Advice needed

[Nowfindingdory]

My dd is currently 6 (year 1) and attends a mainstream school. Within the last 3 months she has had 4 external exclusions and 5 internal exclusions. The sen has said she feels she has social, emotional mental health and some traits of adhd so has been referred to cahms and also play therapy. Some of her symptoms are short attention span, unable to sit still for too long or complete work, easily distracted, disruptive and uncooperative behaviour, struggles to engage in learning, frustrated easily, hitting teachers. Also does not socialise or interact with other children, plays alone her preference.

Im worried they school msy get fed up with her and excluded her permanently. Can they do this. I suggested an education psychology assessment and they have said no because she is very bright and the assessment assesses their cognitive development which she would pass with flying colours.

She is quite bright but she is doing very little work now so she can easily fall behind her peers. They currently give her 121 support for the majority of the day but unfortunately for them it is still challenging for them. Unable to function without 121 so many teachers rota to give her this.

What things would cahms do and what does the assessment require.

I would ideally prefer her to be given 121 by the same person daily but without a statement they cannot employ someone to do this. Is their a possibility we could try to get a statement even though she falls under emotional, social and behavioural rather than educational. No diagnosis has not been made just the schools opinion what they think it is.

Statements have now been replaced with EHCs (Education, Health, Care Plans), but yes, it is possible to have one without a difficulty with cognition. She clearly has a 'need' that stops her accessing education.

I would do 2 things - One is to get her support in school, you can put in a parental request for an assessment for an EHC. Lots of advice from IPSEA here, or SOS SEN here, or Contact a Family here. All have helplines you can call.
Each local authority also has a SENDIASS (Sp Ed Needs / Disability Information, advice and Support Service) who are there to give you help and advice.
Your dd is clearly not accessing education if she needs full time 1:1 to remain in chool, and even with that has had so many exclusions, so absolutely would be entitled to be assessed for an EHC.

The other thing, is to go to your GP and ask for a full Paediatric assessment, to try to find the underlying cause of her difficulties. People make adjustments a lot more readily, and support is more readily available when a child has a known diagnosis.

My son has high functioning autism, he is bright, was it steven hawkings that has high functioning/aspergers? same thing.

Ed Psyc can do work on behaviour issues - at least they do in my area (I'm Hampshire) Round here we also have a Behaviour Support Team who the LEA employ to work with primary school children. I would look on your LEA website to see what services are in the area - if the school is an academy they can buy in LEA services.

Backforgood - thank you. Yes i forgot it is called EHCP now. Do you think i should ask for this assessment now or wait until the other assessment has come back. She has been referred to the boroughs portal which is a centre point which decides what service she needs which could be cahms, play therapy, paediatrician etc. She will then be referred to the relevant service by then. From what i have been told there is a massive waiting list for cahms 6 months plus and there is also a long wait to be assessed my an ed psy by the local authority. We went to the gp and the referral was made. It was declined at the other end stating i should go on a parenting course if she is under 5 which she wasn't or to be referred by the school.

Thank you for your comments muckpup and wonderstuff i will take a look on the website. It is an academy but a brand new school but a brand new school so they have did they havent got the funding and they are struggling as it is.

I believe you can self refer for an EHCP assessment if you feel the need. Get a statutory assessment done.

Barnados can help you apply for an Ehcp, we done that but we were not succesful, however if your child has been excluded you have a much better chance xx

We went to the gp and the referral was made. It was declined at the other end stating i should go on a parenting course if she is under 5 which she wasn't or to be referred by the school

Well then why aren't the school making the referral ? I don't understand why they haven't done it if that's the way it is done in you r LA - any support she can get has got to make life easier for them as well as you. Ask the school to make the referral.

I would always suggest keeping clear in your mind that - despite all good intention in the 2014 Code of Practice, there are till 2 separate authorities. There is the Health Authority (and all the services you are waiting for seem to be HA ones), and then there is the Education Authority. You can go through both systems alongside one another, you don't need a diagnosis of anything to ask for help in school and you don't need to be getting help in school to get a diagnosis, or any sort of therapy, so my suggestion would be to do both at once - try asking the school to apply for an EHC, and, if there is some reason why they won't, then you have the right to put in a parental request (and can get support for that from any of the big charities - including, but not exclusively the ones I linked to).