Help - Moving schools due to statement for speech problems

[minigirl762003]

Help I need some reassurence that Im doing the right thing.

My son is in Year 1 (he's 5) and we have just received his proposed statement for his speech problems (He has oromotor dysprexia). He is currently in a mainstream school where he is settled and has many friends however after speaking to thier senco I am not convinced that they will be able to meet his statement requirements well. They would need to recruit a TA and get that TA trained for his speech problems (as stated in his statement). Also a speech therepist would only see him for 5 sessions per term.

I have also been to see a local school which has a langague unit attached to it. There is a speech therepist there all day every day and he would a session with here every single day.

My head say the second school wins hands down. They are set up for his kind of problem and he will progress so much quicker there

BUT

Its taking him away from his friends. He can be quite sensitive and I dont want to set him back further. But I know that moving him is for the best

Please tell me some good stories about moving schools and sorry to go on so much.

hi minigirl, i know how you feel. my ds went to the same presch and nursery with all his little friends when we decided that the best place for his apraxia of speech would be a language unit. we moved him and he started in september. his older sister still goes to his original sch, his younger brother goes to the nursery. he is a social animal and i was very concerned about this with him. But the fact is these children need specialised schooling to not only speak, but to learn phonics and every aspect of the curriculum. he has only been there for a matter of weeks but we have seen strangers understand him where they would not of been able to before. I think he would have started to get left out of the friend network when he was unable to put his input into the latest playground craze. children adapt very very easily, alot more easily than us parents! it has been a very positive move for him. he only has 7 children in his unit, the parents have a good network of support and the 3 children in yr2 are looking at transfering back to their original schools. all the staff in the unit are trained to a very high level, his original school was very keen to help us but we felt a few years in the formative years putting in support would be better than him coasting and then struggling with the friendships in later years. at this age they dont see how different their school is, but i was worried that if he had to go to a unit if he couldnt cope then it should be sooner. we are very happy with this decision. we now have to decide wether to try for gaining a place for our youngest child, he is a nervous chap. but this makes me think he would be better placed with well trained staff who are able to help his social side. the unit seems to have less changes in staff timetables than my dd school, i dont think we have had a supply teacher in yet. this would have worried me at mainstream as every new person has to 'tune in' to my ds. feel free to ask me any questions.

My dd had a cleft palate, a small jaw and a trach plus she is deaf. She started MS with 30 hrs support and her own TA. The TA was trained by the SALT that came in weekly for the first term until the TA was trained up then she came in once a month. The TA was brilliant and worked really hard with DD. I credit this TA with giving our DD speech when she had none at the start of school.

Thanks for your replies.

We made the decision last night to send him to the language unit. We decide this as he will get speech therepy every day from the speech therapist who is based at the unit. In his current school he would only have a speech therapist come in for 5 sessions a term.

Also at his current school they would have to recruit a TA then train him/her where as at the unit they are ready for him straight away.

It just such a big decision because it will affect his whole future, we just dont want to get it wrong.