Moderate Dyslexia. Has anybody managed to get a statement?

[2006hildy]

DS 8 on SA. He is bobbing along the National Curriculum level but underperforming to his IQ,

He gets extra help with his reading, writing and spelling.

I know his problems are not as bad as other ds. I wish somebody would do something. I wish he could be referred to an EP but SENCO won't just because he is bobbing along the National Curriculum level.

I know he has to move to SA+ before we can apply for Statutory Assessment but without referral there is no chance. How do I move DS on from SA to SA+?

Am I expecting too much from the system?

The simplest solution I can think of for getting to SA+, is to push, push, push, for referral to their EP. In light of your recent success I think you should try and make this happen.

The problem in the school my girls go to (which IME is crap for SEN - I have one dd with moderate Dyslexia and one with ?ASD) is that the solution seems to be: lump them in with the low-achieving kids including the non-attenders, disruptive and low-IQ instead of compensating for the ACTUAL DEFICITS in the SpLD. My school could not actually give a monkeys that my dd is underperforming to her IQ and would just shrug if I mentioned it!

Bobbing along the lower range of NC levels (including making zero progress over a year in maths) seems to still be appropriate progress (this for a girl with a verbal IQ in the top 3-4%) and so provision map it is. I have just had my Dyslexic daughter re-assessed by the loveliest EP you could ever hope to meet. She has written a beautiful report, explaining my daughter's difficulties and how acute they are, in clear, unambiguous, layman's terms. It suggests enlarging maths work sheets and using colour for maths symbols, so we are not talking "20hr 1:1" here, but I fully expect school to just completely ignore the advice in it (I got the report done in readiness for SATs and secondary school and to compare to her assessment in Y3).

Are you expecting too much? No.

Are you asking too much in school or LA's opinion? Yeah, probably.

This was the schools answer " I have spoken to the Educational Psychologist, re the referral for DS1 -8. We are having a planning meeting in early October to discuss all children who may need an assessment and DS1 will be considered then."

In the meantime we got a nasty note from CT in Link book.

Hence my email to SENCO:

"Following the comment in DS1's Link Book this Friday I need your help.

The school does not think DS1 has moderate dyslexia but Special Educational Needs therefore can you make a “reasonable adjustment” for his organisational skills. I have to prompt and remind him when eating and dressing still so it is highly unlikely he would be able to remember to find his reading book, change it and put it back in his bag for homework. Since the start of term we have been unable to do the required amount of homework as he is incapable of ensuring he has his homework. I have mentioned to CT that DS1 is dyslexic.

I am worried DS1 will be neglected the same way DS2 7(ASD) was without a Statement as his requirements don’t appear to be taken seriously again. This is why I feel the need to request a Statutory Assessment for DS1 before his writing in particular falls more and more behind. With history repeating itself, from his father as he has exactly the same problems.

I hope securing an EP referral it would shed more light on DS1's problems."

You're right they don't give a monkeys. Especially if it is an invisible disability and then they think you're talking claptrap! They big up his achievements and don't actually address his ACTUAL DEFICITS. OOOOhhhh!

I'll keep on pushing especially with Mumsnet help.

No, and we're ADHD too!

What tactics have you used to try and get one short of taking to tribunal? I don't think I can without being on SA+?

If you can manage it it could be worth getting your own EP assessment. They may pay more attention to that.

When I originally started the process of getting a Statement for my DS, he only had a formal diagnosis of moderate dyslexia by Dyslexia Action along with dyspraxia dx by an indie OT. As my DS was originally in an indie mainstream school, there is no concept there of School Action and School Action Plus. But I had considerable evidence of failure to progress, despite substantial independent help/therapy put in place by myself, which amounted to more than SA+.

Therefore, when I applied for Statutory Assessment, my DS was not on either SA or SA+ as the concept simply does not exist in most indie mainstream schools. I was refused SA, so commissioned a full set of indie assessments/reports including one by one of this country's leading experts on dyslexia. She found that my son was severely dyslexic.

After a massive fight between myself and my LA (which I've documented on this board), my son is now funded by them at a indie ss because a Tribunal found that a mainstream school could not support his severity of dyslexia. He has other dx, but the Tribunal found that it was specifically his dyslexia needs which could not be met by the LA's named mainstream school.

Btw, do not make the same mistake that I made at that start of my DS's process: moderate does not mean "medium", it actually means "this is serious and normal interventions for mild dyslexia may or may not work".

"I know he has to move to SA+ before we can apply for Statutory Assessment"

No, that is not correct. You can apply for a statement without a child having first been on either School Action or School Action Plus.

Apply for the statement yourself and now and ignore any naysayers.

