meeting with Lea --help

[Phoenix4725]

in a nutshell , ds has verbal /oral dyspraxia , receptive is 2% oral is below 1% as well as lowmuscle tone\hypermoblity and uses a wheelchair ,wears afos and has problems with fine control

He went to Ms reception with full statement with all of teh above plus delayed devlopment which i always susspected not correct ,but after one term was obviouys not working, no adjustments very litle signing etc.Ds changed to unhappy little child that was pooing and wetting self

Went to ican got full assement and they said statement review he does not have devlopmental delay all his diffculties are related to language/understanding and physical issues no behaviour \asd etc

.Called review we then moved after and Lea agreed speech unit yay i thought

But paperwprk went out to speech unit along with ican report and they have come back they feel ds to severe for there remit

All agreed special not suitable esecially local one ,THere now talking about ds back in ms as only option

have meeting on the 8th and not sure where to go next , am looking out of area but the special schools do seem more approiate for dc on the spectrum.any idears i am on the Herts/ESSex border

no ideas about your area, but my ds is also to sever for s&l unit but apparently will be ok in ms without a statement !!!we have a special school near us that is for kids with moderate leaning difficulties, i always thouh sn schools were for profound difficulties, so changed my view alot about sn schools, is there different types of sn schools in your area

ah see ds does have a statement but its the unit saying no.there concern is about ds in ms for afternoons
as they only have morning in units ,there lsa but not just for him in afternoons and then there the obvious physical need in afternoon .Seems to come down to money Lea will not provide any extra other than for unit where schol feels he wil need extra support in afternoon and i do actually agree with them
think going to have to go look at others were in east \herts.

Ds does not have any ld as such so special school turned him down as not suitable so right now he is not in school and there using fact he is not 5 til July to wiggle out providing any even though he had a term in ms f/t from September

Pheonix

There are a few good schools in Herts. There is Middleton in Ware which is a MLD but who are reluctant to take physical disabled. There is a brilliant school in Stevenage that is for children which Physical difficulties as there main problems and the addaptaions that they have and the equipment they have is just Brilliant I have been and had a look around and was very impressed the children are so happy and cant wait to talk to you , think it is called Lonsdale. There is also the SLD school in Stanstead Abotts (Amwell View) which I know is also very good. I know children at all three of the schools and hear nothing but praise from the parents so please go and have a look for yourself you will get a feel for what is right for your child, look at the children and see how happy they are and how willing the staff are to talk to you then make an informed decision. there are also lots of other special schools in herts but from your description I think these will be nearest to you.

I forgot to mention that both the SLD and MLD schools have achieved a grade one Ofsted in nearly every area and the SLD school has achieved Specialist schools status. Cant be that bad then. Dont know what Lonsdale acheived but I was very impressed.

Thank you

will go have a look , trouble we have ds does not fit critea for Sld or mld as cognitave devlopment is within normal but then his speech will stop him from acessing school for physical diffculties since

he just had be awakward and have to do both typical male

yes wares pretty close im towards Bishop stortford

thank you will do though am hoping might be able force lea hand for the orginal speech unit though its Essex it in fact only 4 miles from door.

Frm his speech point its fantastic , daily salt actually in unit , lots of signing etc but its he physical thats now the problem

Has anyone been able to force lea into putting extra money in above and beyond a unit placement so his needs are assesed sepratley for teh afternoon a sthast where the problems are lying

yeah daft thing is essex offered the place when was in essex and herts agreed to honour it and let ds go as nearer than what they could offer .

in the afternoon its ds pysical problems that then become the issue theres shared support in class for children from the unit mind there also baulking at just how severe ds language disorders are

yes sadly he does , he uses wheelchair most of the time though can walk a bit but very wobbly and prone to going arse over tit with no notice

and has problems with fine motor controll cant hold a pencil properly, needs help undressing/dressing scissors etc , same with food he cant cut his food up and often prefers fingers to fork
, needs be cut very small and need only easy chew food as is quite badly affected by the oral dyspraxia to

I can see the schools point about extra help needed but case of persuading Lea to give

Pheonix
Make an appointment to go and see Lonsdale School in Stevenage it sounds perfect for your DS. I visited it and if my child had been in a wheelchair I would deffinately go for it a friend whos daughter had a stroke in the womb started off in the SLD school and is now in Lonsdale and she has speech problems, the addaptations and facilities they have are brilliant , they are also in the process of building a new school which will be in the grounds of a main stream school so the children that are able to will go into the main school for the lessons that they can cope with, so they will be integrated where possible. Please Please view and speak to the staff there they are so lovely.

