still living with one or both of his parents but with restrictions is considered to be "looked after"

Google it.

Gifted and talented children are classed as having SEN.