IPSEA's website is good www.ipsea.org.uk

"I know he has to move to SA+ before we can apply for Statutory Assessment" If this is what the school is telling the OP, then this is an illegal blanket policy. If it was true, my DS would certainly not be in a indie ss for dyslexia now.

im in a similar position - school from their own assessments put my 10 year old daughter at 4 years behind. school refuse tocall EP in as they say EP will not see her as not far enough behind. my daughter is now due to be assessed by dyslexia action next month.

my daughter is in a small school - 10 kids in the class and 2 staff members. she has been there 6 months and in that time they have out lots in place for her but have written it down that this has made no difference and no progress has been made. the head refuses to put her on the sen register although class teacher/senco feels she should be on it so no iep or nothing so far.

she is in an out of county school - did a google and found that in the LA the school is in they have a written policy that no child will get a statement unless they are 6 years behind! the policy states that it is to save money!

if I apply for a statement it will go to the home authourity which is a different LA and they have no such policy but with schools so far ignoring her as she is a placid well behaved girl she has fallen further and further behind and gone under the radar so she has yet to get to school action/plus

my plan is to get her seen next month, get a dx then apply for the statement. to be 4 years behind and for everyone to feel this is okay I find simply shocking. both y other children are statemented and I don't think either of them are as far behind academically so to leave a child just because its dyslexia is madness

bjkmummy I find it shocking that schools accept that 4 years behind is not enough behind yet. You poor dd has to fail, fail, fail before they will finally take notice.

And an illegal blanket of 6 years is truly shocking! What they are saying is that it is totally acceptable for a child to leave primary school with the same literacy levels as they had when they had just left Reception

Originally, I was going to write the following to your message "If there are only 10 in the class, then the school really is not addressing her needs at all. There's absolutely no excuse for the school not to be able to help her, given the small class size and the 1:5 ratio." But then I rethought what I had written and compared your DD to my son DS experience. He had daily 1:1 from a LSA and still failed to progress because the CT & LSA were not trained/experienced/qualified (call it whatever you want) specifically in dyslexia. Does your DD's teachers/TA have qualifications/experience in dyslexia?

As I said up thread, be very very wary if you get a dx of "moderate". When my DS was out of school, I took him to have private weekly lessons with a centre specialising in dyslexia. I came to very much trust the owner and staff here I cried on their waiting room sofas enough times over each dirty dealings from the LA during my build-up to Tribunal. The owner told me that most (but of course, not all) mainstream schools and teachers simply do not understand "moderate". They treat it as "slightly more than mild". But it is not. Different strategies might have to be used for "moderate"

Eventually my son received a dx of severe dyslexia (0.1 percentile). The LA tried to argue in Tribunal that a TA could deliver a daily program to him designed by monthly input from a specialist dyslexia teacher. The Panel found that my son needs daily input from a teacher with post-grad qualification specifically in dyslexia. They also found that the 3 day course run by Essex County Council that the HT of their named school went on was not the level of qualification needed (She had been on this course only just 6 weeks previous to the Tribunal but then couldn't complete it because of her work-load and wasn't even going to be on the one to teach my DS - so that filled me with great confidence as to how her school would be able to cope with my 0.1% DS! )

My now grown-up DD was on SA+ at primary school. (In fact she was one of the first to go on it under the then very new 1996 Education Act - which shows my age ) Her secondary school then removed all support. Fortunately, by her own tenancity and sheer hard-work, after she left school, she has done very well for herself in her choosen career (proud mum moment lol). But I've always been left with "mum guilt" that I didn't do enough for her during her school years or fight when her secondary school removed her provision. Hence why I am now warrior-mum with DC3.

bjkmummy - time to get the warrior-mum outfit back on again and fight fight fight for DD!

I do not think any of the staff do have dyslexia training although her class teacher told me she is dyslexic herself! the report ive got from the school put her as weak in all areas. in the part where it states is it expected she will be referred for further assessment - they have ticked no!

for has she been formally recognised as having learning difficulties - they ticked no!

the teacher wrote ' I am very concerned about her ability in literacy. I am aware since she came to us she is further behind in maths and literacy. through specific lessons TA and teacher support we are seeing good improvement in her maths ability yet this advance is not reflected in her literacy progress' (she is 10 and is now learning her 4 x tables)

this term and last term we put in place several extra session/intervention programmes tailored towards her needs and yet we saw very little progress. what advances was made during the summer term seems to have been lost during the holidays'

the school were so keen to sign her up when we went there as they needed the numbers but now 6 months later I feel ostracised. in such a small school all the parents/teachers/governors are so interlinked and with having the 2 boys out in special schools which we have not publicised definitely feel we are the family with 10 heads. I have to stand there and listen as a parent stood next to me shouts out to all the other parents about a get to gether straight after school - but doesn't ask me or my daughter. she is in year 5 - the oldest girl in the school. I only moved her 6 months ago but have found the grass is not greener at all. it will go down like a lead balloon if I attempt to get her statemented but to hell with it. I think with what the teacher has wrote and I can show from her school reports that she has made no progress - in fact I truly believe her last school deliberately marked her up. my LA are going to love me - just when they thought I had gone away quietly.......

