learning assessments 26 May 2022

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Psychologists

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One of the services that the psychology team offers is learning assessments. A learning assessment can be a useful option to consider when children aren’t achieving their learning potential. Literacy (reading, understanding and writing) is an area that children experience difficulty with and sometimes, numeracy may also be a concern.

An assessment can help identify the barriers to learning for children.  Assessments may be helpful as they can give greater insight into why difficulties are occurring, highlight supports that children need, and help with decisions about schooling options.

Learning assessments may also help identify whether there are any attention or emotional issues that are preventing the child from making progress.

What do learning assessments involve?

To start with our psychologists will want to talk to you and find out about your child’s developmental, school, social and emotional history. This appointment is with the parent/carer (s) only as this gives you the opportunity to talk freely about your concerns.

From this, the psychologist will be able to work out which standardised tests may be helpful.  They will want to schedule 1-2 sessions with you and your child. These assessments may include a cognitive assessment (looking at learning potential) and an academic assessment (looking at literacy and/or numeracy). Other assessments may also be suggested.

When our team sees children, we work hard to put them at their ease so we can see them at their best. The first session in particular may involve rapport-building strategies.

The psychologist may want to talk to the teacher too. While school reports have a lot of useful information, our team can learn quite a bit from talking to the teacher. Sometimes we may even arrange an observation of the child in the class to find out more about how their behaviour may be impacting learning.

Sometimes they are also going to want to talk to other therapists about their assessments and therapy progress.

What happens after the learning assessment is completed?

The psychologist will meet with you to give feedback on what the assessment has revealed and their recommendations for how to move forward.  They will also provide you with a written report which you may choose to share with the school and other therapists. The aim of this session is to answer your questions and to help you as a parent/carer plan the next steps in supporting your child.

You are more than welcome to contact Reception on 9274 7062 to find out information about any of our services. For more information about our psychology services in general, please click here:

https://www.childwellbeingcentre.net.au/services/psychological-services/

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