Secondary education for the dyslexic child

[Soindecisive]

Hoping for some words of wisdom from anyone who has experience of having a dyslexic dc at secondary school.

I have a choice of two local state schools which deal with children with special needs in different ways.

One takes the child out of the lesson to work in the SEN department (lessons typically missed are languages and RE).

The other school does not take the child out of the lesson but the classes are streamed. I suppose in this case you might avoid the disruption of missing certain lessons - but you could end up in a class where everyone needs a lot of attention.

Anyone experienced either/both methods. Advice very much welcomed as dd is in year 5 now!

We faced a similar dilemma when looking for secondary schools. In the end we had a third option of a school specialising in dyslexia; if this hadn't of been available I would have opted for the school withdrawing DS from lessons. If a child is struggling with English then making them do French/Spanish/German is futile, IMHO - better to spend the time focusing on their particular area of weakness. I would ask the SENCO what experience/training they have in working with children with dyslexia; unfortunately in our local school the SENCO was well meaning but acknowledged that she had just had very general SN training - in her case the focus was on autism/aspergers and behaviour issues - and didnt really know too much about the best way to help a dyslexic child. There are loads of organisations out there (eg Helen Arkell Dyslexia Institute) which offer training for teachers and Sencos - so it may be that a school could allocate some of their training budget for this. The risk with schools that don't provide specific support and just use setting is that your DC may be in the bottom set with children who don't want to learn or have behaviour issues - if your DC is bright but just has a SN then this could have a a really bad impact on their self-esteem, and they may get really frustrated. I also wonder if a school doesnt provide additional support whether they would be pressing for extra time/scribes in exams (if Mr Gove hasnt abolished this completely by the time your DS gets to his GCSEs!). Ask lots of questions, its an important decision. Good luck!

Ditto the taking out of languages