What should I ask?

[Smashie11]

Hi all,
Looking for a bit of advice about a meeting that is coming up. It involves my DSs nursery and his SALT and myself and DH.

DS (3yrs old) was at SALT tail end of last year and beginning of this year. His speech has come on amazingly and we can now hold conversations (sort of) with him. Before SALT signed us off she said she would go and observe DS at nursery. This was fine with us and nursery, who are absolutely amazing with DS.

Long story short SALT have said they feel DS could use some 1 to 1 at nursery after summer hols and that he would benefit from visual aids at nursery. She felt he was quite flighty/rubbish at staying in one place, only wanted to talk about Lego Marvel Super Heroes (latest obsession), not very good socially and not great eye contact. Obviously we are thinking ASD, as is she, and we are currently waiting on our next paed appointment (sept/oct) as first appt paed said he wanted to wait and see.

Nursery have organised a meeting with us all but I would really like to be a bit prepared as I feel totally in the dark about all this. Nursery have been amazing and are willing to do whatever it takes to help DS although I think they feel a bit out of their depth with DS hence the meeting and 1 to 1 after hols.

So what should I be asking? Should I take anything with me (I have no idea what)? Just don't want to let my wee man down by not asking the right questions or asking for the right help iykwim. Should probably add I live in Scotland as think things are different here than in England. Thank you in advance.

Well I'm in England but have a three year old who starts school in sept just diagnosed with asd. He is non verbal thou.

By a big level arch file and a ring bound notepad as this makes organising things easy. Write all your questions in the notepad and put any reports you have in the binder. Take both along so if anyone wants to look at reports you have it.

Right notes in the binder as I think you need to think about types of questions.

What do nursery think the problem areas are?
How can they / you / salt help?
What do they expect to see improvement wise?
By when?
If they don't get desired results then what happens?

So if they say ISP/ IEP targets you need to know what being worked on etc.

Sorry that sounds a bit basic for now. But really think about what you need to know. Write that down or you will forget( well I would!)

Ask if they will be keeping the nhs informed and education. How can you contact salt going forward?

Sorry my brains not in the right place now. Will come back to you after some food!

Thank you 2boys.

Just looked through all DS letters etc and they all seem to be appointment letters and no reports apart from blood test results, which were ok. Only thing even close to a report is minutes of meetings that we (DH and I)have had with nursery. I'm sure that will change soon though.

Good idea about the notepad, I'm rubbish at remembering things. Our SALT did phone me with her update after observing DS at nursery and I could barely remember the half of it to relay to DH.

Some great questions for me to ask too but can I just ask what is IEP/ISP? Should I be noting down, what I call, DS's quirks? Or is that more info for the next paed appointment?

It's all so new and baffling. It's hard to know what to tell and to who

In my notepad I have a one page bullet point if ds history as I'm always repeating myself.

So it's basic stuff like sat at x moths, walked at y first words at z then his history of falling and getting into nhs podiatry and slt which how he started his journey.

Then I have some diary pages in the same book. Any odd, new quirks go in ( had a bad year where ds tried un intentionally repeatedly killing himself! My older boy that is)

Then the meetings etc are all in the front. So yes. A potted history and list of behaviours is a good idea.

In England my toddler has a ISP - was a IEP ( individual education plan)
www.specialeducationalneeds.co.uk/iep---individual-education-plan.html

www.educationscotland.gov.uk/Images/CfEBriefing13_tcm4-809982.pdf

You need to building up a profile so if A IEP is felt appropriate you don't need to waste time waiting to see the pead, build up a picture as you go along. If he needs help later in the form of formal help at school you need lots of evidence of what's been done, what works, what's been tried etc. don't think that far ahead thou. Not yet. Getting a iep etc in place now is what I guess your needing.

I think these links explain IEP / ISP but maybe there are better sites. I just did a quick google

If your DS was/is under the SALT, she will have had to write up her clinical notes after each session / appointment with him, so you are entitled to a copy of those. You shouldn't have to rely on memory of a phonecall with her and keep all this information in your head. It might be worth speaking to her to obtain a copy of any notes before your meeting, so at least you know where the SALT will be coming from.

Thank you again 2boys and sorry to hear about your tough year with your eldest, hope things are improving for you both. I will have a proper read of the links later when DC are in bed but the quick scan I had makes sense. The SALT did mention in the phone call about setting DS some targets to work towards during the summer hols so maybe she means something like IEP/ISP.

zzzzz - some more great questions thank you. I think I'm going to have to develop a more forward approach with this. I'm more a go with the flow kinda person but I don't think that will insure the best for my DS.

zen1 - I will give SALT a phone tomorow and ask for a copy of his notes. We did a 6week group session plus the observation at his nursery so like you say there must be some notes for him.zserdeezz

With regards to his quirks I'm still not sure what is normal toddler behaviour and what isn't. I'm comparing him to when my older dc were his age but they were both girls and are at least 7yrs older than him so toddler for them was a while ago and I wonder if I'm not remembering correctly. Is there some info anywhere that I could read up on?

Try the national autium society and nhs sites. I'm not sure either are particularly great but they the first two that spring to mind