We are going to begin by looking first at how you can use the LMA with young pupils. We are going to track the progress of a child called Jem through the LMA process up until the point where his Primary learning medium has been established and he is ready to move on to annual monitoring.
Jem is a five year old with severe low vision who is just has coming to the end of his first year in reception class in his local school. Jem's QTVI is Jan Norton and she has been visiting Jem and his family at home since he was two.
Jan began the LMA process when Jem was 3. She uses form 1 to summarise all the relevant information the service has about Jem. Each time Jan conducts a new assessment for the LMA, she copies the previous version of the form and updates it in relation to the current assessment. This is easy to do because she stores the forms electronically. The changes she has to make are usually minimal. Here is a version of Jem's completed Form 1 written when Jem had just entered school for the Selection of General Media element.
Jan also has four complete versions of form 2 on file. Each form contains the results of short observations that Jan made over the period of a year about how Jem uses his senses to carry out various tasks. Jan completed three of the forms herself , observing Jem in a range of environments, both familiar and unfamiliar. Here is one of Jem's completed Form 2.
Jan has also helped Jem's mum to carry out an observation and to fill in a Form 2 herself. Jan found this was really helpful as a means of starting the conversation with mum about Jem's future learning and literacy options and for planning literacy related activities in the home.
Before Jem started School, Jan shared the results of the observations the reception teacher during her visits to the school to prepare for Jem's arrival. Jan also did a joint observation with Jem's reception class teacher, Alice Rooker, of Jem playing with a child in the playground so Alice could see for herself how Jem uses his senses in a practical setting. This was recorded using another Form 2. Jan used this exercise to explain more to Alice about Jem's use of his senses.
Once Jem had settled down in class, Jan used Form 3 to record observations about Jem's preferred sense for accessing general learning materials in the classroom, both close to and at a distance. She considers Jem's interaction with the class teacher and notes what teaching styles Jem responds to.
Jan uses this information to help discuss with the class teacher what resources and teaching approach would best help Jem in the classroom. As the term progresses Jan and the class teacher add observations to Form 3. Here is Jem's completed Form 3.
Along with the rest of the class Jem is very quickly introduced to the alphabet, phonics and simple words.
The evidence of the forms completed to date all points to braille being the primary medium for Jem's literacy development.
During term 1 Jan completes Form 4, but she and her colleagues have no doubt that Jem is ready to begin a formal literacy programme and that the relationship between Jem's sensory skills and the acquisition of early literacy is clear. Here is Jem's completed Form 4.
On completing Form 4, Jan is confident that she has sufficient evidence to go straight to Form 5 (Initial selection of literacy medium.) She completes the first part of Form Five at the start of the year and then waits until halfway through Term 3 before completing Part 2 of the form which is concerned with progress in literacy acquisition. Here is Jem's completed Form 5. All the evidence is consistent with the conclusion that Jem's primary learning medium is braille, but given that he does have some residual vision, additional instruction should be provided to encourage him to maximise his use of this vision.
Jem is introduced to print letter shapes using a multisensory approach in the class based phonics sessions while at the same time learning to read and write through braille. Jan and the team continue to monitor Jem throughout the rest of the reception year and Jan compiles a report at the end of the year based upon the data collected so far.
She cuts and pastes most of the content from the forms. Here is the completed report for Jem.
(If you'd like to see another sample report on a young child who has just started in reception class then you might want to look at this report for Wilbur who has very low vision.)
Jem's progress in literacy continues to be monitored though Year 1. At the end of Year 1, the Team around Jem meet to discuss Jem's progress. They revisit and Update form 5 and are satisfied that their original decision about Jem's Learning Media remains valid. Jem transfers to Phase 2 of the LMA for annual monitoring of the decision.