The Concept
DLA mobility component considers whether your child needs:
- Guidance or supervision when walking outdoors
- Help planning and following routes
The form asks about:
- Familiar places — Routes they know (home to school, local shops)
- Unfamiliar places — Somewhere new
A child might manage familiar routes but be unable to cope with unfamiliar ones. Both matter.
Types of Mobility Needs
Physical:
- Can only walk a certain distance before pain or fatigue
- Needs physical support to walk safely
- Uses mobility aids
Cognitive/Sensory:
- Gets lost or confused in unfamiliar places
- Cannot follow directions
- Runs off (no sense of danger)
- Cannot cope with sensory environment (crowds, noise)
- Freezes or has meltdowns in new environments
Describing Mobility Needs
Be specific:
Distance:
"Can walk approximately 50 metres on a good day before needing to sit. On a bad day, cannot walk more than 20 metres. Uses a wheelchair for distances over 100 metres."
Supervision:
"Cannot walk to school alone (10-minute walk). Needs constant hand-holding and verbal guidance. Will run into the road without warning — has no sense of traffic danger."
Familiar vs unfamiliar:
"Can manage the walk to school (familiar route) with supervision. In unfamiliar places, becomes extremely anxious — has meltdowns, freezes, or tries to run away."
What Aubis Does
Aubis DLA asks about mobility separately:
- Can they walk outdoors?
- How far before needing to stop?
- What supervision do they need?
- How does it differ in familiar vs unfamiliar places?
- What happens without supervision?
It captures the specifics in your words.
Aubis scribes. You decide.