1

This meeting took place in 2004. ‘Darren’ was a Year 9 student at a local High School, The Head of Year (HoY) contacted the Educational Psychologist (EP) by telephone to discuss Darren’s recent, difficult behaviour, which had culminated in the need to physically restrain him following a violent outburst whilst on a trip out from school. The Ford Wheel consultation meeting was arranged, notified by letter and held within two weeks of the referral. It was attended by Darren’s father, the HoY, a Learning Mentor and the EP. The key adults rated Darren on the twenty constructs in the rating booklet. These pages show the actual ratings made by the three key adults.

The Ford Wheel A case study

2

The rating booklet

This is the first page of the rating booklet used in pilot 1 cases. The adultcan rate the child anywhere on the five point scale. Ratings on 1 and 2 areconsidered to be positive or neutral ratings. Ratings of 3, 4 or 5 are ratingsof increasing severity or problem. Ratings are later transcribed to graphs.

3

The HoY gave Darren 3.7 for Seeks Attention. Two of the rating constructs, Grief & Loss and Fine Motor Skills (FMS), were only added to the rating booklet some weeks after Darren’s meeting had been held and therefore there are no ratings for those two constructs.

The HoY tends to rate Darren higher, i.e. more problems, on ObviousBehaviour Pattern constructs. Poor ratings by teachers in the earlypart of most meetings proved to be a common theme in pilot 1 cases.

The ratings made in the case of “Darren’’

4

The thick, black lines on the circular graph intersect with the thin spokes of thewheel at the point corresponding to the rating made by the key adult, e.g. theHoY gave Darren a rating of 3.7 for Compliance and 1.7 for Receptive to NewInformation (the latter is shown as a circle to highlight Darren’s skill in this area).

IDENTITY..................

This is how the HoY’s ratings of Darren look on the graph

5

This shows Darren’s father’s ratings (in purple) superimposed over the ratings of the HoY. The small circles represent a positive or neutral rating – it is interesting that parents tend to view their child in a more positive lightthan teachers. Thirteen of the father’s twenty ratings are positive or neutral.

6

The Learning Mentor was the only key adult to see anxiety in Darren and she spoke about this. Her comment was followed by silence but after a few minutes this seemed to unlock a lot of conversation about what might be causing that anxiety.

7

At the follow-up meeting one month later Darren’s problems in school

seemed to have receded:

Dad said:“I have sorted it – I control his access to (another relative) and I give him a bit more time.”

HoY said: “I have allocated Miss N, a specialist support worker, to keep

an eye on him – that seems to have done the trick.”

Specialist support worker said:“I have helped him – we talk daily – occasionally I give him some advice.”

8

Darren remained in mainstream school until the end of Year 11. He left school in 2006. His case file at the Educational Psychology Service indicates no further involvement by any support service after the Ford Wheel consultation meeting. The understandings reached in the meeting seemed to have helped resolve a difficult issue for Darren and for the school.

Long term outcome of Darren’s case