Governance Today Summer 2021

Can you imagine what every child with SEN might feel if we and their teachers saw them as not only having a ‘lack’ but also a ‘strength’. The attitudes our teachers have towards our children are the vehicle for conveying belief in them. We can assume that if our teacher’s view of our children increases in aspiration and positivity then our children’s self-concept and esteem will in turn rise. Practical takeaways So, instead of just thinking of SEN as a weaknesses audit - lead with the strengths. Could your setting carry out a strengths analysis of the children on the SEN register and share this with them and their teachers? Could staff train in a completely different form of INSET to see how it goes - sharing with them the strengths of SEN? Move towards ditching labels altogether in your school. Simply say: we don’t label (we leave that to the medics and psychologists), we only deal with individual children. Then staff can target your SEN students with two interactions which can shift their performance. First, specific praise: “I love that idea you came up with, so creative.” Second, encouragement: “You come up with brilliant creative ideas and you will be at an advantage in this task.” If my teachers had done that, I might even have passed maths GCSE the first time. This is not a policy shift or a major investment of funding. There is no paperwork alternative or intervention. This is just about our attitudes towards SEN - shifting from thinking of SEN as just a barrier to also being a recipe for success too. This is not about papering over the cracks but beginning to shift the perspective in how we think about SEN. I think of this as a piece of the puzzle, not the full answer. Perhaps we need a new terminology to help us do this? I’ll need to find someone with the word-creativity of an archetypal dyslexic to ask for help with this problem!” Daniel Sobel MA Ed (Psychology) FCMI FCIC FRSA Dyslexia: Dyslexia has been linked to higher visuospatial ability and creativity. There is evidence that dyslexics are over-represented among entrepreneurs and art students. There is a suggestion that the coping strategies dyslexics adopt, such as delegation, may be beneficial for entrepreneurs (Martinelli et al, 2018). Autism: Noted cognitive strengths in autism include enhanced visual and auditory perception of certain stimuli, hypothesised to be involved in the ‘savant’ abilities observed in some. Some autistic people also have noted strengths in systematising and attention to detail: these give rise to ‘special areas of interest’ where autistic people frequently develop exceptional knowledge and autistic children display exceptional vocabulary. There is evidence that unexpected cognitive strengths can be found in autistic children typically labelled ‘low-functioning’, such as the non- verbal (Mottron et al, 2006; Baron-Cohen et al, 2009; Courchesne et al, 2015). ADHD: There is a variety of research (for example, Lerner et al, 2017; Wiklund et al, 2016) that finds a positive association between ADHD and both entrepreneurial intention and entrepreneurial action. This suggests that there are real benefits to ADHD when it comes to risk-taking and adventurousness. I relate to my own ADHD as a super power (slightly overdoing it I’ll admit). I can brain-cope with far more than most, hyper-focus and learn complex material at quick speeds. There are advantages and the advantages are great - but only if you know what they are, how to access them, and how mitigate the challenges. The Good, the Bad, the Ugly and the Strengths of SEN The good news is that compared with 25 years ago, every teacher in the country knows what the major SEN types are - their common terms and basic presentations. This is a massive achievement and we can be proud of in being ahead of the curve internationally. The bad news, as I have said previously, is that these terms can distract us from thinking of the student as an individual. ‘Ben is ASD’ makes it almost impossible to see Ben as an individual child. The ugly news is that I bet very few teachers, children or parents can tell you some of the obvious wonderful strengths that can be found in the varying types of SEN. Further information & resources Baron-Cohen et al: Talent in autism: Hyper-systemizing, hyper-attention to detail and sensory hypersensitivity, May 2009. Courchesne et al: Autistic children at risk of being underestimated: school- based pilot study of a strength-informed assessment, Molecular Autism (6), March 2015: https://bit.ly/3xi7Iu2 Education Selection Committee: Special education needs and disabilities, October 2019: www.parliament.uk/ education-committee Headteacher Update: Families seeking SEND support left exhausted by 'adversarial and bureaucratic' system, October 2019: https://bit.ly/2L2ktlB Lerner et al: Entrepreneurship & ADHD, IZA Institute of Labor Economics, October 2017: https://bit.ly/2QO4JJm Martinelli et al: Common Beliefs and Research Evidence about Dyslexic Students’ Specific Skills: Is it time to reassess some of the evidence? Interdisciplinary Education and Psychology, November 2018: https://bit.ly/2Qnr2ph Mottron et al: Enhanced perceptual functioning in autism: An update, and eight principles of autistic perception, Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders (36), February 2006: https://bit.ly/3aqQIZ1 Sobel: SENCOs under siege, Headteacher Update, February 2021: https://bit.ly/3dMtBdE Wiklund et al: Entrepreneurship and psychological disorders: How ADHD can be productively harnessed, Journal of Business Venturing Insights (6:14), August 2016: https://bit.ly/3elW5dd 11 Summer 2021