Special Educational Needs Essay Example for Free

Special Educational Needs Essay In this essay will discuss the term Special Educational Needs, understanding of segregation, integration and inclusion, the importance of Warnock Report, development in policy since 1981,and the Medical and Social modules. The term Special Educational Needs in child development has a meaning of children who needs extra support. Early in 1700s in Britain term Special Educational Needs did not exist and it did not need to exist as children with Special Educational Needs were looked from their families or church. After the radical change as result of Industrial Revolution in Britain by mid 1800s special institution were created for every human ill. Education on children with Special Educational Needs began through individuals and charities; the first school to be opened was for children with visual impairments in Edinburgh 1976 by Thomas Braidwood he was followed by the school for blind in Liverpool opened by Henry Dannett, this schools however were nothing what we have now but still they made a difference for children in needs as they had very little contact with outside the world. In 1870 Foster Act – Education for all allowed all the children with Special Educational Needs to enter the main stream schools and their difficulties were recognised. Many of these children were experiencing difficulties in making progress and as a result of the elementary classes contain large number of pupils, and they were taught by teachers with no specific special educational trainings. They came to the point that children with SEN were unfit to include in the main stream schools. According to ‘Gibson and Blandford (2005) significantly the report’s recommendations included the integration of pupils with SEN into mainstream education. However, the level of integration indicated in the report was limited form of education provision for pupils with SEN; limited in those pupils although physically located in a mainstream setting, would have to adapt in order to fit the location and culture of established forms of teaching and learning’. In 1893 James Kerr was a medical officer for the Bradford School Board; his role was to assess children’s mental process and identify children that are not suitable for ordinary schools. Special Educational Needs incurred a high cost than ordinary provision. So most of the children were isolated in ordinary schools or received no schooling. Children with visual impairments from the age of five in 1889 should be provided with education and for children with hearing impairments should be taught by specialist teacher and those teachers should get paid more than mainstream teachers. Also in 1889 the commission recommended that each school should have a medical officer. In 1994 Education Act said that every child should receive education within primary, secondary and further education based on pupils age and all the local education authorities should meet the needs of handicapped children. In 1945 service regulations established 11 categories for handicap children. Inclusion is education that means approaching to educate children with Special Educational Needs, under the Inclusion module children with Special Educational Needs have to spend their time with non-disabled children. Inclusion rejects the rights to put a child in need to a special school, inclusion is about mixing all the children together the one in need and the ones that they are not in need, to have the right to be educated in the same way and to meet everybody’s needs and abilities. Integration in Special Educational Needs means the rights of the children, and supporting those children by following the law, Education Act. While the Segregation has a meaning of separating children from each other, the ones that have a disability should be placed to special school and the ones that are in the term ‘normal’ should go to the mainstream schools, also segregation means the discriminations of children from the race, religion and types of disabilities. According to Education and Skills Under the 1944 Education Act, children with special educational needs were categorised by their disabilities defined in medical terms. Many children were considered to be uneducable pupils were labelled into categories such as maladjusted or educationally sub-normal and given special educational treatment in separate schools. According to the article wrote for the inclusion week has said: The 1981 Education Act This law brought in the first duty on LEAs to educate disabled children in mainstream schools, taking account of parents wishes and establishing three conditions that were to be met before it could happen. These conditions were: the disabled child can be educated in the ordinary school, other childrens education will not be adversely affected, and there is an efficient use of resources. By late 1960s and into early 1970s parents, disability groups began to subject the policy of segregated special schools; they argued that continued segregation could no longer be justified. Demands were increasingly made, not only from community but from those adults who experienced segregation provision. The Warnock report in arly 1970s said that educational professionals and parents had begun to put pressure to government to investigate the standards of national provision for children with needs, in 1973 Margaret Thatcher established a committee under the Warnock that educational provision should be reviewed in England, Scotland and Wales for children and young people with handicapped disability. The work was completed on 1978 and as it is final report 225 recommendations on the policy and organisation for children with additional needs. The Warnock report criticised the orthodoxy and segregation and argued that children should not be categorised and therefore children should have their own Special Educational Needs deficit and their needs should meet within mainstream schools. The report also shows that 20 per cent of children could experience a learning difficulty at some time. Finally in 1981 Education Act translated many of recommendation of the Warnock report and they were put into legislation. The term Special Educational Needs had a legal status and the term handicapped that was used since 1945 has finally ended. Furthermore the Act clearly articulated how children with Special Education Needs should be assessed and how the statement of SEN should be formulated. Finally children assessed with Special Educational Needs were possible to be educated alongside with their peers within the mainstream schools. Even after putting the law into consideration for children with Special Educational Needs to attend mainstream schools most of the settings had lack of money to implement the Act and they remained the existing system of segregation to the special school provision. In 1983 to 1991 the proportion of children being educated dropped by 12. 