[Bruckner]

I was wondering if anyone has any information about speech therapy for children. My son is most likely going to need it. Is it a covered expense there? Does your GP give you a referral? Any advice or information appreciated!

Emily

[incredible hulse]

Hi Emily
My son has special needs and part of this is speech and language therapy at Kindy. There is no direct charge for this and it is organised through the early intervention education services. This can either be done via referral from the school or as in our case direct parent referral. I cannot compare against the US but as in the UK it appears there is a huge shortage of teachers in this area and our sons visits from the speech and language team are very few and far between, and it did a while to get these visits also. In general there seems to be a general lack of funds available for special needs in schools in NZ and we are currently battling to get ORRS funding (likely to be unsuccessful) for our child. My advise would be to start researching (and hassling) the various departments as soon as you have a date for your arrival - we did and are still trying to get a lot of services that we feel are necessary after 16 months here. We have some knowledge of the system, specifically in Welly and Kapiti; if you need more info feel free to drop us a PM

[Bruckner]

Thank you so much! I will PM you with more questions.

Emily

[Sam B]

Hi Emily

I am a speech and language therapist working in NZ for the Minestry of Education. Unless your son has severe health needs, you will access his speech and language therapy through the special education service. You can refer him yourself, or most likely his teacher will. I think the service is pretty good, it's free, generally provided in school. Speech and language therapists here think their caseloads are big, but they are titchy compared to the UK, so kids generally get a reasonable service. If you don't think he is getting enough help, there is the option of private.

Anyway, feel free to pm me for more info. If I knew more about your son's difficulties, I could give you more info about the service he will receive.

Sam

[Sam B]

Incredible Hulse - It sounds as if your service is not meeting your son's needs at present. I am amazed to find that Speech and Language therapists here have such long waiting lists here, when their caseloads seem so small compared to what I have been used to. My advice to any parent would always be that you are the best therapist your son will have, so try to get your therapist (if you can pin her down) to give you lots of activities to do at home as well. For all children aged 5 and under, I would recommend a book called "It Takes 2 to Talk" by Ayola Manolsen (Hope I've spelt that right) which is a book produced by Hanen, an organisation in Canada. It is brilliant, and if you follow some of the strategies in this book, with any child, regardless of whether they have difficulties or not, you will notice a difference in their communication skills. All parents of young children should be given it free at birth!

[incredible hulse]

Hi Sam
The S+L therapist we see is pretty good - it justs seems there are not enough of them or the funding is not in place. Maybe specific to Kapiti/Welly as it is a busy area (it took us a year to get on a doctor's list as they had to wait for one to come in (from UK!), but the whole SEN network appears quite restrictive because of it. We are doing the primary school rounds at the moment and it appears without ORRS funding the alloted hours is minute to the schools. My son has a statement from the UK but ORRS funding appears to be a lot more difficult to obtain.
My wife (primary teacher of 10 years) looked into retraining to become a S+L therapist but as there is no "migration" path it would appear, it was not feasible for her to start a 3/4 year degree course again - maybe this is why there is a shortage?

[Sam B]

As far as I know, there is a Masters course available in NZ which is 2 years of training, this might be suitable for her? It is tricky to get ORRS funding here, you seem to need a "diagnosis" to qualify, but it was also tough and getting tougher in the UK. I'm sure you know this, but primary schools vary widely in how they manage children with special needs, some will be ace. In the area I work, we groan inwardly when parents pick certain schools, because we know that the children won't get the help they need and deserve.

It's often the more low decile schools that seem to cope better for some reason. Look for things like whether they run oral language groups that all children with difficulties can access. Does the SENCo do the job full time, or does she/he also teach a class most of the time? I bet you know all this anyway. Feel free to PM me if you want any specific advice.

[Bruckner]

Sam,

I've sent you a PM.

Emily

[wanderingoregonian]

Although I don't have kids myself, I have seen how difficult it is for parents when their children are having difficulties with communication. I too am a speech therapist, however I work primarily with children who do not speak or whose speech is so hard to understand that they need a means to supplement their speech. I have been quite impressed with the knowledge and skills of the speech therpists here . Then again, I immigrated as part of the skilled migrant scheme yet another sign of the real shortage of speech therapists here.

I too like the it takes 2 to talk book and would recommend it (see my pm)

Can you call the local GSE office (special education) and say that you are new/moving to the area and you would like some information about services?

Here is a list of GSE offices

http://www.minedu.govt.nz/index.cfm?layout=document&documentid=7278&data=l

Here are a more general link on special education in NZ: http://www.minedu.govt.nz/index.cfm?layout=index&indexid=7954&indexparentid=6871

[Bruckner]

Thanks wanderingoregonian. I got your PM and replied. I'll definitely check out the links about too. I love this forum!

Emily