Applying for a statement, writing a letter for a formal assessment, help please:0)

[brandy77]

Ok Attila put a link on another thread of mamabells so she may want help as well.

Ive read the standard model letter on attilas link but im not quite sure exactly what you write and what to include.

It says i believe %%%%%%% SEN are as follows......... ?

What exactly do you say and how do you word it. Sorry a big ask. I mean my son (same as mambells probably) will suffer extreme seperation anxiety for weeks, this will lead to violent behaviour. The only way they will deal with him is by distraction, but i mean heavy distraction, probably for the whole morning (9-12 for 3 weeks) The school have said i can stay for the first week and then be weaned off with a timer, so they will be making efforts to support us. But on thinking perhaps i shouldnt stay for the first week, will this make my son worse?

He will find things like eating dinner around a table very intimidating and scarey and just find school life scarey. He is prone to violent outbrusts and i know he has odd behaviour in the way he talks to people, the school havent obviously experienced this yet.

He also has a medical condition that requires tablets to be taken, they cant be taken at a certain time of day , he would have to monitored to see how much he pees before he can have a tab. Im really worried about this as the sudden urge to pee when his meds wear off is described as having a bee in your bladder, and i think, oh god what if they tell him he has to wait to go to the toilet and he will wet himself. Ive told the school that if he peed say 3 times in an hour and the heavy water drinking would follow then he would need a tab. But if different staff are keeping an eye on him then they might miscount wees, sounds ridiculous i know but hes like a hosepipe without the meds, what goes in comes straight back out again.

"my reasons for believing that the school cannot on their own make the provision required to meet my childs needs are......"

well this is the problem, they may be ok in reception with him as theyre only 14 kids and 2 staff (originally thought it was 3 staff, i got that wrong)but last year they got a boy statemented with ASD and hes now in Year 1 where the classes are bigger. The teacher has said to me "oh he was much worse than your son", i think, hang on how do you know! aghhhh

Sorry for waffle!

oops forgot mamabells son already has a statement, perhaps you could help me word this correctly too

Brandy

I will try and help....not sure how useful it will be!

Could his preschool give some real life examples of the issues that your son had at preschool? These could be an indication of some of the problems he will have at school. You could list these as examples in your letter.

Sorry, I will have to carry on later - got a very irate son demanding that I finish what I'm doing!

'It says i believe %%%%%%% SEN are as follows......... ?'

`If it were for ds3 (and it was 2 years ao that I applied) I would rite

'related to his diagnossis of asd, which manifest in X ways and causes Y difficulties that cause a need for support within an educational setting'

tweak the dx to suit or if no d juast specify 'related to his SEn which I would describe as of a physical / behavioural / learning difficulties nature (all those that apply), is being investigated by and manifests itself as......

'"my reasons for believing that the school cannot on their own make the provision required to meet my childs needs are......"'

Include lots of NAS opribted info huighlighting for example the Triad, anything treferring to social inclusioon, language, social skills etc. Number them, and then do a linked list of how these aspects of ASD will affect the school environment.

So agian for ds3:

'as a result of his ASD (see NAS sheet 1) his language is severely impaired. This will impact on his ability to learn during spoken lesons, interact with his peers and crucially on a safety level alert people as to his needs and concerns- such as illness or distress.

Finish sectioopn with a reference to an appendiced report or the contact details of any SALT

DS1 has less professional involvement, his is absed upon behavioural problems. That would read

;'AS a result of his asd, ds1 cannot cope with groups, social interaction or unstructured time (see related notes on shets 1-3); this in turn leads to him becoming inctreasingly anxious, distressed and very often physically aggressive in a school environment. It severely impacts on his learning potential because of the teaching methods used in a larger class, and rpeents hima ccessing taught education in any significant or effective manner.

You have to spell it out, link to info sheets and as many reports as you can find. Ditch any one side report forms you are sent and fill in your own version on the PC covering every bit of info. Hit them with as much paperwork and cross referencinga s you can. put the possible consequences of not sattementing-

I put:

'DS1 could easily severely injure a child without proper supervision, causing both financial effects on the LEA (AKA I'll sue your bollcoks off) and harm or danger to other children whose protection is the responisibility of the schoola nd therefore LEA

Sorry back with you after a very long day.

