Changes to how we assess children
We are consulting on some new proposals for this service. Read and comment on the new proposals.
We propose that from September 2016 the sensory service will use the assessment system created by the National Sensory Impairment Partnership. This is the system used by over 70% of visual and hearing impaired services across the country.
This system assesses children for a wider range of things including:
- their degree of sensory impairment
- how their sensory impairment affects language, communication and access to the curriculum
- what hearing amplification they use or the habilitation skills they have
- the support they need to use equipment effectively
- the training their family or educators need
- the help they need moving through education and into further education
- the learning environment they are in
- how their sensory impairment affects their personal, social and emotional learning
- whether they need a sensory impairment teacher to help with the different organisations working with them.
How this will affect children who use the service
We cannot give exact figures but we believe that:
- around 90 children who get a weekly visit from a sensory impairment worker will get a fortnightly or monthly visit instead. However we will provide more training to school staff so children get more support in the classroom
- 96 children with visual impairments and 17 children with hearing impairments who receive ‘monitoring’ may find they get more or fewer visits, depending on the new assessments
- 500 children will see no change at all.
The deadline for comments on these proposals is Thursday 21 July.