5 per cent and in some local education authorities the number of children that they were attending segregation provision was increased. The whole idea of the term Special Educational Needs was that children and young people to be educated, to attend mainstream school and to participate in activities same as normal children, but this outcomes did not follow, an national survey in United States has found that disabled people were less educated, also less likely to be employed, people with disability are marked as different. In 1997 the term Special Educational Needs has been replaced with Special Needs Education, this change in terminology distinguish the provision of Special Educational Needs. The idea of bringing to place the term Special Educational Needs was to categorise the disability of children and to include all of those who are in need to additional support. Under the 1994 Education Act children with Special Educational Needs were labelled by their disability, many of those children had no contact with the outside world and received no education whatsoever. The Warnock report 1978 followed by the Education Act 1981 changed the name of handicapped children to Special Educational Needs children and integrative which later was stated as inclusive which meant all the children to receive education, not depending on their needs or abilities. According to the web site, Douglas Silas Solicitors has been said: The Education Act 1944 originally established that childrens education should be based on their age, aptitude and ability. Eleven categories of handicap were described which included for example, educationally subnormal and delicate as well as blind. At that time, the general philosophy was that the child should fit the school rather than the school fit the child. 1974 saw the establishment of the Warnock Committee, leading to the publication of the Warnock Report 1978, which was named after Mary Warnock, the chair of the inquiry whose remit was to look at the needs of children with SEN. The Warnock Committees conclusions were that 20% of children in the school population could have SEN but 2% might need support over and above what a mainstream school could provide for. The Warnock Report recommended that there should be specialist provision for children with SEN which could protect the 2% and ensure that they received appropriate provision. The Warnock report was introduced under the Education Act 1981 but had no additional funding for the new process of getting the teachers trained. The Warnock report remained till 1990 but during this time many children were declined to receive special schools. The Green paper on 1997 was introduced to government to support children with Special Educational Needs also the UN statement. Government had looked again to the Special Educational Needs framework also SENDA 2001 and 2004 Special Educational Needs of the strategy for removing the barrier, Government had invest more money for Special Educational children from 2. 8 billion to 4. 1 billion in the last four years. The Warnock reports seem to be struggling to remain fit for the purpose of Special Educational Needs, there is a failure in the system to cope with raising the number of children with autism, emotional and social development. In 2005 Warnock had called the Government as emergency for reviewing the situation of Special Educational Needs particularly the concept of inclusive, while the Government had said that the policies do not need to be review they actually need to be changed from the ground. Ofsted and audit commissions known the issues of the reports therefor had said that Special Educational Need does not need to be reviewed. It has been four years already and Government has no answer for reviewing the policies and when prime minister has been interviewed he had said that there is a room for the policies to be improved and they are keeping Special Educational Needs under the review. Government still had not reviewed anything on Special Educational Needs policies but it has been said that they are looking into it in private. The review took place in 2010 from Government and it has been 30 years after actually took place. It has been said that Governments new policy has been softened on inclusion for sending the children with Special Educational Needs to the mainstream schools and for closing the special schools. Government vision for education of children with Special Educational Needs it provides clear national leadership. Early invention to make sure that each child who has learning difficulty to receive the need and help as soon as possible, also the parents of children with Special Education Needs to have access to childcare. Removing barriers of learning in every setting and making sure that inclusive practise is taking place in every school. Also by raising expectation and achievement by making sure that teacher are receiving the appropriate training for Special Educational Needs. Delivering improvements so then parents has a clear understanding of what to do for their children and where to get help for their children with Special Educational Needs. Overall in this essay I had a chance of understanding of the policies since 1981 also the Warnock report in more details, the integration, inclusion and segregation, Children with Special Educational Needs now are able to receive the same education as other children and are attending the mainstream schools. The meaning of term Special Educational Needs that in my point at the beginning of this course was completely different now I have an understanding that I think most of what I know I would not be able to put in words.