Ed psych report - not sure what it means for the future

[Waiting_For_Godot]

Get out of that hole!

[Belinda]

.

[Morning Glory]

WFG - I have been following this thread over several day - I do not know you or your background as well as others obviously do on this forum but I do have a DS with SEN we have over the past 4 years had to get him diagnosed, gone through a nail biting appeal and fight to get him a statement of educational needs.

I have been able to sit back and observe as an outsider for the last few days and would like to make some comments.

In all of the post I don't seem to remember you saying exactly how your DS feels about all this. Does he think he has issues? Does he feel different? Does he want to know why he feels different? Does he really have an issue or does he just not like school?

What does he really think about school - is it the school he doesn't like, the lessons, the other children? Does he have friends? I get the impression that music is a passion with him and that would be something I would look in to channelling his energies either in or outside school.

The other thing you might like to try is play therapy, my DS had play therapy for a year and it was amazing really built his self esteem and when we were getting him diagnosed the PT gave him some counselling to see what he was expecting once he got diagnosed (he was desperate to know why he felt different) and how he thought his class mates would react etc.

I do get the impression from your posts that everything in his life seems to be quite negative but that may just be the way you have written the posts. He also seems to be living in the shadows of a more well behaved, bright, older brother. I also lived in the shadows of a more intelligent, laid back, well behaved brother and I always felt I never quite reach his standard when I was a kid (now it's different).

I believe that it is important that a child is happy at school whether it is private or state. If a child is not happy they will not learn and in the end that is what school is all about. If you get your child into the right school it is worth its weigh in gold - our DS struggled in Primary, (great school, really supportive but he found it really hard) but now he is at his new GS he is the happiest I have seen him.

It sounds like rather than moving him to another school and hoping that will fix things some other issues need to be addressed first. A diagnosis is certain not a quick fix, your son will not automatically be the most popular guy in the school, behave well, and enjoy school. Strategies to help children take time to be put into place and for children to use them and sometimes they don't work and others have to be tried.

For example: on my son's EP report it advises the use of a laptop as DS's handwriting not very good and he finds it hard to write for long periods of time. In practice there is no point him having a laptop if he cannot touch type quicker than he can write (he can touch type but not quite as fast as required). He also takes ages to get his books out at the start of a lesson, sometimes 5 - 10 minutes after everyone else, can you imagine how long it would take him to get out a laptop, plug it in, start it up etc. What if it has no power or he loses his document - he would get anxious and probably refuse to ever use it again.

In state schools SEN is complex - going through several stages School Action, School Action + and finally a Statement. You have to go through each stage in turn and you have to prove that the school is not able to support your child at each level. SEN budgets have been slashed so provision is limited. It is much harder to get support for a bright child, I was continously told I would not get my son a statement it has taken 4 years of evidence collecting and a lot of time and energy. So moving him to the state sector is not a magic wand either.

Sorry to babble on a bit

[Looking for help]

WFG -I have missed this thread. I am sorry you haven't got a conclusive answer to your son's problem, but know that you will do the best for your son. I don't really have anything to add, as we have no experience of this. Hopefully with you on his side, everything will work out.

[Waiting_For_Godot]

Morning Glory,

DS has asked me before if he has something wrong with his brain because he can't stop himself splurting out silly or rude comments and he just can't behave. Most kids say they can't do maths or they can't play football but he says he can't behave.

DS is not in older brothers shadow. He achieves higher than his brother in every area except maths and behaviour and it is only the latter that I am keen to remedy for his sake. He is always picked for teams (DS1 can't even get into the F's!) and only recently he has won a place at a pretigious music academy that runs on a Saturday. If he does feel in his brother's shadow then it is in his head as the evidence shows that he has no reason to be in his brother's shadow. Interestingly, DS1 is a bit miffed about DS2's current achievements!

[Morning Glory]

WFG - The music academy sounds great for him, so I wish him all the best with that.

[tigger2]

WFG...I have only just had a chance to skim over this thread and realise that I may have missed an important point but have you taken your dc to a consultant paediatrician specialising in diagnosis of learning/developmental problems? If you have my apologies but I was baffled by some of the comments in an ed psych report and the comment that they can only indicate what issues may be but for a firm diagnosis you need a consultant paediatrician or psychiatrist . If you already know this my apologies but your GP could help with a referral. It may be a bit of a wait on the NHS but if you haven't already done it this may be what you need.

[mystery]

I agree - what does herman think? Have you tried the GP - paediatrician - CAMHS route - the other advantage is that if they do identify something it won't just be this one-off experience that you get with a private ed psych - test and run kind of thing.

[Morning Glory]

I spoke to a private EP to start with on the phone who said he thought my son may have AS and then went to the GP for a referral.

We were referred to the Community Paediatrician which took about 4 months (which in the SEN world is relatively quick, 8 months wait for SALT appointment, 3 years for OT assessment, 4 years for LEA EP assessment, 1 year to be statemented).

We did have quite a lot of evidence e.g. SALT report, Play Therapy Report, School input etc. and with also talking to him she had no doubt he did have Aspergers, so the actual diagnosis process was pretty quick.

Good luck WFG

[mystery]

WFG you have a lot to catch up with on here. Hope the waterfalls walk was good. Hopefully the academy should put your mind at rest as if your son behaves well at this (even if only for part of the time) you know that he can - presumably he would not have got selected if his behaviour was so poor that he could not perform to the required standard.