I have been super busy lately taking some courses both for personal development and continued professional development.

In my role at work I mentor lots of young people and many of them have additional needs. The young people are often neurodiverse and have a level of SEN needs. So I took a course specifically for SEND, special educational needs and disability. It was really informative and I learnt lots around the legislation and case law. This drove me to look at SEND case law levels 1, 2 and 3 which is delivered by IPSEA. Before doing that I am taking part in a training day on Wednesday (15th December) on EHCPs. I am really looking forward to learning the knowledge more in depth on how EHCPs are written and how to use case law in them.

And if that wasn’t enough…. The last two weeks I have been taking part in training sessions delivered by the PDA society. The PDA society stands for pathological demand avoidance. Charlie has a diagnosis of autism with a demand avoidance profile. And that's how close we're going to get to PDA as it's not recognised or accepted in our home LA. But demand avoidance profile is… go figure?! Learning more about how Charlie sees the world is always going to be beneficial to anyone who comes into contact with Charlie. So any knowledge I can gain and pass on is just so crucial to help navigate Charlie through his life and support him the best way possible.

Georgina x