Where were all the special needs students when we were at school?

I can never recall during my schooldays 40's /50's hearing the word 'special needs'. I can only believe that were a child seen as '*different*', how I despise that word, they did not receive the education, if any education, I had.

Foetal alcohol syndrome was first diagnosed in 1973

aggie

My Mum was an infant teacher , sometimes she had well over 40 infants ! The Teacher moved up the school with the class for three years , then went back to infants , she said every child she taught could read write and count to some degree , ranging from excellent to the poorest , but , with high unemployment at least they could sign their name and not put a cross !
She was not boasting , she loved her job and did her best
Any “slow” children were helped , even by sitting them next to a “clever” child if it was possible . The children all seemed happy to see her out of school too

Signing your name isn't reading/writing.

so its a good idea to teach children that violence is ok?
I don't count smacking as 'violence.' Just discipline. I'm not advocating beating children. You only have to compare the behaviour of many children today, with that of the past, to see the difference. It's undisputable that behaviour has deteriorated in recent times, and in my opinion, a lack of proper discipline is a major factor. I didn't expect many people to agree with me though, as it's such an unfashionable view in today's society.

Does anyone remember when Joey Deacon was featured on Blue Peter. That was the first time that many of us realised that children with cerebral palsy had a physical problem but were still intelligent. And I’d never heard of autism until I saw a film about it when I was in my twenties and started reading up on conductive education etc that was far more advanced in Romania than it was here.

Katie59

IF it is a fact that there are more “learning difficulties” than previous generations it is likely for 2 reasons.
1. Women having children in their 30s and beyond where the risk is known. (aging fathers too)
2. Drug and Alchohol abuse has damaged DNA in the parents, being passed on to the child but that’s difficult to separate from childhood damage by parents continuing drug abuse.

I don't know if it is true (I'm sceptical), but don't believe for one moment that children in the past weren't affected by alcoholic mothers.

During the war, my mother was evacuated to a family in rural Herefordshire, where the mother was rarely sober. My mother remembered being dragged into town every Saturday. The family's mother spent some of the day shopping, but most of the day in the pub, getting drunk and sometimes going off with men she met. The daughter of the family would most definitely be labelled as "special needs". My mother was 8/9 and the girl was a couple of years older and couldn't read and was "backward".

Although I lived in a very poor area my primary school used to have lots of children passing their 11plus and going to grammar school. In my last year I was in a class that had lots of bright academic children. It was only years later that I remembered that there was another class. I assume that’s where the children with special needs were. Even recently @ 30 years ago I had a friend who was headmistress if a primary school saying to me that ‘there is no such thing as dyslexia’. She was a very good teacher but I’d love to ask her now why she thought that as it was very out of character for her.

It was always there, they were either in the back corner of the class or at was called then a Special school. Every teaching authority seemed to have its own ideas and schools.
I was always bottom in spelling tests and remembering having to move desks, then moving back when we did the mental arithmetic tests.
My child was picked up by a supper head who said it was Dyslexic it was not recognised by our authority and I moved them to an authority where it was. When testing them they asked if I minded being tested as well. They found I had mild dyslexia as well.
I was a teacher and often had to say to parents I agree your child has....... but you will have to see the Head and see if they can arrange testing I also told of the adjoining authority where help was given. At uni, a computer and the lecturers' notes were given after each lecture.
I know someone who is a Sen. coordinated and they say it is all more sorted out now, so why do we hear of so many parents crying for help?

My Mum was an infant teacher , sometimes she had well over 40 infants ! The Teacher moved up the school with the class for three years , then went back to infants , she said every child she taught could read write and count to some degree , ranging from excellent to the poorest , but , with high unemployment at least they could sign their name and not put a cross !
She was not boasting , she loved her job and did her best
Any “slow” children were helped , even by sitting them next to a “clever” child if it was possible . The children all seemed happy to see her out of school too

Oh

Regarding Autism, although it was Kanner who first described it in 1940s US, it was psychiatrist Lorna Wing who is often perceived as doing the first serious UK study.
'In 1979 Lorna Wing and Judith Gould examined the prevalence of autism, as defined by Leo Kanner, among children known to have special needs in the former London Borough of Camberwell'

IF it is a fact that there are more “learning difficulties” than previous generations it is likely for 2 reasons.
1. Women having children in their 30s and beyond where the risk is known. (aging fathers too)
2. Drug and Alchohol abuse has damaged DNA in the parents, being passed on to the child but that’s difficult to separate from childhood damage by parents continuing drug abuse.

Thank you nanna8 for starting this thread. The responses show that we shall always have more to learn about human behaviour, including the fact that many of us take offence and make judgements as a knee-jerk reaction.

