Ed Psychs

[DimpledThighs]

I am curious about ed psychs - esp after talking to my friend about her son.

Have you ever met one who was helpful and encouraging or does it all seem like a bit of a mystery who they are and what they actually do.

I don't want to pry, but would like to reassure my friend - she is a bit down about recent events and the education for her son. she is not a mumsnetter, but I know how supportive everyone can be on here and thought I could pass it on to her.

I'm a teacher and learning support is in my remit. I have to say that in my experience (and it's only my experience, I'm not making generalisations) the Ed. Psychs I've worked with have not been all that useful. One I knew barely went near the chn and then turned up at meetings talking nonsense about them. Another changed their mind continually about diagnosis and confused everyone no end.

There will be good people out there though. Unfortunately they seem to be hard to find and I'll bet they get pi**ed off with a lot of the things they see happening from within the system.

Tell your friend to talk to the school and listen to what they say. If they are crap then get to the learning support team within the LEA.

We saw an ed psych (privately) with ds1 when he was 7. And I have to say it was the best money we ever spent: we spent some time corresponding and filling in forms before the assessment and after the assessment; and still keep in touch from time to time now (2+ yrs on).

It completely transformed some of my attitudes to ds1, and made a huge difference to our parenting of him, and his behaviour and development; and had an impact at school too..

I would say it was the single most significant event in my experience as a parent over the past 9+ years.

Incidentally it also initiated a transformation in me too, which ultimately led to a complete change of career and outlook;
and impacted on my spirituality too!

Is that positive enough for you?

I think it depends on whether or not you see them privately or through the school. I've heard of some LEA's where a school will only be given 6 visits in a whole year and one visit may even be a morning. It's impossible to support a whole school in such a short time.

Oh right - that is useful - she was starting to feel really isolated.

Other input would be helpful but just ghost and roisin have given me a very helpful insight already, thanks.

glad to help

any other ideas?

My son saw a ed psychologist and they put him through tests which took around an hour and we had to return the following week for the second hour.

I wasnt allowed in there to distract so cant give you blow by blow. All I know is that he was given a number of tasks to do it was called the Weschler scale of intelligence.

Cognitive assessment
Performance subtests - puzzles, colours,mazes

Verbal subscale
Comprehension, arithmetic, vocabulary, similarities, sentences

Thats it really and they then score an average of ability overall and hand you an IQ figure.

Must depend on the person like any profession. We used a good one called Peter Gilchrist. It was worth the money. But we understood what he did as my sister is a clinical psychologist ad my father and brother psychiatrists so no mystery at all about what a psychologist would be doing or their role. PG was very helpful and encouraging.