Bolton Data for Inclusion
The
Action Research Centre for Inclusion
(Sponsored
by: The Barrow Cadbury Trust)
at
Bolton Institute of Higher Education.
Data No 33 :
December 2000
Author(s) :
John Griffiths
Title :
Provision for Children described as Having Special Educational Needs in a County Primary School
Abstract :
This is a detailed examination of the processes a child can go through once they have been identified as having “Special Needs”. Although the observations are from one school the detailed analysis of the official and unofficial procedures provides valuable insights into the impact of existing SEN legislation on individuals described as having special educational needs.
Provision for children with SEN at a County Primary School:
Description:
Circumstances of observation at school:
I
visited a County Primary School on Monday 13th February.
My visit to the school was arranged through a colleague on the course who
is a parent of children who attend the school. The visit took place a week after an OFSTED inspection of the
school had finished. I attended a
classroom English session with one class of thirty-five, which is “about
average” in terms of class size in this school. The size of the class is above the thirty pupils per class
which will be the statutory limit on infant class sizes by September 2001
(Section 1 of the School Standards and Framework Act 1998 and the Education
(Infant Class Sizes) (England) Regulations 1998 (S.I. 1998/1973)). According to Bennett (1998), for example, a large majority of
each sample from 1996 national survey in the UK indicated that classes were too
large and that this had a negative impact on teaching and learning.
There is an evident need for smaller classes of at most 30 students per
class.
Sources of information:
After
observing the class we were able to interview the Special Educational Needs Co-ordinator
(SENCO) who was also the class teacher. The
roles and responsibilities of the SENCO are considerable and have increased
substantially since the introduction of the 1994 Code of Practice, raising
questions about the extent to which SENCO's teaching commitments should be
reduced (Farrel, 1998). I was also
able to question my colleague who is a parent of a child in the class who is on
stage 2 in the class to avail myself of a parent’s perspective and themes that
have emerged in her many informal talks with both the SENCO and the school’s
Learning Support Assistant. Further
to this the SENCO had previously answered in writing a list of questions
complied by myself and colleague, which we then followed up in our interview.
Staff involvement in provision for pupils with SEN:
Apart from the SENCO there is a special needs support teacher who works with this particular class for two sessions of twenty minutes per week, following a phonic program for literacy. Class teachers initially assess children at the Stage 1 level (in consultation with the SENCO), the SENCO is responsible for assessment at Stage 2, and an outside Educational Psychologist for assessment at Stage 3 and above.
Service users:
The
class we observed served as an example for this piece of work of special needs
provision and inclusion in practice, and contained four pupils on stage one and
six on stage two of the identification procedure as laid down in the Code of
Practice in the Assessment and Identification of Special Educational Needs (DfE,
1994, pi). Within the school there
are two children who are statemented, although neither of these are in the class
I was able to observe.
Goals of Service:
The
goals of the service according to the SENCO are to provide equality of
opportunity, to recognise pupils’ difficulties and cater for these as best
they can, and to use with the resources of outside agencies were possible.
The school has a published policy for special needs provision, although
this “needs updating” [SENCO interview] as it was written three years ago
and was unavailable for inspection at the time of our visit.
Background of developments in legislation for SEN provision:
This
essay will evaluate the practice of special needs provision at the School in
terms of a social constructionist theoretical approach to children with SEN.
The principles and definitions governing their education have developed
in a way that is broadly comparable with progress in relation to other
disadvantaged groups in society. At
the same time, provision for children with SEN has, in the last two decades,
been continuously affected by major policy changes with regard to the funding
and management of schools. These
include the wide and deep-ranging development of legislation which increases the
control and regulation of education through central policies (Clough, 1998).
In the Education Act 1996 a child is classified as having SEN if s/he has a
“learning difficulty” – defined as “a significantly greater difficulty
in learning than the majority of children of his (sic) age” (Ch. 56, para.
312). A change in the way in which SEN is viewed within educational
legislation was ushered in by the Warnock report (DfES, 1978).
Prior to that decisions about children with SEN were framed by the
character of individual impairments rather than by any broad principle of
educational entitlement. Tomlinson
(1981), for instance, showed how the assessment of children identified as
“educationally subnormal” consisted of procedures for categorising
educational needs in terms of “handicap”.
Within the Warnock report the focus was expanded not only to take into
account environmental and social influences on children’s difficulties at
school, but also to identify schools as a context within which children’s
educational needs may be created (Armstrong, 1998).
