20% of children are SEN

[Guest]

SEN means "Special Educational Needs", but when said as SEN it would be "an SEN" because "An SEN" is "A Statement of special educational needs"...

 

That would depend on whether you pronounce it as sen, or spell out the letters ess eee enn

 

Come on naah, sooert thi sen's aaht!

[El Cid]

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), approximately 11% of American children between the ages of 4 and 17 have been diagnosed with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) as of 2011. However, if you ask the American Psychiatric Association (APA), they maintain that even though only 5% of American children suffer from the disorder, the diagnosis is actually given to around 15% of American children. This number has been steadily rising, jumping from 7.8% in 2003 to 9.5% in 2007.

http://www.collective-evolution.com/2016/10/28/almost-no-children-in-france-are-medicated-for-adhd-heres-how-they-define-treat-it/

[Flanker7]

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), approximately 11% of American children between the ages of 4 and 17 have been diagnosed with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) as of 2011. However, if you ask the American Psychiatric Association (APA), they maintain that even though only 5% of American children suffer from the disorder, the diagnosis is actually given to around 15% of American children. This number has been steadily rising, jumping from 7.8% in 2003 to 9.5% in 2007.

http://www.collective-evolution.com/2016/10/28/almost-no-children-in-france-are-medicated-for-adhd-heres-how-they-define-treat-it/

 

There are advantages for children and all of us to be labelled with a condition that needs special help.

 

Asthma for cyclists

Heart problems (Meldonium) for tennis players.

 

But it encourages people to define themselves by what they are a victim of.

[Mister M]

What is interesting is how higher levels of unemployment and poverty creates a higher proportion of children with special needs.

 

I've spent a lot of time in Liverpool and those figures don't surprise me. It could even be a bit higher.

 

Would anyone on this forum support selective breeding?

 

Although to get a statement of SEN takes a lot of persuasiveness and tenacity from the parents. It is often thought that parents who are the most articulate get their kids the support they need as they know the education system well.

I think children with SEN (autism, ADD, physical disabilities) cuts across all social classes. They shouldn't be stigmatised.

[Anna B]

A lot of it depends on where you put the goalposts.

 

We are now in an academic, exam orientated society, so kids who don't measure up to this standard may now be considered as 'having special educational needs' when 30 years ago they would have been happy doing practical subjects like woodwork or housecraft, and still have prospects of a good job.

 

That said, the figures now don't surprise me, but I think there are a lot of reasons for it. We are better at diagnosing than we were, and children that were once considered just a bit ''odd' are now diagnosed as autistic. And some children, like very premature babies for example, survive when once they would not, but they are left with disabilities.

 

Special schools have closed, (where they may have been excluded from general statistics) and children with disabilities are now in mainstream schools and counted along with all the others.

 

I think we also have to look at the environment too. Chemicals in food and the environment may have a damaging effect. Petrol fumes for example are known to be detrimental to development. Good nutrition is certainly important for general development and growth, as is good quality early years stimulation, exercise and language development, which relies largely on good parenting.

 

Small class sizes in schools helps, (we have the largest class sizes in Europe,) particularly in primary schools where much of this development occurs, and we need an ethos where children value education and actively want to learn. And, of course, supportive and informed parents can make a huge difference.

 

Teachers need much better training in supporting special needs children in mainstream schools and better trained support assistants to help them. There may well be a full range of different disabilities in any one school/class, each requiring a specific method of support, but the time, training and expertise is lacking.

The paperwork alone is a nightmare and the targets set are often unrealistic. Many SEN children need one to one support most of the time, but very few get it.

 

So yes, a lot of things need to change.

Edited November 1, 2016 by Anna B

[El Cid]

We are now in an academic, exam orientated society, so kids who don't measure up to this standard may now be considered as 'having special educational needs' when 30 years ago they would have been happy doing practical subjects like woodwork or housecraft, and still have prospects of a good job.

 

 

I think that there is too much pressure for everyone to be the same.

 

We have always been a mix of personalities, we need to learn to understand other people.

Someone with a mild SEN should be able to work, they should be supported and not looked at as lesser people.

[Anna B]

I think that there is too much pressure for everyone to be the same.

 

We have always been a mix of personalities, we need to learn to understand other people.

Someone with a mild SEN should be able to work, they should be supported and not looked at as lesser people.

 

Yes, I agree. However no matter how much legislation is put in place, in practice, the support is often lacking in the real world.

[Berberis]

We label children more these days, and people that are a little different get tagged as be on the Aspergers spectrum.

There tends to be more pressure for people to conform to norms, city people tend to be different from country people.

 

http://www.theguardian.com/society/2015/dec/29/largest-uk-sperm-bank-turns-away-dyslexic-donors?CMP=fb_gu

 

There is no such thing. I think you are referring to the Autistic Spectrum.