There's no national checklist or score for an EHCP. Instead, the law sets a two-stage test. A council must assess your child if they have or may have special educational needs and may need support through an EHCP. It then issues a plan if the assessment shows that support through a plan is necessary. A diagnosis isn't required at either stage.
This guide explains the test in plain English, how it applies to ADHD, autism and dyslexia, and the signs that it might be time to apply. It covers England only.
Written by Laura Frampton, a UK-qualified teacher with over ten years' experience working with children and their families, including seven in a school SENCo team.
What counts as special educational needs?
In law, a child has special educational needs (SEN) if they have a learning difficulty or disability that calls for special educational provision: support that is additional to, or different from, what most children their age receive.
A learning difficulty means significantly greater difficulty in learning than most children of the same age, or a disability that makes it harder to use the facilities schools generally provide. Needs usually fall into one or more of four areas:
- communication and interaction
- cognition and learning
- social, emotional and mental health
- sensory and/or physical needs
The legal test, in two stages
Stage 1: Should the council assess? Under section 36(8) of the Children and Families Act 2014, the council must carry out an EHC needs assessment if your child has or may have SEN, and it may be necessary for support to be provided through an EHCP. Both parts use "may". You don't need to prove a plan is needed to get an assessment, only that it might be.
Stage 2: Should the council issue a plan? After the assessment, the council must issue an EHCP if it's necessary for your child's support to be provided through one. In practice, this usually comes down to whether your child needs more, or different, support than their school can reasonably provide from the resources it normally has.
Do councils have their own criteria?
Some councils publish local guidance or "thresholds" describing what they look at. These can be useful for understanding how your council thinks, but they can't replace the legal test. If a refusal relies on local criteria that set a higher bar than the law, that's worth questioning, and your local SENDIASS service can help.
Do you need a diagnosis for an EHCP?
No. The legal test is about your child's needs and the support they require, not about a diagnosis. A child can have an EHCP without any diagnosis, and a diagnosis doesn't mean a child automatically qualifies.
A diagnosis can still help, because reports from professionals often describe needs in useful detail. But if you're on a long waiting list for an ADHD or autism assessment, you don't have to wait for it before asking for an EHC needs assessment.
EHCPs for ADHD, autism and dyslexia
No condition qualifies or rules a child out on its own. What matters is how your child's needs affect their learning and school life, and what support they need. The examples below show the kind of detail that helps.
ADHD. Describe what you and the school actually see: how long your child can work before needing an adult to re-focus them, what happens at transitions, whether impulsivity leads to incidents or exclusions, and how much work is finished compared with classmates. Executive function difficulties, such as planning, starting tasks and organising belongings, are often the biggest barrier and the easiest to overlook.
Autism. Cover communication and social interaction, sensory needs, how your child copes with change, and anxiety. Many autistic children hold things together at school and release the stress at home. If that's your child, the school may not see the need. Write down what happens after school, how often, and what triggers it.
Dyslexia. Show the gap between your child's literacy and that of others their age, what interventions they've had, and what progress they made. Specialist reading or spelling assessments help, but school data on progress over time can be just as strong.
