Let's Recap

I had to look back at past posts to see where I had left M’s story and the last real post about his progress seems to have been in January 2010. I realise that if there are people still following M’s story, it kind of leaves things open ended.

So just to recap, we became aware that M had difficulties with speech by the time he was two and a half. He was referred to the local Speech and language therapy department at the recommendation of the local preschool manager at three and a half.

The speech therapist told us that M was 18 months behind in both receptive and expressive language and that this delay would severely impact on every area of his development and education. We were told that there was no one to one speech and language therapy available for children with complex disorders, but that should we wish to pursue this avenue privately, we should look for a therapist in the yellow pages. M had follow up visits over the next year, but was mute at every appointment and was therefore marked as 'Not Assessed.'There were no clear sign posts to ALTIP or for charities such as ICAN (please see links on left hand side bar)which would have given us alternative avenues for helping with M's difficulties.

During a further visit to the paediatric department, ruled out the possibility of autism, but when we asked what help was available for our child the doctor shrugged and showed us an empty pair of hands.We were told that his needs should be met by his independent education plan and that the Head master could call for funding and resources. Cue a bat a ball game between health and education authorities.

M’s behaviour deteriorated and the teachers at school, struggled to manage his needs. Whilst the headmaster called for some very helpful interventions such as the involvement of the behavioural support team, M’s language needs were not adequately met by the local authority.

After a two day assessment at ICAN’s Meath school at age six M was finally diagnosed with severe SLI. You can read a full account of this on the left hand side bar. We employed an independent speech and language therapist, who worked with M and trained his teaching assistant in the school setting. Initially this was weekly basis dropping to after the first eighteen months after diagnosis.

At six M was assessed at being between the 1st and 3rd centile for language almost across the board. Initially, M’s Teaching assistant drew pictures sequences on a white board, in order that he could understand class instructions. M was unable to tell the difference between What Where and Why and was therefore unable to ask questions to learn about his world. M lived completely in the here and now, with no concept of history or the environment he lived in other than what was tangible and visual.