Fly I am sorry you feel the way you do about middleton but I must disagree with you about it being full of the SLD overflow. exactly what do you base your opinion on this on? have you spent much time there? do you have much to do with the parents of these chldren? In fact do you know the children who go there? If the answer to these question is NO them please keep your opionions on this to yourself, as I know for a fact that there would be a lot of parents who would be very unhappy to hear you speak this way about their school.

ds had just had statement review where we switched from Ms to speech unit , going have a meeting think next step and maybe tribunal here i come

we looked at \ABA but is not for ds his problem is not taht he does not want to its more that he can not do

oddjob
will give them a call on Monday is defintley worth following up thank you

Pheonix please do I think you will be surprised, let me know how you get on and what you think.

Flying
I am sorry but you have made me really cross , is it just that any child more disabled than your is SLD or have you seen the children who you are talking abouts statements ? You are not a proffesional in these matters so please do not try to be.

flying, i agree with oddjob3, i know lots of chldren that go to MLD school you are talking about and they are very happy as are their parents. the school has very little absence,and most of them are very cappable you can not tell how capable a child is by looking at them. I also know a lot of parents that are fighting to get their children into this school and out of mainstream. i think you need to think about what you say on here because one day it may be you wanting to get your DS in there no one knows what the future holds.
When looking at your previous threads you seem to have a 'professional qualification' in an awfull lot of areas !!!!!.
I have a teaching degree and have a lot to do with special needs children so feel that I am more than qualified to make the asumptions that Oddjob made and funnily enough came to the same conclusion.

FlyingDuchess - I'm not trying to stick the knife in and give it a twist, but if the majority of children in MLD schools were not on P levels, then they shouldn't be there in the first place.

Flying I am not policing this site but am angry that you think you have the right to make assumtions as to the capabilities of children that you do not know. visiting a school 3 times (probably just to look round by the way which doesnt take long)in one year does not give you the right to make assumtions about certain children. And certainly not to try and put off someone whos child could possibly benefit greatly from attending the school.
I realise that you have your problems with the LEA concerning your own child but it is not the same for all of us.Every time you have mentioned Herts on this site (I have been a watcher for some time before becoming brave enough to post) you have to give a negative comment, please remember that every case is different and think how upset you could be making some one feel who is moving into herts for the first time and is asking for help, If it were me I would be feeling pretty sick by now and woundering what the hell I had done if I listenend to every thing you said.
Herts is not all rubbish it has done allright by me so far.

To be fair to FlyingDuchess, I think she is just trying to pass on what she's learned to others so that they are more aware than she was. I don't think her negativity/ realism (?)/ blanket statements are badly meant at all, just a by-product of her experiences. I have said the same thing to her before about not scaring people who are new to the area or the Statementing process and who don't have a clearly defined path and accompanying resources to get them to the victory that she is aiming for...but I don't think she's trying to do anything malicious.

Wow - this thread is a bit hot.

Phoenix4725 - you are the OP and this is about your DS (Perhaps another thread about the merits of Herts or otherwise could be started to avoid detracting from Phoenix's questions?)

So, Phoenix, if your DS is cognitively typical, but has physical and communicative difficulties, could you look for a school with a bit more of a CP type profile? Lots of children with cerebral palsy are cognitively able, but physical difficulties need to be managed.

Or could you go for a school perhaps for hearing impaired children (I'm thinking that then signing would be top notch) with LSA support for the physical issues?

Its ok Im not new to the statements ds has had one in one form or another since he was 3 and had fight tooth nail for .

And so far have found herts ok to deal with better han Essex ,Think from what a lot have posted is that they seem fall down more around asd issues rather than ones that can be seen

Ds is on whole within normal bounds all problems are Pd caused or speech caused though he does have receptive issues ,He just did not cope in ms school down to that as he ha dnone else signing other than lsa who was less of signer than him so how she was meant teach who knows

Lou

we did look at schools for the deaf but met a block they did not want a hearing child in school let alone one that due to physical diffculties could not sign perfect

Yes i am wondering if school for pD will be more apt .We looked at mld before but was told by head and he is well respected that ds really did not belong there so none quite knows where ds belongs

.Though in my eyes find thats less of problem than the speech .Think i need to investigate more and go see and talk to them know theres talk of ds eventually using a voca and handwriting just not going to happen though hes getting good with computers.

Its the Lsa a bit thast problem for unit as lea will only normally fund place in unit will not fund extra support on top of