So with eight-year-old son Alexander about to begin the biggest transition of his schooling life so far, when the year 2015 rolls into 2016 and the Bletchington Public School student goes from year two to year three - infants to primary - Mrs Kirby knows she needs all the information she can possibly muster.

Alexander has a mild to moderate learning delay, which has made some aspects of his schooling life difficult, and as the transition into primary school learning takes place the method in which Mrs Kirby’s son goes about his day-to-day learning, too, will change.

Enter the Cerebral Palsy Alliance (CPA).

A group that provides family-centred therapies, life skills programs, equipment and support for people living with disabilities, the CPA will next week run an Education Matters seminar designed to help families support children with disabilities or learning difficulties.

“It’s important to be able to know what support is out there for our kids,” Mrs Kirby said.

“Alexander’s got a big jump ahead of him, going from infants to primary where the learning is based around comprehension ... it’s an area he struggles with and that’s when he starts to get frustrated and mucks up in class.

“It’s just about finding the best strategies to help with the transition.”

To help find those strategies, the alliance has organised for a panel of guest speakers from the department of education and representatives of the Catholic and independent school sectors.

CPA’s Sandy Livermore said the program would help parents learn about each department’s disability criteria, find out about placement panels and their role as well as learning and support teams and what funding support is available if a child needs special equipment. 

“The schools want what’s best for the kids too,” Mrs Kirby added.

“But often knowing exactly what’s available to help can be a problem.

“These seminars are crucial for us as parents to be able to identify what’s available to help kids with disabilities, so we can then go to the school and say ‘let’s try this approach and see how he goes’. 

“Who knows how many other kids it’ll benefit as well.”

Ms Livermore encouraged anyone who has a child with a disability to attend the seminar, with RSVP via email slivermore@cerebralplasy.org.au by today.

The seminar will be held next Tuesday at the Cerebral Plasy Alliance’s office at 95 Prince Street.

It will run from 10am to noon.