SALT report in. Any views?

[lougle]

Ok, The SALT report is in.

Summary is:

Attention and listening - fine
Understanding of language -fine
Spoken language - fine
Social interaction - fine

School reports anxiety about new tasks in the classroom, which has now reduced. DD2 can be observed playing alone in the playground at times. She's been attending nurture groups and her co-operative play skills have seen some 'recent progress.'
DD2 seems to be at an early stage of friendship development because she defines friends as 'people who go to the same activity' rather than 'people who share likes/dislikes'.

So there we go.

Interestingly, she wouldn't get dressed today, citing a sore tummy. I couldn't get to the bottom of whether it was 'tummy ache' or a 'pulled muscle' - she couldn't describe it. DH came home and said 'did DD2 go in ok today? She was worried about the activities they're doing today for Euro Week.'

DD quite happily would go along with anyone and did fantastic 1 to 1 as well. Wasn't reflective of classroom though and recent testing has shown that she can be in a class no bigger than 8!

Thank you, sazale. I'm glad you've got to the bottom of her difficulties.

I'm certain she's intelligent. I'm certain she's very bright, actually. I'm also very aware that she's already equating the fact that she's in 'circles' for maths with her not being clever.

I really feel for you lougle and you have 2 choices really as we all do when faced with difficulties getting people to recognise the difficulties our children face. You can either stand back and observe and see what happens or you can continue to gather evidence do as much reading as possible and try to ensure that your Dd2 does not get discharged by all the proffs involved.

The way I see it is that it takes a lot longer to get a high functioning girl diagnosed than it should my Dd3 was 9 and I was told this is quite early for a girl!! Most apparently fall apart at secondary and then get mis-diagnosed first.

You know you are not going to give up because this is your amazing Dd2 we are talking about but just pace yourself because you could be in for a long haul.

Take care and be kind to yourself

ERRNI - All of ds's scores were within the average range (as are all of his formal assessments) SALT goes on to say 'but an analysis of the storyline confirms x,y,z'

CCC2 - showed clinical significance in speech, semantics, coherence, stereotyped language, use of context, nonverbal communication, social relations, interests.

Ds has various strengths and weaknesses, his strengths hide his weaknesses very well. Ds main difficulties are with semantic and pragmatic. Semantics he can score 0.4 centile some days and 75th centile another, so that makes it 'ok'. In my experience language disorders such as pragmatic difficulties are not prioritised for speech and language services, so they don't bother analysing.

With DS1 he had 'age appropriate' scores and I had to accept that the profs couldn't see anything. With DS2 I would follow up any assessments done and ask for actual scores - age appropriate is a huge percentage of the overall population covering minus 2 standard deviations to plus 2 standard deviations ie twenty odd percentile to eighty odd percentile.

Push for classroom observation. DS1 was not observed to be disengaged until year 6.

Diagnosis ime is at transition - basically primary, juniors and secondary. The more complex and compliant seem to be diagnosed when secondary fails. For both boys it has been necessary to have about 3 years of assessment. Whether the NHS do this or you have to go private depends on whether the requests come from the school or the parent.

16th percentile to 84th percentile

Keep plodding away. It took 5 years of real effort to get DS diagnosed, and then it was only cos he's a bolter. The minute he stopped doing that his school declared him "cured".

"Stranger danger" was one of his explicitly taught targets last year & he's an expert at smiling and nodding his head without having a CLUE what he's being asked to do.

Honestly I think you need a private EP report from someone sensible like Linda Miller as the NHS is letting you down. I regret bitterly not getting a private report years sooner than I did, and letting blind faith in the state professionals cause me to fail my child.

It is worth remembering that until private SALT did classroom obs at the end of summer in year 2 and the specialist nurse did classroom obs at the start of the third year I had nothing but minimised, odd comments from teachers that would only be made at IEP review, seemingly out of the blue, and vague comments in the text of NHS SALT and OT reports. They might give the actual scores but they don't say what they actually mean or suggest.

Age appropriate means that, using those particular measurement tools, she does not meet the criteria for additional support. It does not mean that she is fine.

I 2nd what keep says. I deeply regret the length of time that elapsed before I got independent reports. We did them for tribunal so at first I was shocked at the cost! Now I've seen them they were worth every penny and more.

I have a 6 year olds Y2 son who is having difficulties in school with anxiety, picking up reading etc. The NHS assessed him for ASC and concluded that they couldn't decide. I'm now wondering whether to bother with a 2nd opinion or just to get a thorough, independent assessment when I can. His differences can be quite subtle and he is ultra compliant which means school are next to useless. However, I'm so much more clued up this time!

I hope you get some answers soon x

Poltergoose - I do hear what you are saying about private reports.
When things go wrong a living nightmare is not an inaccurate description of just how bad it can get.

The family fund, Caudwell, and cerebra and contact a family can all help chase down funding. I know this, because I'm in the process of doing it myself, following a forced relocation.

Cerebra have a passport where you can describe a child's difficulties. I did it a couple of years ago just to try and get ALL Ds's issues down in one place. It has come in so handy since relocating as I can give a plain English description of DS's difficulties to professionals at the start of a meeting, or to a swimming instructor etc.

www.cerebra.org.uk/English/gethelp/personalportfolios/Pages/default.aspx

I do think it's worth filling one out to use as a starter for 10 for discussions with professionals, especially if like mine you have a child with an "olympic ring" profile of difficulties rather than a nice easy obvious presentation.

