I think it's a really difficult balance, but it was something that was brought up in the research stages of our report. So, we held a round table during the research period, and participants said that they were particularly concerned about the lack of awareness and knowledge of children who had additional learning needs. And, obviously, this is quite serious because these children are at risk of being excluded and are over-represented in excluded groups. And they were particularly concerned about children who were sort of on the cusp, or not properly diagnosed, and a lot of these children would have things like attention deficit disorder and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, and, again, these made up the cohort of pupils who were excluded. So, when you consider that, you tend to think, actually, diagnosis could be really useful, so that staff are aware of the pupil's needs, and maybe aware of why the child might be demonstrating challenging behaviour. However, what participants did say was that unless there was a proper understanding of the child's condition or additional learning needs, and that the proper support was there, then diagnosis alone wasn't of value. So, I think one of the participants said that up to 50 per cent of learners in a classroom could have an additional learning need, so, again, if the support isn't there, that child isn't going to benefit from diagnosis. And what was really highlighted is the importance of the school being inclusive, and for that child, regardless of whether they had an additional learning need or not, to have proper opportunity to progress.
Thank you.
Thank you. And, then, to what extent are schools aware of the impact of early trauma ACEs, and how are schools adapting their practices to take account of them?
I don't think we're really capable of saying that on an individual level. We're aware, as you've heard from previous evidence from heads of education, et cetera, directors of education, that work is going on on an all-Wales basis, and there's obviously an awful lot of work that's going on on the ACEs agenda. I referred to being a previous school governor, and that's somewhere that's become a trauma-informed school, and they have established that and are widening that base. I think that what the school does though is something that has to loop back, as I said, with the curriculum changes as we're going forward. There's a concern that I have at the moment regarding the progress on EOTAS and PRU within the new curriculum, and there's work that I think will still need to be done, and something that I'm sure will be considered by this committee when it deals with the curriculum assessment Bill when it comes forward later on in the year, because there were comments made by the education Minister, I think, in response to Suzy Davies, in the statement in January, that we're talking about disallowing areas of the curriculum on the basis of the individual learner, to which I have no concern in itself. However, the emotional and mental health well-being needs of this particularly vulnerable group of people needs to be centre stage. So, the role of the health and well-being area of learning and experience, and the role of mental health and emotional well-being within the curriculum, is hugely important.