ABSTRACT
In this chapter the author looks at the interactions with the schools from two viewpoints: her perceptions and those of the special needs co-ordinators, who were the people that she worked principally with. The author interviews other advisory teachers about their perceptions of the role to see whether there were elements of commonality in the functions readers undertook. The advisory services can facilitate the formation of groups drawing membership from a number of institutions. One problem of Local Education Authority (LEA) advisory services is that they are to organise them purely upon subject lines, hard to avoid given the subject-based approach embodied in the National Curriculum. The other implication is that in order to promote whole school approaches the LEA needs to have a whole advisory approach towards implementing the changes in schools as it is neither logical nor feasible for advisory staff with a special needs brief to work on their own.
