Speech and language unit assement

[adrianna22]

Hi

DS 4, has been put in for a referral at a speech and language unit. If he will get accepted for a referral from the speech and language unit. He will have to be assessed there in order to get a place.

What tests would they do or what things would they assess him on?

Thanks.

How long is his assessment at the language unit? My ds is having a 6 week assessment at the moment. The place is subject to the assessment. Apparently they rarely turn kids away after assessment (the hard work is getting the assessment) but I am not counting my chickens yet and am having to put in a tribunal appeal in case they do. Also, if they do say he needs to go back to ms school he will have to settle in a new school only a couple of months after starting school for the first time so all in all I'm feeling rather stressed about it.

As far as I can tell, his assessments are those used by his previous SALT - talking about pictures, pointing to the correct ones etc. (Don't know names of actual tests). Any associated difficulties have to be secondary to SLCN and he has to respond to therapy. I suppose my worries are about associated difficulties and as his speech has come on I worry they will say he isn't bad enough for the unit though it is still bad.

I hope it works out for your ds.

Hi bilberry

Thanks for your post.

I'm not sure how long DS assessment will be as he has just got put through to a referral. He has to be accepted for the referral first.

Why is the assessment so long? Well I guess it's fair since kids may present a false picture, if it's a one day assessment and not used to the environment.

I think you'll be fine. DS has ASD so this may go against him. Though his ASD symptoms are mild.

They generally do tests to assess current language levels. So receptive understanding, expressive levels, speech sound development etc.

Some language units are for very specific speech difficulties and their entry criteria is based around this.. For instance the language unit where I am is just for children who have specific speech sound problems. So when they are assessed they have to have average levels of understanding and their speech sounds have to be severely disordered.

Do you know what your local language unit is set up for? You could ask them for their entry policy?

Our assessment is basically while he attends school. The SALT is only in our unit/base two days a week (two whole days, 7 kids) and I guess there is only so much "point to the picture of a tube/sister/small tree" a kid can cope with at one dose. I presume the specialist teacher is doing her assessment as well and they need to do all the normal/specialist p1 teaching as well. Ds seems happy at the moment.

Is your ds starting reception this year? How is he getting on? How long might the referral to the language unit take?

Thanks missbluebird for your post. It was either the educational physiologist or the SEN department that referred DS to the language unit, so I was't aware, but rather surprised they would consider this. But again, I'm not going to get my hopes up.

Bilberry DS starts reception next week, but his quite excited. He loves the uniform, especially the tie as he hasn't seen one before.

They've already referred him, but I'm not sure how long they would take to get back to me.