Colours
I recently received a text from a mum who was in rather a state, as she had just discovered that no one in the secondary school knew her daughter was dyslexic!
Diagnosed in primary school, this mum just assumed the paperwork had followed her daughter to secondary school, she also assumed that the school knew and were acting appropriately on this information.
So now this mum has been told that the school is very sorry that they knew nothing about her daughter being dyslexic and has been told it is too late to go for any exam arrangements because there needs to be an updated profile & Learning Support Advisory Teacher (LSAT) report in order for exam arrangements to be made.
I am told that the school Special Education Needs Co-Ordinator (SENCO) was very apologetic and said they would see what they could find out. In this SENCO’s defence, she is new to post, so this situation is not of her making & has until this point been out of her control. The SENCO also explained that the school had no funds to afford to get learning support advisory teacher visit & report.
For any parent this is a stressful situation, your child starts a new school and you assume all their paperwork has gone with them, you assume that you don’t need to check with the school that they have all the paperwork & information they need to facilitate your child’s education & learning.
Thankfully for this mum she is a close family friend of mine and her  stress was lessened by the fact she had a family friend (me) who is able to step in and help, but not all are lucky enough to have a qualified specialist teacher as a family friend, who can & will step in and offer a free dyslexia screening test when the schools budget is blown!
Whilst don’t have any problem in helping my friend out, knowing that she would do exactly the same for me in any given situation, my issue is that no parent should ever be told the school does not have the funds to facilitate a child’s learning!
As Whitney Houston so beautifully sung, ‘…the children are our future, teach them well and let them lead the way…’
Our children deserve investment, they have a legal right to an education and reasonable adjustments. If we do not invest in our children we have no investment in our future, it’s time for change!
It’s time to educate our educators, teach them to spot dyslexia, teach them to be aware, teach them that our children are our future!
For information on teacher training and parent courses contact Elizabeth Wilkinson, The Dyslexic Dyslexia Consultant by visiting the website www.theddc.org.uk
Or by visiting the next Dyslexia Information Day
Saturday May 16th 2015
at Enginuity in Coalbrookdale
Drop in any time between 11am and 3pm