The 1981 Education Act took up many of the Warnock report
recommendations; “special needs” were assumed to be educational rather than
medical and to exist on a variable continuum.
In taking this into account provision is now based upon the principle
that, “so far as possible” special educational provision shall be in a
mainstream rather than a special school (Robinson, 1996).
As part of the 1993 Education Act, Part 3, a Code of Practice on
Identification and Assessment of Special Needs is now published.
This document, which details many of the procedures which are to be
followed with regard to SEN provision, has a status between a regulation, which
is mandatory, and a circular, which is advisory (Cowne, 1996).
The code incorporates the principle of integration of pupils with and
without SEN, within which there should be maximum participation in the national
curriculum. There is a stage system
(stages run from 1-5 in ascending order of need) within which a child will be
placed upon assessment, which should be according to the extent of the child’s
needs.
Assessing a child as having SEN:
Taking
a social constructionist approach to evaluating SEN provision involves an
expansion of the field of inquiry beyond just the specific classroom and school
being observed. As Burr (1995, pg.
5) puts it, “knowledge and social action go together”.
The question we pose and the answers we obtain are framed in ways which
are fundamentally related to the activities which are being carried out
(Nightingale & Crombie, 1999). The
categorisation of children as having SEN is a highly political act.
It also has implications in terms of resources which may be allocated to
provision for SEN. The wider the
definition, the larger the demand for extra resources that may be created. The figures in the Warnock report which have been widely
accepted, suggest that 2% of children will have SEN to the degree that
statementing is required, whilst 20% of children will at some point in their
school trajectory come within the classification of having SEN.
Since SEN are not now solely organised in terms of organic dysfunction or
“handicap” within individual children, the assessment children for SEN may
be recognised as being a site of social and political construction, the
ramifications of which can be debated and challenged.
Theoretically, the fact that stage 1 SEN pupils are in large part assessed by
class teachers, and stage 2 pupils by SENCO’s responds to demands that there
should be careful and consistent monitoring procedures prior to the formal
assessment of a child’s needs by an educational psychologist at stage 3. It was apparent from the school visit that in practice a
child’s being put forward for assessment for stage 3 SEN is dependent not just
on their SENCO’s judgement of their needs, but on their position relative to
other children in the school for a limited number of “places” available for
assessment by the educational psychologist.
This reflects an increasingly stringent allocation of resources by the
LEA; the school is now allocated approximately 28 hours per year of the
educational psychologist’s time. “It didn’t used to be like that it used
to be according to need but now we’ve got so many hours of her time… so if
we get any children to put forward for testing half our time goes because she
has to work out the results and everything and the paperwork back in the
office… she counts that as her time… well you can knock four of those off
(the 28 hours/year) or five, six off… just have two planning meetings… and
we’re expected to prioritise the children… that we think are the greatest
need in the school er… but that doesn’t mean that we’ve not got other
children that we think need support… we just can’t put them forward… there
isn’t time” [SENCO interview]. In
this way the theoretical role of the SENCO is qualified by limitations on local
authority resources.
The SENCO at the school identified the arbitrary nature of the 2% figure (of
children expected to be classified as stage 3 or higher) as having further
practical effects that impede provision for SEN at the school.
The 2% figure is not merely descriptive of the percentage of pupils that
will need statementing. It is used
in practice as a cut off to which pupils can be statemented.
Children who are put forward to be assessed by the educational
psychologist undergo testing which results in a standardised score that can be
compared to national figures. If the child achieves a score which is “in the bottom 2% of
what the population scores on any particular test then they will accept them as
they do need extra help… if they get 3%… which basically means they can’t
do… they can do very little… then they’re not accepted for extra support..
and that’s the criteria that Manchester have got at the moment” [SENCO
interview]. Davie (1996) indicates
that the number of pupils requiring statements is 2.86% of the school
population, and that this will vary from region to region.
Over 248000 pupils or 3% of all pupils in schools had statements of SEN
in 1999 (DfEE, 1999). An individual
child’s classification at level 3 is therefore not just a reflection of his or her needs but the result, according to
Galloway, Armstrong & Tomlinson (1994) of a political compromise based on a
statistical artefact.
A social constructionist approach is useful here because it allows for the
conceptualisation of assessment as
being much more than a value neutral activity in the way that psychologists
looking for more traditional psychological frameworks would tend to.
