school want to do an assessment

[kilmuir]

I live in ME but my 3.10 year old son goes to a British school here. He is in F1 and just back from his parent teacher interview.
I had raised concerns about his speech being rushed and incoherent and he had poor eye contact. At home he does repetitive behaviour with things like a spoon.! he will hold it in his hands, twiddle it around, jump a few times then do it all again. Can do it for ages if you let him. We have made a point of distracting him and getting him involved with other things which works.
He is now doing this at preschool. The teacher was lovely but quickly made a note that my nephew has high achieving Aspergers and I remember him doing a lot of tapping etc when he was little.
I feel quite teary, not sure why. Any advice

:(

the next little while is going to be scary and heartbreaking and hard.

Who is going to assess him?

In the UK school cannot assess for SN, they can only get help with 'strategies to use in the classroom'

so you need to find out if he is going to be assessed for Aspergers or related conditions, or if you need to arrange this yourself through your own paedetrician.

I would let them do it, if only to rule anything out. If it does turn out he has some problems then school can help with strategies on how best to help him. I have to say I am not in the 'don't label' camp, I think a diagnosis if needed can be a good thing. It may be nothing but an assessment will give you those answers, it doesn't mean he has AS, it may just mean he needs a little extra support for a short time and he will be fine. Try not to worry, as I always say, no matter what diagnosis a child has they are the same child as they where before.
We have all felt teary and emotional at times, especially when some one tells us something about our child

:(

the next little while is going to be scary and heartbreaking and hard.

But you will come out if this and be in a better place than you are in now. Because you will have more knowledge about your DS.

Who is going to assess him?

In the UK school cannot assess for SN, they can only get help with 'strategies to use in the classroom'

so you need to find out if he is going to be assessed for Aspergers or related conditions, or if you need to arrange this yourself through your own paedetrician.

If you were in the UK I'd be advising you to get a list of your and the school's concerns and go to your GP and demand a referral to a developmental paediatrician. As Indigo says, schools in the UK can't DX and can only assess for educational needs.

You may have to find out what's available locally. Do you have private medical care/insurance. Would it cover an assessment by a paed?

the school have a special needs teacher , very experienced. they say she will come in and observe him.
I do need to find out what is available here with regard to an evaluation and helping him. I think not much! we are thinking of moving back to the Uk in the summer ( husband in the forces), if necessary i will go back to the uk earlier.
I agree that it is only through assessment that we can move forward. It may be a phase, it may be more. I did smile when the teacher said, ' oh he is very clever boy, don't worry about that'. I wasn't!
Trouble is i am googling and getting ahead of myself.
I think i will arrange to see the head when school resumes after half term, she is very knowledgeable .
Who would normally assess in the UK?
Can't believe how teary i feel. Husband not here at moment, back in a few days, so thank you for replying.

In the UK a child development paedetrician would make a dx. They would assess the child and also get other people (like an ed psych) to.

Although it differs region to region.

We don t really have SEN teachers like you do inthe ME.