Special Needs Education task

The first part of the Special Needs Education task, writing a reply to the following email:

“Dear Eki,

I’m writing this letter because I’m starting to worry about my son’s future. At the moment he is a happy, 16 year old student on a special class, where he has studied since he started school. My son is autistic (communicating with him is difficult and his behaviour and speaking are often repetitive) and has always had problems in math. I think that part of the learning disability can be just because he is not interested I math and the teachers during the years have not always been qualified. His intelligence is anyway a bit above average and he is very talented in geography. Also his memory is extremely good. He has still a year to go before making decisions about the future, but I have some questions I would like to have answered, to calm my nerves:

1. Is it possible that he could continue in normal vocational education or upper secondary high school with an assistant? He has had one since he was three. What requirements there are in his case? Are there some other options if the normal vocational school is not a possibility?

2. What laws and standards there are concerning special needs in vocational education? What rights (f.ex. inclusion, special support) my son has as a student of a vocational school?

Daddy -71”

And my response:

 

Dear Daddy -71,

Thank you for your letter. It’s always good to receive questions from parents about their children and we do our best to provide the answers you are looking for.

In answer to your first question, yes it is possible that your son should be able to continue in vocational education and there are a number of avenues open to him in that area. There are courses which are entirely set up for special needs students and then there is the possibility to enroll in other courses with a personal study plan so as to overcome any specifically challenging subjects.

There are, as with all vocational education dreams, some limitations about exactly what subjects one can study and where, so it’s sensible to keep in mind the locations of those possibilities and see what your son is most interested in and where those places can be applied from.

For the second question, it is very much worth noting that everyone living in Finland legally has the right to education, regardless of mental or physical state. That your son has been able to lean on support thus far in his education should only go to underscore this fact and put you at ease. Nothing changes beyond any point and I hope and trust that you will always find people willing to help find solutions to the challenges you face.

The next step, I suggest, would be coming in for a meeting, with myself, your son and the careers councellor all present, so we can together weigh up the best options.

For further information, you can check out the following links:

http://www.ammatillinenerityisopetus.fi/

http://www.luovi.fi/

http://www.esteetonamis.fi/

I hope this response has proven useful and I look forward to hearing from you again in the near future.

All the best for now,

Christopher (Eki) Smith

For the second task, I interviewed one of my colleagues, Tuija Niinisalo, about what it's like to work with secial needs children, the day to day challenges and how she overcomes them:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kAFOr9PtQkU