The blocks to assessment at stage 3 impact on the classroom I observed in
that there are no children at stage 3 in it, although according to the SENCO
some of the children do need extra help as provided for at stage 3.
The child at stage 3 and beyond is positioned as having certain moral
rights in legislature beyond those of other children.
Whilst the Code of Practice was established at a
national level, the resource implications are at local and school level.
It can be seen that children who are not recorded or statemented, but who
are seen by parents or professionals as having SEN by parents or school
professionals are thought to be disadvantaged by not having a label which
distinguishes them clearly from other pupils.
As Allan (1996) points out, in a climate of resource constraints,
distance from the norm has become valued.
The assessing and testing of children with SEN can also be viewed as a
disciplinary technique through which they are constructed in a similar way to
that described by Foucault in his analysis of groups such as the madman, the
patient and the criminal (e.g. Foulcault, 1973).
As Allan (1996) points our, all children are the objects of scrutiny
within the school system, but for pupils with SEN the gaze reaches further. They are observed not just at work in the classroom, but also
during break times. Their
relationships with their peers and with adults, as well as information from
parents about the pupil in the home context will also be noted as part of
“good record keeping” (Cowne, 1996). All
aspects of the child’s interpersonal relationships may therefore be kept under
scrutiny to a degree that mainstream pupils would not be scrutinised. The 18%
(using the Warnock figure) of children who do not require statementing are
mostly children who would previously have been educated in mainstream schools
before the policies of inclusion and integration came about. All of this focus on the individual child can serve to
obscure the ways in which children with SEN as subjects are an institutional
creation. Special needs are not
noticed in a vacuum but appear against a background of “normal” ability and
performance and it is this which gives them relief.
They are noticed because students fail to meet the requirements of a
given curriculum, which is increasingly an explicitly political selection from
culture. The child’s interaction
with the curriculum, according to Clough (1998, pg.6) “tells us something
about him or her, but it also tells us a great deal about the curriculum.
Thus we have tended to reify a notional disability rather than attend to
the broader and much more elusive curricular data of which any given failing is
an abstraction.”
The national curriculum elevates the cognitive-intellectual domain above others
such as the aesthetic-creative, physical-motor, social-interpersonal and so on.
Children with who fall in the lower percentiles of achievement in one
domain would not necessarily do so in others.
It is the elevation of particular kinds of knowledge that produces
children who fail (Clough, 1998). Even
within the cognitive-intellectual domain at the school some of the children who
are recorded on the Record of Needs are, for instance “much better at maths
than they are at English” [SENCO interview].
The
space in which the child receives special education is significant in relation
to claims that the child is integrated. Ideal
notions of integration are largely concerned with children with SEN and ordinary
children sharing spaces, with the most pervasive sharing also seen as the most
successful. In this school for
instance, all the children share the same classes for most of the time.
Locational, social and curricular integration have a tendency to be
regarded as progressive stages for children with SEN.
Within this school, there do not seem to be problems with social
integration in that “At the same time it is the increased physical proximity
that is often cited as evidence of integration and is subjected to maximum
surveillance” (Allan, 1998). Within
this diverse classroom setting, however, group categorisation is still applied. Children are divided into groups based on their achievements
in their SAT’s, in the class I observed, the group of children with SEN was
labelled the red group (the other groups were also labelled by colours).
The children sit together each group at a different table (this is not
the SENCO’s decision), and differentiated tasks are then set for each group
during the lesson; “the text is directed towards the middle of the class… so
you have to then add questions on for the brighter ones and you know… even say
“what does this word begin with” for the red ones” [SENCO interview].
The status in terms of inclusion of those children who cannot be put
forward for assessment for stage 3 for the reasons described above is even more
questionable, since some of them may well fall below the 2% cutoff point, yet
they do not receive the legislated extra support guaranteed them when
statemented.
Factors which tend to maintain the child’s classification once assessed:
One
significant aspect of the assessment being on-going is that identification of
SEN should not lead to life-long labelling (Armstrong, 1998), it being
recognised that the child may in the future be reassessed and de-categorised as
having SEN. Where support is needed
but not provided to a sufficient extent, then again the practice of SEN
provision may serve to maintain the child within the classification.
Another consequence of the Code of Practice’s demands for detailed
assessment and planning is the effect of adding to the administrative and
bureaucratic load on teachers and particularly SENCO’s (Cowne, 1996).