I said I wouldn't post again but I think you need to read how many people with specific learning difficulties or learning disabilities and autism end up in our criminal justice system because they have not been supported properly, including being diagnosed 'in the past'

report here

They were all in my school. Sadly there was no special treatments for them back in the day but I was born when Noah had the ark!

You are right greenlady. There has never been a time when all children could read, write and do mental arithmetic beyond a very basic level. Even today, there are many adults who are functionally illiterate and innumerate. There are also people, mainly born in the 1930s, who never received an education beyond elementary level.

Until the Warnock Report in 1978, there were many more children with special needs in separate schools. Since the 1980s the trend has been to integrate more children into mainstream schools. That's why anybody who left school before 1978 might not have come across many (or any) children with special needs.

I remember a lad in early 70s who was dyslexic. It was quite a new diagnosis then. Trying out new ideas to make dyslexic pupils' lives easier in school has been moving apace for the last 50 years.

Corporal punishment was outlawed in UK state schools in 1986, but prior to that was only administered by senior teachers and had to be logged. Outlawed in private schools 1998-2003 depending on which UK country you were in.) I don't remember it being used after late 70s.

I bet they havent forgotten. I remember the one time my mum smacked me.
I cant even begin to address the rest of your post. It's just too depressing.

so its a good idea to teach children that violence is ok?

It's true that in the past, conditions such as autism went undiagnosed, and children with obvious behavioural issues were catered for in special schools. I'm not denying that autism exists and is diagnosed more frequently nowadays, but I do think there is a tendency towards labelling perfectly normal, but naughty, children as soon as they start being difficult.
Also true that many teachers ruled by fear in the past, but it did ensure peaceful classes and a lack of the low level disruption that seems to be the norm today.
My concern is that children today cannot just be 'naughty.' I dislike the namby pamby 'naughty step' and 'gentle hands darling' approach to behaviour that used to be effectively dealt with by smacking.
I was smacked as a child and I smacked my own children when they were naughty. They are now successful women in their forties, and neither of them has ever mentioned being smacked when they were young. They've probably forgotten.
Today, it seems that children have to be diagnosed with a problem when they are persistently naughty. The one that irritates me most is PDO (persistent demand avoidance). In other words, sheer naughtiness and refusal to obey instructions. It didn't exist when I was growing up.

As a child I was in a large primary school in a working class area. Bright children (the scholarship-11+ class) were in the A stream, the B stream was the secondary modern children, and the C stream those who would now be regarded as having special needs. any children who were more of a problem were sent off to a special school.
My first teaching job was in a small primary where the head teacher taught part time because numbers were low. I had what is now year 6. There was a boy with real learning difficulties, but because the school was small, and very much a family/community school we kept him. I expect the secondary school packed him off somewhere.
There were always as well a small number of children who "bunked off" and were returned by the EWO from time to time.
Just because a problem isn't named doesn't mean it isn't there. Sometimes things were spoken about in private but not openly discussed or labelled.

A friend of the family has a child with a rare genetic condition, this causes many issues but he's in mainstream primary school and has received endless support from them, he's actually thriving there.

Esspee

I lived in a working class school catchment area and apart from one boy labelled “fidget Fraser McIntyre” by the teacher because of his restless behaviour I was unaware of any child with special needs.
I also believe that we all left primary school able to read, write and do simple arithmetic. We had to read out loud and give answers orally to mental arithmetic questions daily.
The brighter children went on to the local Academy or Secondary school and the less bright to Junior Secondary.
When you read Mumsnet you get the impression that there are huge numbers of children these days with special needs.
Like you OP I wonder why.

you are saying that you believe that every child left your ?primary school able to read, write and do mental arithmetic....but belief is not fact. I am 67 and I can remember children in my class who had varying degrees of difficulty with various things. It was a good school by its lights and did its best to support those kids. I was one of them...I know now that I am dispraxic and mildly dyslexic. Luckily I am academically bright and because I was VERY good at other things and an early reader it didn't hold me back...but yes swimming classes and PT were a nightmare.

Rosalyn69

I think “special needs” is very over used. My son is high functioning autistic with ADHD but was never “special needs”. He was different from the other children for sure.
I feel that so many children diagnosed as “special needs” may well have other much simpler problems.

what term would you like to have used instead?

nanna8

No one was diagnosed with autism, ADHD etc when I was at school. The only person I remember who was special needs was a deaf boy who coped quite well in the classroom without an aide , just a small amount of extra attention. Has something in our environment caused all these children to appear? Is it connected with parenting, is it just that they had a lower profile and there was no diagnosis available ? Are we over diagnosing children and labelling them? I have worked with severely autistic young adults but they were very obviously in need of extra help. Not all who are diagnosed have visible issues, though.

If you have worked within specialist education or care, then I am amazed that you need to ask