Speech therapy wording in statement

[AgnesDiPesto]

Had a mental blank. Can someone think of a sentence for Statement to ensure the SLT is someone with experience with children with asd and capable providing advice to an ABA provider who knows their stuff. Eg we want someone able to provide consultancy / monitoring layer and some assessment. We are not asking for direct therapy as ABA staff will do the language programmes. At the moment we have inexperienced NHS SLT who knows nothing about autism ordering ABA staff to do targets ds can already do. We have a private therapist in mind but LA digging around for someone on staff. Just want to make sure we don't end up with another numpty who knows nothing about language dev in asd. Wondering if any minimum training or experience requirements we could try and get written in.

Bump

What about "slt therapy provided by an ABA-proficient SALT with track record in autism speech and language difficulties"?

SALTs always advised to do things with ds that he had mastered years ago. I decided that it was because SALTS have practically NO experience working with children like ds as the criteria for intervention is so high and under normal non-tribunal circumstances there would BE no SALT iyswim.

So all they can think of to advise us to do, is blow bubbles at him and get him to say 'more', even now.

Star. Those are exactly DS3's targets.

He isn't doing either of them - well, he SIGNS more. Occasionally. Other times he just puts whatever he wants more of right into my hand. But he won't say it. And she has no answers as to how signing is going to make him SAY it, when he's happy to sign.

And DD and DS1 BOTH had these as targets from the age of 3yo-7yo!

How about: A SLT, with significant experience (or X years experience) of designing, monitoring and reviewing programmes and setting targets for children with autism in mainstream settings and experience of working collaboratively on target setting with ABA therapists will consult each term (6 weeks, month etc) and agree speech and language therapy targets with parents and the ABA providers. Targets must be SMART and relate specifically to areas of difficulty identified by parents, ABA providers and SALT

Sounds fab IE but no chance getting that! Our DP application may be obsolete as rumour LA about to be sacked as Pathfinder as only recruited one family for EHC plan!
Star we are stuck with endless turn taking targets despite ds playing a mean game of snakes and ladders and even discovering cheating (he goes down extra snakes to make the game last longer).
It's just SLT games are so boring he can't be bothered to play so she has decided he can't do turn taking when really he just can't be bothered to do it with HER.

Water it down then Agnes, but keep the collaborative working element so targets aren't set that aren't relevant.

tbh, I'm not sure if SALTs aren't the most sinister of the lot. That's been my experience anyway. More to lose perhaps when caught out.

And all the crap salts that were involved with ds had 'asd experience' (I think it is quite hard not to now as they are such a big client group). Some even sat on asd boards for various things.

I think what you need is someone experienced in the advanced language difficulties of children with asd. Even if your ds isn't at that point, having a SALT knowing where he is going would be something worth having. Stops you getting someone that only ever gets as far as blowing bubbles at kids.

'A SLT, with significant experience (or X years experience) of designing, monitoring and reviewing programmes and setting targets for children with autism in mainstream settings and experience of working collaboratively on target setting'

Everyone will say they can do this.

'speech and language therapy targets with parents and the ABA providers. Targets must be SMART and relate specifically to areas of difficulty identified by parents, ABA providers and SALT '

This bit is rather good and gets more to the point of what you want.

I have found that putting in DS's statement that targets must be set with our input has been a bit of a life saver. We have our own SLT now but when we didn't, they couldn't just go and set targets without consulting me first.

Yes, very important point.

Surely it isn't AR time though Agnes?

Although, I suppose it is always AR time in a hostile LA.....

Life is one long AR .......... or it feels like that sometimes!

AR was October got the proposed amended statement in Dec when numpty SALT tried to get out of doing anything by getting ALL SALT taken off statement. We asked for wording to go back in - took until Feb for LA to arrange a meeting with us and now trying to agree new wording.
Last year we got the statement amended in March after AR in Sept!
So yes life is always one long AR!
LA do seem to accept a SALT with no autism expertise cannot 'advise' an ABA supervisor with lots of expertise, so at least that is one step forward.

That is a small step for mankind!

What about SLT experienced in 'pragmatic language impairment and/or non-verbal language disorder' and in 'setting SMART targets yo be delivered via aba tutor' thus taking the weasel-words 'ASD-experienced' out altogether?

Cos you want him/her for language expertise. You've got proper asd experience on the team already, no point insisting on supplementing it with (presumably) inferior asd input.

Just wondering if asd slt is a Trojan horse for losing your ABA at AR (paranoid, moi?)

Cost up a proper slt doing private consultation only 3-6 times a year. Weigh against risks of the wrong person harming the programme / the data / the professional advice to next AR. Then decide.

Oh yes she is def there to spy. No question. We have started paying privately but want LA to agree to fund or give us Direct payments. But if we let them water down the wording will reduce value of any DP or private salt. The LA are trying to get a LA communication lead to do it. But I suspect if we get that the frequency of visits will fall and it may be short lived eg until time to appeal statement has passed and wording will be too vague to enforce.

So get them to provide a really good slt by agreeing that their input is annual, or 6 monthly. "It's only a consultative role, just to keep the programme on track". And then employ same person yourself in between privately.

Hard for tribunal to award high cost but low quality direct provision when you're asking for low cost but high quality indirect

'speech and language therapy targets with parents and the ABA providers. Targets must be SMART and relate specifically to areas of difficulty identified by parents, ABA providers and SALT'. Request 1 hour/ 2 hours of indirect input once per term (or whatever) according to clever wording above.

Then make a point of also insisting on something which looks expensive but is totally vague, unenforcable and pointless such as "direct input 'up to a maximum of two hours once a week to be readily available when parent-professional team considers necessary, according to HT/ SENCO/ LEA EP's random mother in playground's view of dc's language needs and progress in school"

Thus good SLT advisory role goes in, loads of rubbish LEA slt also looks like it's going in, but you 'concede' that last minute and hey presto, semi-decent overall programme

Just found this rather fab document which requires evidence based approaches and says:

Detailed ?Knowledge and Skills? required of speech pathologists working in ASD will be outlined in Speech Pathology Australia?s Guidelines for speech pathologists assessing, diagnosing and treating clients with Autism Spectrum Disorder (under development). In broad terms, however, the requisite knowledge and skills may include:
A sound knowledge and understanding of the core characteristics of ASD including the communication and behavior of a child with ASD;
A knowledge of available screening, assessment and observation tools and ability to interpret results and evaluate the language and pragmatic skills of a child with ASD;
Ability to analyse the underlying pragmatic language disorder and its impact on the communication development of a child with ASD;
Knowledge of a range of intervention approaches and programs appropriate to an individual with ASD;
Ability to plan and implement communication intervention;
Skills to develop functional visual strategies to assist with the child?s communication and
behaviour;
Knowledge of behavioural techniques and programs and ability to manage the child?s behaviour
and optimise outcomes during therapy;
Ability to work with families and utilise family-centred approaches, as appropriate; and
Application of a multidisciplinary consultative approach through contact with other specialists,
educators and support workers involved in the management of an individual with ASD.