North Ayrshire Council - Educational Psychology Service

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Early Years

Prescat
This section is to introduce you, as a parent to:

P
R
E
S School
C Community
A Assessment
T Teams

and how they can help preschool children who may have additional support needs.

Why have PreSCAT?
Early support is of tremendous value to children with additional support needs and their families. To do this, all services come together to form the Pre-School Community Assessment Teams (PreSCAT). They share information and provide a co-ordinated service to children and families. In order to do this effectively professionals and parents/carers need to talk together and plan the best way forward.

Who is in the PreSCAT team?
An educational psychologist is responsible for each of the three Pre-SCAT areas within North Ayrshire. He/she organises and chairs the PreSCAT meetings, and ensures that information goes from the meeting to the appropriate people and services.

The Pre-SCAT team consists of agencies already involved with your child in North Ayrshire. These may include:

parents (always part of the team)
educational psychologist
a doctor from Community Medicine
a health visitor
home visiting teacher
speech therapist
physiotherapist

Everyone at the meeting will have a sound reason for being there. Parents/carers are always present and are the most important members of the team.

Which children are discussed at Prescat meetings?
The team discusses children who have additional support needs which require long-term continuing support and additional help.

These needs arise from a range of difficulties including:

delayed development
language and communication difficulties
visual and hearing impairments
physical difficulties.

What happens at the meeting?
After introductions, everyone present will be asked about their view of the child's needs. Parents' views are particularly important. Specific objectives will be set for future work. This 'plan of action' specifies what is to happen and who will be responsible for seeing that it is carried out. There is a written report from the meeting which provides a record of recommendations.

What kind of recommendation might Prescat make?
Each child is different, but common Pre-SCAT recommendations may include:

support from a home visiting teacher
early or particular nursery placement
appropriate school placement
contacting other services.

Hopefully, this information will help you to understand the purpose of PreSCAT a little better, but if you do have further questions, feel free to contact us using the details below.

Access to Files
When the educational psychologist becomes directly involved with you and your child a file is created by the psychological service in your child's name. This is to keep copies of notes and any letters or reports. This file is kept safe and confidential by the psychological service. You can arrange to see the contents of this file by writing to the principal psychologist at the Irvine office.

Quality Assurance
The psychological service operates within the priorities and standards of North Ayrshire council and has a range of quality assurance procedures. In addition the service is subject to inspection by Her Majesty's Inspectors of Education, in the same way that schools are. Inspectors have full access to all service documents and records including individual files. Confidentiality is of course maintained by inspectors and no details about individuals would ever be discussed publicly.

Suggestions/Complaints
We value feedback and suggestions from our clients. Should you wish to comment on the service you have received from the psychological service you can speak directly to the psychologist involved. You can also contact the principal psychologist.

Alternative Formats
You can request a copy of this leaflet on audio tape, in large print and in other languages

Contact
Principal Psychologist
Psychological Service
6A Kilwinning Road
Vineburgh Park
IRVINE KA12 8RU
Telephone: 01294 272427
Fax: 01294 276308

You can download the information above in this pdf leaflet (218Kb).