I WAS interested to read your report on Scottish councils’ failure to spot children with additional support needs (ASN), including autism and dyslexia (“Councils fail to spot pupils with autism and dyslexia”, The Herald, February 5). Unfortunately, this is only part of the issue.
The most important aspect is the support being offered to children with ASN. Having worked as a teacher in primary education for 30 years, for the past 11 years I have trained and supported hundreds of parents and carers of children diagnosed with autism in Scotland. I am very surprised to read that the Council of Scottish Local Authorities (Cosla) spokesman is not aware of evidence that the needs of children are not being met. He is clearly unaware of the recent march in Glasgow by parents of children with autism and the campaign by parents who are fighting cuts in Argyll and Bute to name just two instances.
I would be interested to know what evidence the Scottish Government spokeswoman has for the assertion that the attainment of pupils with ASN has improved in recent years.
I have met a minority of parents whose children are being well supported in the appropriate educational setting for their child’s needs. However, in my experience the vast majority of children are not receiving the support they need and increasingly are being put into mainstream education when small group teaching and/or one to one support is essential for their education and wellbeing. There seems to be a variety of reasons why this is happening – increasingly cuts in funding are being put forward as the main issue. However, many teachers in both primary and secondary education have insufficient training to meet the needs of children with ASN and particularly those on the autism spectrum.
In addition, the number of children with autism who need small group specialist teaching is very much under estimated. It is depressing and worrying to see so many children missing out on appropriate education, very anxious about going to school and causing extra stress on their parents who already have to face many challenges bringing up their children.
Barrie Cooper,
The Old Cottars, Gelston, Castle Douglas.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here