At this school the SENCO is also a class teacher; about half of SENCO’s
are also class or subject teachers (Evans, Docking, Bentley & Evans, 1995),
and one factor that particularly impedes her work is the “lack of release time
from classroom teaching” [SENCO interview].
The school cannot afford to pay a supply teacher to cover her class, so
the many functions that a SENCO is supposed to fulfil as part of adequate
provision for children with SEN are sometimes unachievable or only partly
achievable in practice. The SENCO
at ACPS has been unable, for instance to maintain an updated published policy
for SEN due to simple lack of time.
Conclusion:
Despite
the move towards inclusive education for children with SEN, from a social
constructionist point of view the maintenance of a system of categorisation and
labelling in terms of achievement on a too-inflexible curriculum creates
children who fail at school. A key
site of contention in literature and the evolution of educational policy on SEN
is the location of the problem/s of a child with SEN.
Positivist assumptions within the field have traditionally legitimated a
form of psychological and individual reductionism which view difficulties as
residing within the child concerned. From
a social constructionist point of view both research and legislation on SEN
creates the objects of its inquiry or provision beginning with the first moment
of identification of the topic.
In approaching the subject in this way, radical alternatives to the present
organisation of provision are suggested. Reiser
(1995), for instance points out that a focus on the individual child rather than
the curriculum and how it needs to change has led to isolation, exclusion and
separation. From a social
constructionist perspective ending the categorisation and labelling of all
pupils would be conducive to attending to children’s needs on an individual
basis. The curriculum should be
flexible enough to fit the child, so that failure is avoided and childrens’
strengths are developed, encouraged and given legitimacy in terms of educational
achievement. Educational
achievement therefore would need to be redefined across the board for all
children.
Within the classroom I observed at the school, it is obvious that such a radical
change of approach would have many practical consequences, e.g. the separation
into groups within the classroom based on bands of ability would need to be
discontinued. In fact the changes
suggested would involve a reorganisation of the entire system of education for
all pupils. This reframing in terms
of every individual child’s needs would require much more in the way of
additional resources, and this is a factor central to the problems of provision
in practice even with respect to current legislation.
There are also criticisms of the anti-labelling stance of social
constructionists. Soder (1989, pg. 255) for example criticises this as
dangerous; “This well meaning denial of the problems of disabled people is
developing as a professional ideology in a time when service structures are
undergoing changes that in themselves tend to make the needs for disabled
persons invisible. Segregation is
abolished and integration, deinstutionalisation and decentralisation is being
implemented. The driving forces
behind this development are twofold. First
there is the well intentioned ideological commitment: not to label and treat
separately, but to integrate. Second
the financial crisis of the state that motivates the search for less expensive
alternatives.”
The social constructionist approach, in being able to incorporate societal and
political aspects within it’s theoretical framework has major advantages over
positivist psychological theories. The
conclusions reached in evaluating provision at this school therefore also
necessarily involve societal and political change.
Ultimately the education system we as a society are prepared to pay for
will be reflected in it’s ability to meet the needs of all pupils, including
those of children with SEN.
In this evaluation of provision at this school, whilst I was able to speak with
the SENCO and a parent of a child with a Record of Needs, I did not speak to any
of the children with SEN about the issues.
This partly reflects a concern on my part about the ethics of bringing up
these issues with the children as an undergraduate student, and the status of
this assignment as a 4000 word piece of coursework.
Nevertheless, it reproduces what is the norm in research into SEN, which
is the exclusion of children’s voices.
From the limited extent of my observation it appears to me that SEN provision at
this school fulfils the SENCO’s stated goal of recognising pupils’
difficulties and catering for these as best they can, and using the resources of
outside agencies where possible. To
summarise the shortcomings of provision I have identified, there are the
limitations on access to an educational psychologist which result in children
not being put forward for stage 3 assessment.
The limitation, where children are put forward, of their being
Statemented only where they fall below the bottom 2% of children on standardised
tests. There is also the lack of
release time from classroom teaching for the SENCO resulting in her struggling
to combine the multitude of functions a SENCO is supposed to fulfil with normal
teaching work. These are all
resource related and point to a problem of underfunding within the present
system of provision. Further
shortcomings are at a more ideological level, relating to the systems of
assessment and categorisation that are long standing in the developmental
history of educational provision in the UK, and impinge particularly on children
with SEN because they are the low scorers on current tests. The curriculum is clearly a big part of this, in that it
fails to sufficiently value children whose abilities don’t lie in the
cognitive-intellectual domain, and fails to give them a chance of “success”
at school.