A begged assessment from an Indi salt school might be the way to go. Once your 'friends' they have contacts and can signpost. There ARE cheaper/free ways of gathering info.

IPSEA and SOSSEN both have funds for those who fall out of legal aid criteria but who can't afford private.

It isn't just about the money though, or at least it wasn't for me. By going private I had to adjust to giving up hope totally in the system I believed could/should/would do right by my child eventually. The concept of 'going private' made me shake and feel I had entered another world and one I did not like.

It must be so frustrating for you all, who know that the reality is that private assessments unlock provision. I'm frustrated that if DD2 had different parents, she probably would/could do that. Unfortunately it isn't an option for us.

In terms of other funding streams, I hear you. However, I do think we have to be realistic here. You've all been hearing me bleat on discuss DD2 and you've seen videos and you've see lots of 'her' through my posts.

The reality is that on paper:

-She's 6
-She's a typically developing girl who is a bit shy
-She's just a bit behind on friendships, but getting better
-She's just not that clever (but not SEN).

From the professionals' point of view, there is a spectrum of normal development and someone has to sit at the low end of 'average', for 'average' to be 'average'. The mathematician in me sees that logic perfectly. Why not DD2? She's August born (tick), born 5 weeks premature (tick), in bottom sets for maths (tick) and not setting the world on fire in literacy (tick) but not so alarming that she can't write or spell at all (tick).

I agree that someone has to be the 'low ability but normal' person on the bell curve. I just disagree that this person is DD2. Because I see her passion for space, her inquisitive mind, etc. I see how she's watching everything around her, trying to make sense of it. She's passive, but she can absorb information if she finds it interesting and relevant to her.

No charity is going to fund assessments for a child who has already had assessments which tell the reader that she's a normal kid who's got a neurotic mother.

In the short term, I have got to keep a dialogue with the school. She's got 4 more years at primary school. This is already her second school in one cluster of schools. I can't move her again without very good cause.

The school is right - she has improved on the anxiety stakes. I don't think it will have the long-lasting impact they feel it has. They see her as 'improved'. I see it as 'DD2 is having a temporary hiatus in anxiety due to the frequent ability to escape the classroom.' She cries if I even mention dragonflies finishing.

'Slowly, slowly, catchy monkey' is the only way to go here.

DS2 has only been a current patient of NHS SALT for 5 years because of articulation difficulties which were apparent far earlier than his functional and social language difficulties. Failure to progress and teacher reported issues led to further assessment and referral to paed.

But despite all this the school still didn't understand or claimed not to because you need the narrative not just the results. I needed objective eyes and ears that would not minimise severity. School had suggested disengagement was rare so it was a shock to find out he was completely disengaged for over 90% of the time.

If the assessment is not for tribunal I would say that any good Indi would be enough so that you are not totally reliant on the school for info (about half the price of MS if you can possibly afford it).

DS2 has only been a current patient of NHS SALT for 5 years because of articulation difficulties which were apparent far earlier than his functional and social language difficulties. Failure to progress and teacher reported issues led to further assessment and referral to paed.

But despite all this the school still didn't understand or claimed not to because you need the narrative not just the results. I needed objective eyes and ears that would not minimise severity. School had suggested disengagement was rare so it was a shock to find out he was completely disengaged for over 90% of the time.

If the assessment is not for tribunal I would say that any good Indi would be enough so that you are not totally reliant on the school for info (about half the price of MS if you can possibly afford it).

^Star^ your comments about going it alone/private really resonate for me.

I would prefer it if the state fulfilled its obligations to my son, however he only has one childhood and the damage already caused by failure to meet his needs will take years to heal.

I KNOW that this forum is great for free resources - simply because I've now relied upon them for years, and usually pick up at least one good tip per week. DS wouldn't have made the progress he has without them. I also try hard to share what info I have.

What I'm no longer prepared to do after my own experiences is let people believe that eventually the help their child so desperately needs will arrive eventually on a white charger courtesy of the state. It may never happen, and I'm friends with a few adults on the spectrum who are kind enough to help me with my son so that their own childhoods & consequent issues in adulthood do not repeat themselves.

The only thing that stopped me emigrating last year was the fact the my son is not a native language speaker in the countries I considered.

Do contact Linda Miller - she knows sources of funding that will unlock access to her services. Sometimes even a quick conversation with someone who speaks "LA lingo" can help you formulate your argument better.

When DS started first school he was regarded as being at the top of the bell curve of normal and no-one listened to me, as I was just "Mum". Looking back I'm lucky I wasn't called crazy by a school till AFTER he was finally diagnosed at the end of a five year battle .

It could possibly help to utilise your right to a second NHS opinion out of area if you have somewhere in mind. Lorna Wing seems to have a good reputation for complex/subtle presentations and the NAS may have advice on how to get that precious referral.

You do have my sympathy as I have a close friend who wasn't diagnosed until she was 34. Her own experiences mean I haven't been allowed to give up trying even the most obscure routes for support for DS.