statement experts please help x

[devientenigma]

Part 3:
B needs full access to the national curriculum and RE. It will be differentiated to his particular needs and modified on an in house basis, with maximum flexibility and attention to academic and personal development.

To continue to develop language and communication using oral and makaton.

To continue to develop his fine motor skills.

To continue to develop his social skills.

To develop his independance and self help skills.

To develop his willingness to comply with adult requests and engage in activities of the adults choosing.

To work with support of all adults to improve behaviour in all settings.

Provision to meet needs and objectives.

B requires:

full access to NC/RE as 1st point above.

access to support staff with specialist knowledge and experience of children with significant learning difficulties.

regular access to small group and individual support.

small steps approach with the opportunity to overlearn.

programmes aimed at developing areas of delay.

co-cordinated multi disciplinary input.

multi sensory teaching approaches.

access to programmes to develop s&l as advised by salt.

additional means of com e.g. makaton and visual prompts.

programmes to develop his play, social and self help skills including toilet training.

programme of motor skills development as recommended by appropriate therapist.

advice, support and monitoring by the sensory impairment team.

Question is....what do you make of this, is it helpful and what do you think he should be getting?.

TIA x

Try to make a table for yourself with the problems/needs you want to be met, the needs they quote in part 2 and the provisions in part 3. You'll see whether it covers what you need. For my reading it sounds a bit vague. As far as I remember the biggest battle is for resources - the provisions in part 3 should be very specific and quantified.
How many hours per week of TA?
How often, how many hours of SALT?
How many hours how often of sentory team etc
Who will run the multicensory teaching approaches?
etc etc
Who will manage and review?

I am not an expert at all, so hopefully more knowledgeable mums would comment.

I agree, very little here is quantified or specific. For example the salt part could read something like....

x will follow a programme set up and monitered by a qualified salt. This will include at least x sessions of direct salt per week/month etc and x amount of indirect therapy delivered daily by a TA who has accessed x y and z courses. Additionally the TA will meet the SALT at least weekly/monthly etc to dicuss progress/review programme etc. X's parents will be invited to attend at least x number of sessions to ensure a consitant approach by all parties etc etc.

It might also state salt targets will be written into iep etc.

Before worring about provision though make sure ALL your childs needs are stated in part 2.

Go through all your reports and use different coloured highlighters. Use one for problems and then one for recommendations.

Make sure all the 'problems' are stated in part 2 and then map them to the recommendations.

I would say nearly all the wording here needs changing. Words like, 'access to' and 'regular' are meaningless unless quantified. Halleys comet is regular every 76 years but it's not frequent!

I would reject Part 3 in its entireity because it is neither specified nor quantified properly as required in law.

Would suggest you read parts 2 and 3 verbatim (as it stands) to one of the charitable organisations like for example IPSEA, ACE or SOS:SEN (to name but three) and they will tell you what it should say.

"access to" and "regular access" mean basically nothing on a Statement. It is all too woolly and its current format is thus unacceptable.

SALT should also be written into Part 2 as well as 3 (as per the Lancashire Agreement).

I agree - it's too wolly and needs to be qualtified in terms of

WHo, WHY , WHAT, WHERE, WHEN, HOW MUCH

silly question next........would your replies be the same if the child is in special school??

just bumping my next silly Q x

Special schools are no different - Statement still needs to be less wolly and more quantified

cheers everyone x

The legislative purpose is "to require focussed and express consideration to be given to the
specific needs of a child and then to provide for them in terms which will further and effect
its enforceability as a provision?" IPSEA Ltd ?v- Secretary of State for Education [2002] EWHC
504 (Admin) [2003] ELR 393 ? High Court
An LEA policy not to specify/quantify is unlawful.
Statements can refer to funding ?bands? (see further below) but not as an alternative to
specifying/quantifying provision nor so as to override or limit the specified/quantified
provision.

wasuup sorry to sound really thick but what does all that mean to the statement above, TIA

The ONLY difference with a special school afaik. is 1) on some points, the rewards for fighting it may be lower: eg the school may have a very high staffing ratio built in; quantification of 1:1 time would still be better, obviously, but if you've got a list of battles and the class ratios are already more or less 1:1 you may want to pick another one and 2) in all Special Schools local to us, therapy programmes are designed and monitored by the therapist but delivered by the classroom staff, integrated into everything they do with the child. Some kids also have specific therapy sessions but they are addressing temporary issues* and so hard to get into the statement.

*this is per our head who is plugged into various SEN confederations

**because NHS policy is not to allow chronic conditions onto the waiting list; the only way they can meet targets is to only treat stuff they can fix and discharge.

It's case law as is this:

Following from the definition of SEP in EA s312 and the Schedule to the SEN regulations
(which prescribe the format for a Statement) Part 3 must describe all aspects of the provision
which differs from the provision normally made in mainstream schools in the area. Thus:
Different class sizes: H ?v- Leicestershire[2000] ELR 471
Staff qualifications/experience: e.g. "teacher who is experienced in working with
pupils who have significant learning difficulties and autism/communication
disorders": R ?v- Wandsworth ex parte M [1998] ELR 424
Where small group work is involved, the size of the group, the length and frequency
of the sessions: L ?v- Clarke and Somerset[1998] ELR 129
The need for and amount of 1:1 work: L ?v- Clarke and Somerset [1998] ELR 129
Input from other professionals, such as sessions of speech therapy: R ?v- Harrow ex
parte M [1997] FCR 761

Basically quote it at your LEA to make the specify and quantify.

they

arggghh them

gtg in the middle of paperwork myself!