The flippant side of me would say that because the CT is dyslexic herself, did she tick the wrong box? (As a fellow dyslexic myself, forms fill me with dread, and it's exactly what I would do!). But this isn't flippant matter at all.

I feel ostracised. in such a small school all the parents/teachers/governors are so interlinked Yep - been there - got the battle scars to prove. Now my son is in an indie ss specifically because of his dyslexia, and because all the parents have been through Tribunal, I feel one of "in" crowd lol

The only "good" thing, is now you're getting documentary evidence of failure to progress. My DS's record from age 4 to just before Tribunal (age 9) shows total failure to progress, and no progress from one year to the next.

It's no surprise that your DD's literacy is being reflected in her maths work. DS was brilliant at Maths in Reception/Year 1 - in fact so brilliant that indie mainstream school wanted him to redo year 1 because of his literacy and said that his brilliance at maths was a reason to keep him back because he could be the top of the class . I refused to keep him back a year. By the end of year 3, he was in the bottom of maths and very demotivated because the school hadn't applied dyslexia strategies to his maths lesson. This same indie school is Ofsted outstanding for their SEN

When my DS was out of school he had both literacy and numeracy lessons from dyslexia specialist teachers. The numeracy teacher managed to pull his levels back up to "average" in just one year of weekly 1:1 sessions. Purely because she was post-grad qualified in dyslexia and had additionally qualifications in teaching maths to dyslexic pupils.

The LA EP, during the hearing, as well as saying that dyslexia was a speech and language issue, also said that my DS only had 2 hours of specialist teaching each week because the numeracy sessions by a dyslexia teacher didn't count. (Aftwards, tongue in cheek, I did ask the owner of the dyslexia centre if I could have my money back for the numeracy teacher because her hard-work clearly doesn't count.)

These dyslexia specialist teachers pointed out several things to me about maths for dyslexic children.

• Timetables are very very difficult for dyslexic children (I still don't know them) They involve a great deal of working memory effort, and many dyslexic children have working memory issues.

• As children move through KS2 and towards secondary school, the "language of maths" because much harder. The numeracy dyslexia teacher hit a total block with DS when it came to 3-d shapes - purely because he couldn't say or spell the wretched shapes (nor can I!)

-Maths is often involves multi-step problems. So a dyslexic child with poor working memory will have forgotten each step as they try to complete the problem (a bit like a grown-up walking into a room to fetch something and then thinking "why on earth did I come in here" lol)

• Maths isn't just about numbers, it's about words too. So if DS had to answer "100 + 100" - he can do it easy-peasy. But if it is written "hundred plus hundred", then he has absolutely no chance of doing it and doesn't even have the confidence to try it.

• Many dyslexic children try to guess words so might not be able to do maths properly because they are guessing so much. So for instance, if my DS tried "two hundred minus one hundred". He would panic because he wouldn't be able to read the question, and so guess that he was being asked to do addition - so he might come up with the answer of 300.

With your comment what advances was made during the summer term seems to have been lost during the holidays - this is exactly what one of the specialist dyslexia teachers said of my DS in her written evidence to the Tribunal. This sounds like a working memory issue (not that I'm trying to diagnosis on the internet lol) - in my DS's experience, it is a working memory issue.

The Dyslexic Action EP should start to point you in the right direction.

Yep the LA will love you! LAs hate dyslexic children (well mine does!) My LA grabbed onto the fact like a lifeline, that his previous indie mainstream school had written in his Y3 school report "100% Success in Reading xxx books" but failed to read the bit that said xxx books were designed for a 5 year old (he was by then 8) and he had a TA helping him the entire time he did these tests

whats your view on the debate that I would be better to spend my money getting her 1:1 extra teaching rather than fighting for better provision for her in school? ive spoken to a specialist dyslexia teacher and she feels a bit like you that working memory may be an issue. she also want her to have the visual testing done and then also some other stuff which was to do with a listening programme. obviously I need to get the official dx done first as well. she has also just recommend someone who was quite high up at dyslexia action who has just retired and lives in the village where she goes to school and could possibly go into school to teach her.

when I had a meeting with the teacher the other week it was a bit weird as the TA was hanging around in the background listening to what I was saying and had a really sour face! felt a bit uncomfortable if im honest and they wanted me in and out as quickly as possible. she is year 5 and the eldest and missed year 6 by days. of course I have the dilemma of secondary placement fast approaching. in terms of specialist provision there is an independent ss which has some experience of dyslexia in the next city - fees are 10K a year plus the transport costs as well

when I had a meeting with the teacher the other week it was a bit weird as the TA was hanging around in the background listening to what I was saying and had a really sour face! felt a bit uncomfortable if im honest and they wanted me in and out as quickly as possible.

