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Finally, I wish to thank Dr. Hegarty for her continued good
work for the school and to thank the Principal School Medical
Officer and Staff for their support.
Pupils Suffering From Speech Defect
In Day Special Schools 13
In Residential Special Schools 3
The London Borough resolved to make provision for the education
of pupils suffering from a speech defect before taking up
its executive functions and this early decision enabled the
necessary adaptations to be completed at West Thornton Primary
School by the end of the year. In consequence 8 children were
recommended for day special education owing to a speech disorder,
and four of these children were already on the waiting list for
a place in a residential school. It is hoped that this latter
provision will now become unnecessary since the children concerned
are all less than 6 years of age.
The new unit will provide highly specialised facilities
within an ordinary school and every effort will be made to
integrate the children into the general life of the school and
to rehabilitate them into the educational work of the school as
soon as possible. Prolonged investigations are likely to be
necessary before any child can be considered for admission to
the Unit and the final decision will be taken by Dr. C. WorsterDrought,
the consultant adviser on speech disorders. It will be
necessary to confirm that the child's total speech vocabulary is
seriously impaired and that the cause of this aphasia cannot be
related to hearing or emotional difficulties or to low intelligence.
This is a small problem and it is surprising that so many
of these children have been identified in Croydon. Since there
is no conceivable local aetological factor which might account
for this, one can only conclude that it reflects the efficiency
of the excellent diagnostic service which has been developed
during the last five years. It is extremely gratifying that,
having been shown that such children exist in this area, the
Committee has felt able to provide this pioneer unit for their
special educational treatment. The Unit opened on January 10th,
1966.