Within the Education Act (1996) in that it is stated that children with SEN
should normally be educated in mainstream schools.
A child may still be educated in a special school if this is incompatible
with the wishes of parents, or the special educational provision called for is
unavailable in a mainstream school. Further,
the efficient education of children with whom the child is educated must not be
hindered nor the efficient use of
resources. Inclusion, whilst
described as “keystone” of educational policy (Meeting Special Educational
Needs – A Program for Action, DfEE 1999) is still subject to the
institutionalised separation of
those whose needs are considered to be beyond what a “mainstream” school can
be expected to provide. In 1998 38%
of pupils with statements were placed in either special schools or Pupil
Referral Units (DfEE, 1999). Shortcomings
at a wider level are reflected in the absence of pupils such as these from
classrooms at this primary school and mainstream schools throughout the country.
References:
Allan, J. (1996). Foucault and special educational needs: a “box of tools” for analysing children’s experiences of mainstreaming. Disability & Society, 11(2), pp 2 19-233.
Armstrong, D. (1998). Changing faces, changing places: Policy routes to inclusion. In Clough, P. (Ed.) (1998). Managing Inclusive Education. London: Paul Chapman Publishing Ltd.
Audit Commission. (1997). Local Authority performance indicators for 1995/1996. Cited in Armstrong, D. (1998). Changing faces, changing places: Policy routes to inclusion. In Clough P. (Ed.) (1998). Managing Inclusive Education. London: Paul Chapman Publishing Ltd.
Burr, V. (1995). An Introduction to Social Contructionism. London: Sage.
Clough, P. (1998). Introduction: What’s special about inclusion? In Clough, P. (Ed.) (1998). Managing Inclusive Education. London: Paul Chapman Publishing Ltd.
Cowne, E. (1996). The SENCO Handbook: Working within a whole school approach. London: David Fulton Publishers Ltd.
Davie, R. (1996). Raising the achievements of children with special educational needs. Cited in Robinson (1996). Special educational needs, the code and the new tribunal. Education and the Law, 8(1) pp39-60.
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The SENCO Handbook: Working within a whole school approach. London: David Fulton Publishers Ltd.
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DfE.(1994). Code of practice on the identification and assessment of special needs. London: HMSO Cited in Cowne, E. (1996). The SENCO Handbook: Working within a whole school approach. London: David Fulton Publishers Ltd.
DfEE (1999). Statistical bulletin: Statistics of education, special educational needs in England. January 1999. Issue 12/99. London: HMSO.
Evans, R. Docking, J. Bentley, D. & Evans, C. (1995). Special educational needs: Review of policy and practice in five local authorities. Cited in Farrell, M. (1998). The role of the special educational needs co-ordinator: Looking forward. Support for Learning. 13 (2), pp 82-86
Farrell, M. (1998). The role of the special educational needs co-ordinator: Looking forward. Support for Learning. 13(2), pp82-86.
Foucault, M. (1973). The birth of the clinic. Cited in Allan, J. (1996). Foucault and special educational needs: a “box of tools” for analysing children’s experiences of mainstreaming.
Disability & Society, 11(2), pp219-233.
Galloway, D. Armstrong, D. & Tomlinson, S. (1994), The assessment of special educational needs: Whose problem? Harlow: Longman.
Nightingale, D.J. & Crombie, J. (1999). Social constructionist psychology: a critical analysis of theory and practice. Buckingham: Open University Press.
Rieser, R. (1995). Developing a whole-school approach to inclusion: Making the most of the Code of Practice and the 1993 Education Act: A personal view. Cited in Cowne, E. (1996). The SENCO Handbook: Working within a whole school approach. London: David Fulton Publishers Ltd.
Robinson (1996). Special educational needs, the code and the new tribunal. Education and the Law. 8(1) pp39-60.
Soder. (1989). Special educational needs. Cited in Allan, J. (1996). Foulcault and special educational needs: a “box of tools” for analysing children’s experiences of mainstreaming. Disability and Society. 11(2), pp219-233.
Further information is available from:
Karen Barton (k.barton@bolton.ac.uk)
Bolton Institute
Chadwick Street
Bolton, BL2 1JW
England