Experiences of mixed placement or private professionals within statement

[paperlantern]

ds is assessed as functioning within normal cognitive range but due to a range of issues (tbc but broadly speaking severe verbal and all over dyspraxia) is not functioning at mainstream level.

he has been at a special school for his original diagnosis of asd which is now called into question and has made no academic progress, although SLT has.

so now considering a mixed placement with a few days in mainstream for tha academic and social challenge and a few days in special to get in the therapy needed

another option I wondered about is to persuade the tribunal to get my own therapists (ot slt and physio) who understand DS very well linked into a mainstream placement and I wondered if anyone had achieved this

looking for thoughts and opinions on this please.

bugger trying to get this edited or pulled.

report it and ask MNHQ to delete (or edit).

i am currently fighting to have Speech therapy twice a week with a private therapist and OT support (private again, to train TA and monitor once every 3 weeks) included within our statement for a ms placement. I'm no doubt going to have to go to tribunal to get this though.

What is an ideal situation (and one im fighting for) is for the SPLT and the OT to be embedded in the dc's daily curriculum. Basically, what would happen in terms of support in a ss but in a mainstream environment.
How old is your dc and did the ep say no academic progress?

...However, i'm not the best person to ask as i'm currently debating on what i want dc to achieve in a ms environment and if its worth it or go directly to ss.

I've fixed that for you now, paperlantern.

thanks mumsnet hq! serves me right for overexcited mumsnetting!!!

right save to post!

Appreciate the perspective lesley. we're coming from the perspective of a failed ss placement. never thought I'd be considering ms but actually it might be the best fit in our area. like you I am trying to work out what I want ds to get out of a mainstream placement.

One way or another it is interesting to know that other people are trying to get private professionals in. I know wherever ds is he will need significant skilled support, I know the team I have for tribunal is good.

Gosh paper lantern, i would be really interested to know your journey..I take it ds went straight to ss with his diagnosis of asd - was he verbal?
It didn't work , but can i ask how you just "knew" it didnt work in erms of progress as you mentioned cognitively there isn't a problem but speech has shown good progress...

My journey with regards to your original question is that i do have private therapists working in a ms at the moment and i pay privately for these and going to tribunal in march to get these added into the statement along with our spd diagnosis.

Yes he did and yes he was although often not intelligible. He signed a little. He went to MS nursery with support.

The placement is failing because they have treated him as a low functioning ASD child and haven't noticed that he probably actually isnt. .

have said for years DS' difficulties are because of fatigue and physical problems and was not due to all round developmental delay. been getting nowhere with PHysio OT and the school who were all convinced there was nothing wrong that wouldn't rectify in time. To my mind treat DS' difficulties and you see improvement.

Caught out Physio lying about the treatment DS was getting (or not getting) and inexplicably school decided to back physio despite that implicating themselves in the mess. Things very rapidly went down hill from there

"Academic" progress looks good according to their tick charts but his target last summer term was the same as he was getting towards doing at nursery 2 years earlier.
I was told that wasn't possible as all the children at the school were 2 years delayed

Thought I was going nuts but my paediatrician backed me and I met my private therapists on the way to tribunal who have been awesome.

Cognitive testing has only been done recently. he tested in the high end of average range, which was just awesome. Tribunal team seems pretty sure there is a physical complex diagnosis to come in time, but working diagnosis is the dyspraxia one above, coupled with a severe language disorder and audio processing issues.

So I have a ms child who cannot do even the basics due to his variety of physical difficulties. Hence trying to work out where to place DS.

Time is on my side though as he is only 6 and half!

phew that was a marathon

that's over stating it! I think it's high end of average. tested within normal range which was the main thing as it didn't fit with global development delay in ds' statement.

I'd be interested in how that goes. tribunal is due early next year but we suspect it will need to be delayed whilst we check out further diagnosis

right then.

What is helping me is the fact that my private therapists have been involved in ds's life doing what they do best (OT & SPLT) at home , THEN ms nursery (needed 1:1 support there also) and then in mainstream school.

What i did when i initially wanted a ms placement for my ds - i went see all my shortlisted schools and arranged first a look, then if i liked it i went to see the head at the second visit and explained that i would like my therapists to come in and work train the TA so it could be part of ds's activities throughout the day - with an emphasis on the language and cognitive exercises. I would skip part one visit and go straight to the head for first visit. If a ms isn't on board or unfriendly about sen children - better to know now. Trust me it filters down.

In an ideal world that should have worked - and it did, but we had a change in funding and attitudes changed TA was shite basically, variables i could not change.

Your first start is to get the 1:1 support on the statement for the whole school week. None of this 25 hours malarky as it sounds like your ds 's physical boundaries will warrant it. The second, is to make sure all your therapists you employ can write the necessary reports stating how many times they come in during the week (home or previous placement) and the results this has yielded.
Finally, on the 2 schools you like - pay your therapists to go in and see the environment. Its a variable you cannot change and the therapists could well see something you've missed (echoy rooms etc). Most heads should be fine with that.

My solicitor explained that tribunals dont tend to back parents saying they need x y and z - without showing its currently being used at that level of frequency (i.e twice a week).

I hope that helps.