Not sure how helpful I can be re your letter. I didn't get any help completing it so I didn't structure my response very well. Luckily had lots of supporting information from the other LEA departments and paed.

If possible you should try to provide some evidence to show that your son's ASD/medical condition will impact negatively on his ability to learn. If it is just behaviour they may reject the request to assess (this was the reason they gave to refuse our assessment - they said that strategies had to be tried first to alleviate the behaviour before an assessment would be considered)

We also added something similar to Peachy above about how his behaviour impacted negatively and dangerously on the class as a whole and needed constant monitoring to prevent negative situations from escalating (i.e through distraction, reminders of the correct rules or removal from the situation)

As Peachy advises we made lots of references to the Triad of Impairment and how it impacts him such as transitions, inflexibility of thinking, social skills with peers, issues with unstructured time such as lunchtime/playtime - which you also describe, delayed development re social understanding of situations - he has problems calling out, taking turns, having tantrums, is very impulsive and fidgets in whole class situations.

Sorry not able to be more helpful with the structure but may give you some ideas for what sort of things you can put in the letter.

We just put our letter in, we used info off the IPSEA website - its actually on the part that says appealing if your application is turned down (so ignore the bits about Tribunals)- but there is actually more helpful info here than on the section that tells you how to apply! I've pasted it below:

"The Education Act 1996 says that local authorities must identify and make a
statutory assessment of those children in their areas who have special
educational needs and who probably need a statement. (See the Legislation
section.)
This means you will need to convince the Tribunal that a statutory
assessment is necessary to provide the right help for your child.
Generally there are three ways of establishing this. By saying that:
1 a full assessment is the only way to find out what your child?s
difficulties are and what help your child needs;
2 the school could not give all the educational help your child needs
unless it receives extra help from the LA;
3 the school has given your child all the help that could be expected
but he or she has not made enough progress.
Now you need to plan your case around the points which fit your case.
There are at least two different approaches to take:
A Where point 1 (above) applies, you need to make the case that
advice from a number of different professionals is needed to fully
understand your child?s difficulties. In other words, your child ?is a
puzzle? and only a statutory assessment can help everyone
understand the nature and severity of their difficulties and decide the
help they need. Often this is not enough on its own to persuade the
Tribunal that your child needs a statutory assessment. You will also
have to show that they probably need a statement if their needs are
to be met (see B).
B For points 2 and 3, you need to make the case that your child?s
needs probably cannot be met without a statement of special
educational needs. You do not have to prove a statement is
necessary, only that it is probably necessary. The law says that
where an LA needs to determine the provision needed by a child with
a leaning difficulty, then the LA must draw up and maintain a
statement. (See the Legislation, Section 324 and Legal definitions).

In many cases both approaches will apply"

I got a template from the NAS website. Personally I don't think you need to go into too much detail in your request as you will need to do it all again when you have to fill in the required forms etc.

I also got the school to write on the same day I did so that the LEA received 2 letters regarding the same child.

My letter just said:

Dear Mr X,

Re: (Childs name), (Childs DOB)

We are writing to ask you to assess the educational needs of our (son/daughter) under the terms of the Education Act 1996.

We make this request under section 329 of the Act because (Childs name) has been diagnosed with (DX) by (Paeds name). We have enclosed a copy of her latest report following our most recent meeting with her on (XXX). (Childs name) is attending (Schools name) and both we as his parents and the school feel that (he/she) needs extra support whilst at school.

We understand that you will gather information about (Childs name) special educational needs and that a panel will decide whether or not those needs meet Surrey?s criteria for statutory assessment.

Yours sincerely,

(Parents names)

Our DS1's statement process from start to finish was only 5 months, and because we had the school and all the professionals on board we got exactly what we wanted - 25 hours 1:1 support.

HTH.

that was a quick result cjones

After discussions with my ex we have decided to wait till September after all as by then my son would have met with a speech therapist and we also would have seen his paed in London. Im gathering the more evidence you supply the better

Yes, definitely. The whole process will drag on otherwise, so it's best to be prepared.

If you need any further help or advice, please let me know.