If your child goes to a local school and you feel that it has some special needs that need to be addressed then you have until the end of this month to let the local department of education know.
The special needs programmes fall into 3 categories:
Integrative Förderung – IF (Integrated Encouragement): is a programme which takes place during class hours and which the school provides in most classes. The teacher assesses whether a child will benefit form this and automatically put your child in this course.
Integrative Sonderschulung – IS (integrated special education): this is a programme for children who are below the standard level (usually with some kind of physical or mental disability) and will have been suggested by the school psychologist. The children will continue to go to regular school and will be supported during the school hours.
Separative Sonderschulung – Ses (separated special education): this programme is for children who are not being sufficient challenged in the regular class or who are not able to join in a regular class often due to their behavioral needs. The child will need to be assessed by a psychologist before having this course of action recommended.
If you feel that your child would benefit from any of these programmes, be sure to act in the coming weeks by speaking with their teacher and/or making an appointment with a psychologist. In the case that the parents are separated it is essential that both parents give their approval (i.e. sign the request form) or the child will not be considered eligible for the programmes.
As a side note if your child is not a native German speaker DAZ (Deutsch Als Zweitesprache) classes are automatically given to your child.
