Good school in London re SEN?

[MrsGoodman]

My DC is in an academically high achieving school but in terms of SEN they’re not great. The class teacher is young and relatively inexperienced and although my Dc has been diagnosed with ADHD, he’s unconvinced and doesn’t want any communication with DH and me beyond the biannual parents’ evenings.

We’ve had a private clinical psychologist go in and do an observation and she implied that getting them to change is likely to be difficult. The teacher hasn’t even told the SENco about my son’s diagnosis and they haven’t made any special provisions. He constantly gets punished for minor offences such as talking on the stairs, and his confidence is starting to suffer.

Anyway, now obviously thinking about taking DC out but we need to find a good alternative. Can anyone recommend a school in central London with great SEN provisions (a helpful attitude towards SEN would be a start) and also a sizeable outside space? A lot to ask for an inner city school I know, but still..

Is this private or state you’re after?

Ideally state but possibly private too.

Is this a primary or secondary school? How old is your child?

Sorry, forgot to say DS is 5.

That changes things quiet a bit. He’s only in reception/year 1. He should be put on their sen register with a diagnosis but if it’s not effecting his learning he won’t be. The teacher obv wants to look at him beyond his diagnosis and I kind of agree. If he’s doing well academically and his diagnosis isn’t effecting anything beyond minor infringements I wouldn’t worry. Lots of kids his age get told off and this is coming from someone that’s worked in schools and has a DD who’s Sen got comepletely overlooked till year 6.
I obv don’t know the details of your sons situation but I would ask to have a meeting with the senco as she should definitely know about the diagnosis. She should be able to tell you what they can do for him.

The problem is that he's being labelled as a badly behaved boy by the teacher. The teacher sees it as "choosing" certain behaviours rather than involuntary impulsiveness, something that the psychologist confirmed after speaking to him. In our last parents' evening, he had almost nothing positive to say about DC and we left feeling very deflated.

Sen support in school is done on observed needs not a diagnosis, if he is coping with the work then he won't meet the criteria for intervention - was the diagnosis privately done? Our school only accepted a camhs diagnosis because (according to them) parents were paying private assessment centres for diagnosis to get extra time in exams and there was no observable issues in class, older age group but you can see their point.

Having an adhd diagnosis doesn't mean your dc can be naughty in class either, just like my dc doesn't get a free pass for being an awkward so and so for being autistic - in life they need to learn to adapt to fit their square peg selves into our round pegged world is how we put it. (DD has made it into university now, doing ok)

I concur. You won’t find a school that allows him to disrupt other children, not a mainstream one anyway. Did his ep or whoever was diagnosis come and observe him in lesson? If they did they should also have had a meeting with the senco to suggest strategies and things that need to be put in his iep. I’m really surprised he got an adhd diagnosis at such a young age.

I’ve PM you.