Draft Statement arrived today - have some questions

[JK2010]

Hey everyone,

I'd like to ask about the content of Part 3 of the draft Statement.

It states:

'X should be offered 15 hours per week of Teacher Assistant support in order to access the educational opportunities available to her'

then:

'X should be offered Speech and Language Therapy as follows:

On-going direct speech and language therapy with the Speech and Language Therapist, delivered individually or as part of a small group (up to 3 children) involving a minimum of 5 sessions per school term, followed by a period of consolidation ... equating to up to 1.5 hours per session.'

First, does 'Teacher Assistant support' equate to one on one assistance by a third party coming into the school, or will it be provided by the school?

Second, I'm not happy with the offer of 5 sessions of SALT per term! Is this something any of you have appealed against - and won? At least one session per week would seem reasonable - particularly as we are already employing a therapist for three sessions per week.

Third, is this SALT provision always made by the LEA, or are you able to select an existing (independent) therapist?

Thank you.

I'd want this 'X should be offered 15 hours per week of Teacher Assistant support in order to access the educational opportunities available to her' changed to 'X will receive 15 hours per week of one-to-one Teacher Assistant support in order to access the educational opportunities available to her; this support will be used to...'

wrt SALT, I don't know your dd but I'd want the individual vs small group thing cleared up. The amount seems OK but yes, worth appealing if you want more. You can't get them to pay for independent if they have an NHS one available.

Agree with giveme

Should be 'receive', and to do what? It should also be specified whether it is 1:1 or if a TA being available somewhere in the classroom is more what they had in mind?

I have 5 sessions a term but I got them to specify it as direct working with ds at 30mins per week, to be replicated a further 3 times by an experienced TA. It's the same amounth, but better specificity and regularity.

JK

Never accept anything with "should" in it.

All provision has to be specified and quantified by law.

Also SALT should be in Part 2 as well; if it is not there then this is another reason for rejection of the proposed statement!.

IPSEA and or SOS;SEN will be able to tell you what it should actually say.

The Statement is a very important document and one that needs to be right from the get go. This statement is not right currently, it needs further work particularly on parts 2 and 3. Parts 2 and 3 are the most important parts of this document so they need to be right.

Thank you for the replies!

I'm in no rush to get to the final stage, as my daughter won't be moving until September 2011. Priority number one is to make sure the Statement is as strong as possible - no matter how many drafts!

jk2010- we have got 10 sessions a term for DD (verbal dyspraxia) who is 3.8. This is 1:1 SALT and she then gets 15 hrs / week of TA to work on 1:1, small groups (as DD needs require) and practice the SALT. Our problem is who is going to pay for it (independent school)!!