After I sent in one term's notice (because it was a fee-paying school) that I was going to withdrew DS to home ed him, the LSA who had taught him 1:1 for 4 years and who I had a very good relationship with up until then, actually hid from me whenever she saw me walk into the playground. The school then sulked for the first half of that term because I refused to pay for anymore extra help but they also withdrew even CT and TA help which I was still paying for I had to send the head of year a very strongly worded email to remind her that my son was still in their school and they still had a duty of care towards him. Sadly, ime, some teachers/TAs take it as a personal reflection on themselves that dyslexic children can't progress with their help.

Be very very careful with this independent ss which has some experience of dyslexia in the next city As I said up thread, my DS mainstream indie school is Ofsted oustanding for SEN and has even been in glossy mags for their dyslexia unit. This was not my experience at all. If you are thinking of this, carefully question parents with children already there. Also look very carefully at their bandings of experience/support for dyslexia (ie "mild", "moderate", "severe"). If they are indie, they should be showing this info in the online Good Schools Guide.

which was to do with a listening programme Is she suggesting that this is an auditory processing problem? My ds's indie ss has just tested DS for this and he has it so the SALT there has just put him on the Johansen Sound Therapy (in fact we're trying it for the first time tonight lol)

whats your view on the debate that I would be better to spend my money getting her 1:1 extra teaching rather than fighting for better provision for her in school? For 4 years, I threw money at this school to fund extra provision in school, and also provided provision out of school. In the end, I simply didn't knew if it was the school not being able to cope or if my son was much more severe than they had admitted.

So I requested SA (with the schools blessing) and was turned down. When I decided to appeal and got in touch with a solicitor, she advised me to get all the various reports. From that point onwards, I decided that we had to know just how serious things actually were or if it was the school. Because of the way the school had not been totally honest with me, I really didn't believe he was that severe. I was shocked beyond belief when all the assessments and subsequent reports started to roll-in. From that point onwards, ie when I had the full dx, it became about the correct provision in the correct school with dyslexia support in all lessons.

Trouble is with dyslexia, it's not just about "English" lessons. Core subjects such as history, geography, science, maths etc also use literacy skills and each subject will have its own language - particularly at KS3. Severe dyslexia (and I'm not suggesting for one minute that your DD is "severe") impacts a child all through the cirriculum.

I certainly think that you first point of call is to get a proper dx with your DD's levels (mild/moderate/severe) and percentiles. You will then be able to make much more of an informed decision once you have that. Dyslexia Action is very very good and I talked to their EP for ages after DS's assessment (this was long long before I withdrew DS from school and fought my LA to the bitter death).

Thank you for that. I think she has a mixture of things, dyslexia, poor working memory, auditory issues but until she is tested I don't really know and it's all just speculation. Trying to do her homework today and we are just not getting anywhere. I feel like just throwing in the towel until next month and then start afresh once we know what her difficulties are. Whatever the school is doing isn't working and I don't want to drag her self esteem down any further. As she is in a small school her class is made up of yr 3 - yr6 and in reality she is working at yr 2 level and I think she is aware of that as she has commented about who she is doing her work with and it is the younger kids

It really doesn't seem that the school isn't hitting the mark! Yes, a firm dx is most certainly the best starting point in the case of dyslexia - particularly as it sounds as though there are other problems going on with her. I felt once I had the entire picture about my DS, only then could he progress and I've been proved right.

Now he's in a tiny indie ss with tiny class sizes where all the children are of a similar ability regardless of age, my ds's self-esteem is at an all time high. I see him "growing" weekly in his attitude to school and life in general.

I have read many many times both on this board and elsewhere that dyslexic children do not have to be taught by specialist teachers/TA with qualifications in dyslexia - rather a specialist teacher can put a program in place and can then be delivered by a TA. I totally disagree. My own LA does not believe that primary school children need teachers with post-grad qualifications in dyslexia. They believe that dyslexia is a speech and language issue and therefore my DS's dyslexic needs could be met in a speech and language unit. The Judge disagreed with the LA on both counts.

Another way you could help her and your own understanding of her difficulties is Toe by Toe. Do you use it? During my year of home ed'ing my DS, I did daily sessions of this with him. It totally showed me how difficult my DS found literacy and how severe his literacy and working memory needs are. It also showed up how severe my own dyslexia still is, but that's another story

oh and Toe by Toe also showed up the total extent of sheer terror and anxiety reading causes my DS. I had that poxy red book hurled at me so many times during my year of home ed that I'm surprised it didn't fall apart! I gave evidence about these sessions to the Tribunal and it reduced me to tears during the hearing when I recollected his extreme anxiety and terror at these simple daily 10 minute sessions.