Examples for a statement for physical disability(cp)

[muchadoaboutsomething]

Hi. I was wondering if anyone may be able to help me with examples of a good statement for a child who has physical disability. My ds is a part time wheelchair user, needs a walker/tripod sticks and has 25 hours 1-1 at the moment. The council have just sent through his draft statement which doesn't specify or quantify anything. There are lots of things wrong with it, but as I am going to go through it I wondered if anyone had any good examples which they would be willing to share of what I should be saying to get the council to tie it down much more than they are doing at the moment?

Oh his 1-1 is in nursery. The statement would be for school.

I would be contacting IPSEA asap; this statement as it stands is unlawful (as well as not being worth the paper its written on) as provision has to be both specified and quantified.

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

My DS has CP and when started school sounds physically very much like yours, he used tripods inside and Kaye waker outside and a wheelchair for longer distances. Just before school started, in May, he took his first independent steps so practised that inside between tables.

His statement is sewn up tight! He has quantified and specified OT, physio and Salt. OT and physio boths say a block of 1 hour weekly sessions for 5 weeks every term with a qualified OT or physio, it then gives an extra hour per term for liaising with his 1:1, me and equipment checks and a further extra hour a year for more formal meetings, in practise this is the annual review. Also in there are that his 1:1 must attend every session and carry out an exercise program devised by th OT or physio three times a week.This means that he has one half term of physio and the other half term of OT repeated throughout the year, no chopping and changing and no fobbing off with a 'technician', also it protects his therapy time and still allows time for meetings. With regard to the exercises, he usually does 2x physio a week and 1 x OT but this does vary and I need to keep checking on school to see that it actually happens.

Salt - not his major area of need - says termly assessments and 2 blocks a year of small group or individual work with a speech therapist. This is fine and suits his needs although sometimes the social skills groups are not the best!

In terms of 1:1 support he's now in Y4 and has 28 hours of individual or small group 1:1. This is fine for him as he's academically very able but he does need support, what happens in practise is that he shares his 1:1 with another statemented child but there is cover within the school should both boys need actual 1:1 at the same time. When he started reception. He had 32.5 hours with the same woolly wording and Iwas going to challenge it but in the end he got into a unit attached to a mainstream school and the 1:1 issue was covered by the unit place. When he transferred to mainstream at Y3 I was happy to accept 28 hours of 'small group of individual help' because I knew he could cope. If he had been mainstream from reception I would have challenged it!

Hope this helps.

Thanks a lot for that hairy. I have sometimes thought that ds sounds likes your ds but younger. How did you find the unit attached to mainstream? I don't think there's anything like that around me.

Unit was fantastic, it was really what DS needed, a small environment in which to build his confidence and gradually integrate into mainstream, by year 2 he was fully integrated and thriving but he would have struggled, but coped, with reception.

It also helped as he could see other children with disabilities and see that he was better than them at some things (and they were better at others) but until then he'd really been the only child he really knew with any problems! If we were applying for reception now though I don't think he'd have got in as although the unit is officially mixed physical disability and autism in practise DS was really the last 'only' PD child they have had, it's now autism, or autism type conditions, only. I think he would now only be given a mainstream place.