Proposed statement of special ed needs profound dyslexia at 11 years

[kathy79]

Hi everyone

I have just recieved a proposed statement of special eduactional needs today. In which they are only going to grant him 15 hours a week support and only 1 hr a week with a specific learning difficulty teacher.
This is truly what i expected from an LEA like ours. This is no different to what he was recieving at school action plus and resulted in school refusal, anxiety, and lack of progress at school.So bad the school wanted to palm him off to a pupil referal unit and cahms thought he had aspergers syndrome.

There are no specific details at to what stratergies they plan to use with himto bring his reading and writing along. also they want a referal to the physical impairment and medical inclusion service.

My son has profound dyslexia, irlen syndrome, hypermobile fingers, dyspraxia, sensory issues, anxiety, flat feet and leg pains, ketotic hypoglycemia.

They made no recomendation as to school setting only that he should be enabled to have a broad range curriculum and access to the national curriculum.

Anybody got any good advice i only have 15 days to get this sorted out!

HELP

[MrsShrek3]

how old is your ds?
could you clarify what you mean by "profound dyslexia" please? any idea of levels or stuff he can do wrt reading or writing?

[kathy79]

Hi Mrs shrek3
APRIL 2011 he was working at national curriculum levels in litearcy and numeracy level 2c and was in year 4. He is now 11 years old and a year 6 pupil, his levels are not much better now.
Profound dyslexia is diagnosed by a eduactional psychologist as they have measured all abilities and cognative abilitys and IQ. These put my son in the bottom 1 % percentile range of the population across his abilities when a child of his age would score average 25 to 75% percentile range. The only exception in my sons case is his verbal IQ places him just above average for his age scoring 110.His working memory and processing speed are the most severly affected giving a score of 0.03%. Although to talk to him you wouldnt guess it at all!
This is why his propsed statement is giving me cause for concern as visually and verbally he is bright but paper based learning dont stick and its not for lack of trying either!
Intensive help required

[MrsShrek3]

those levels make it very clear and as you say it's obvious he needs considerable support, and y6 and heading for high school age he will certainly need more than 15hrs. There seems to be a bit of strange strategy going on wrt funding ime, we are seeing ESAP and statements coming up with 12-15 hrs for children who clearly need 25hours, I have my suspicions as to why but its a bit irrelevant tothis convo tbh. but ime there is quite a move that way.
I was wondering what you have in mind for when he leaves yr 6? this might be the crux of it, whether you want mainstream or something more specialised, and what environment he will cope with and learn best in. have you spoken to or met with your Inclusion officer for his school? parent partneship etc? sorry questions, just trying to see where youare at.

[kathy79]

Thanks for your reply

i will be contacting parent partnership, sos sen, ipsea etc anyone who can give me any solid advice. Ive asked the private educational psychologist for her proffessional opinion on whats been offered. Funny enough ive been really open minded about schools i just wanted the right placement with the correct statement. Something that appears now that im going to have to fight for.
My ds has been home educated the last 12 months due to school refusal and camhs treatment possible aspergers. My child had no official diagnosis and i have spent the last year rectifying what the school failed to recognise in 4 years. I have got him reading better than before but it still requires intensive help.
Once diagnosed and i had large amounts of info i applied for a statement in order to get correct provision.
Sticky situation, i do havd an lea officer who has been trying to get him a placment at local primary schools but all that have been aproached want to see the completed statement beforehand.
Im not a person to be put off easily and will continue to fight for my ds sons right to educated properly.

[MrsShrek3]

might be worth hunting out the inclusion officers too. IPSEA are great me. As are NAS advice line, but that's more asd specific and sort of depends where house are up to with diagnosis (or not) iyswim, wrt how relevant their advice is.

what sort of provision do you have within reasonable distance? yes mainstream primary and secondary, but what in terms of support units, sen schools, alternative provision? If you find a good one it can be specified in the statement

[KOKOagainandagain]

First thing you should do is write/email the lea and ask for an extension on the 15 day deadline. Combination and xmas holidays and inability of school's to comment on whether they are able to meet his needs until the draft arrives means that you need more time to consider suitable schools. There is usually 8 weeks between the draft and final statements and so this can be accomodated within the statutory timeframe provided that you are not already behind.

You should then consider whether the proposed statement gives an accurate picture of all ds's needs and enables a CT who is not familiar with him to understand how his needs present. If not, you may want to appeal section 2 and because provision cannot be made for unrecognised needs, section 3. If you don't agree with ms you might also want to appeal section 4.

I am going to tribunal in May to appeal just such a dyslexia statement - 15 hours in m/s - SNAP. DS unable to attend school - SNAP. 0.03% working memory - SNAP. We have named Frewen.

[kathy79]

Hi

Many thanks for all your replies. I have had another meeting with LEA case worker and Parent partnership to help. Actually the meeting went well considering, it appears that my sons 15 hour statement is based on the fact the LEA want my son to start in a pupil home and hospital unit due to his anxiety and complex needs and health issues, he will only attend no more than 15 hours to start whilst support is being built up.I have asked for a review to be put as an ammendent in the statement to be reviewed in march 2013 to review progress, hours support etc.
The plan is slow intergration if possible and very close monitoring with the view that if the support will be increased as his attendence increases. They will ammend the statement accordingly. Parent partnership has been excellent with their help and the LEA have taken onboard the educational psycologists report that states that because of very significant difficulties he would not cope.
Its a complex intergration plan they have set out and i am quite surprised at how receptive that have become! It was stated at the meeting that because of his inability to cope in a mainstream school before and phobic behaviour they do not want this reaction again from him!