Most children and young people in mainstream schools will have their special educational needs met through good classroom practice. This is called Quality First Teaching.
Quality First Teaching
- Ensures that the teacher has the highest possible expectations for each child in their class.
- Ensures all teaching is based on what your child already knows, can do and understands in order to help them progress.
- Involves various teaching styles so that your child is fully involved in the learning taking place in class.
- Requires constant assessment and planning from assessment, so progress is made and the needs of each child are met.
Early Identification of Need
In deciding whether to make special education provision to support educational, social, physical or emotional needs, we:
- Work in partnership with parents/carers and pupils to discuss the strengths and needs of the child and keep them up-to-date with their child’s progress.
- Consult with relevant external agencies that will give support and advice to meet the needs of the child.
- Use assessment tools & materials to make smart outcomes for the child to work on.
- Use observations to track the progress of the child and impact of the support and advice.
- Use Short Notes as evidence of discussions and to track what strategies have had an impact.
- Regularly discuss the needs and progress of children with SEN to ensure that the support they are receiving is having an impact.
SEN Support
Where a pupil is identified as having a special educational need we follow a graduated approach which takes the form of cycles of “Assess, Plan, Do, Review”.
This means that we will:
Assess a child’s special educational needs
- Discussion takes place with the parents and class teacher to understand the child’s strengths and needs at home and at school.
- Where necessary, and with permission of parents, referrals are made to appropriate outside agencies.
Plan the provision to meet your child’s aspirations and agreed outcomes
- Through discussion with parents and using reports from outside agencies, a support plan is arranged to meet the needs of your child.
- The provision needed to meet your child’s needs is arranged through interventions and additional support.
Do put the provision in place to meet those outcomes
- Regular intervention sessions are carried out and the progress of your child is tracked.
Review the support and progress
- The support plan will be reviewed regularly with the parents. The impact of the support and the progress of your child will be discussed.
- If a new plan is needed it is discussed and arranged and the cycle of Assess, Plan, Do, Review is repeated
As part of this approach every child with SEN will have an individualised SEN Support Plan that describes the child’s needs, outcomes & provision to meet those needs. Parents/carers and child/YP (where appropriate) views are integral to the this process.
A small percentage of children and young people with significant and/or complex needs may require an assessment that could lead to an Education, Health and Care Plan.
If a child’s needs are more complex we may ask the Local Authority to carry out an Education, Health and Care Assessment. This is a detailed assessment of a child’s needs. Parents or carers, the school and a range of professionals will all be asked to provide written reports. At the end of the assessment phase the Local Authority will consider these reports to help decide whether or not to issue an Education, Health and Care Plan for the child.
For more detailed information see the Local Offer
Details of Identification and Assessment of Pupils with SEN
Most children and young people in mainstream schools will have their special educational needs met through good classroom practice. This is called Quality First Teaching. As a school we measure children’s progress in learning against national age related expectations. Class teachers continually assesses each child and notes areas where they are improving and where further support is needed. Children are formally assessed each term. Those children who are not making expected progress are identified and a discussion takes place concerning why individual children are experiencing difficulty and what further support can be given to aid their progression.
Early Identification of Need
After both formal and informal assessments, children who are not making expected progress will be identified and the class teacher and/or SENCO will discuss this with the parents/carers and, if needed, provide a Short Note. This is a record of the discussion and the identification of the need required. From this point, adjustments within the classroom and through quality first teaching are made or a referral to a relevant outside agency will be made. If a referral is made to an outside agency, the discussions and report that comes from that agency will be used to support the child’s needs. The report is shared with the parents / carers and they will be involved with setting up a SEN Support Plan to record the SEN needs of their child. Appropriate support and interventions will be planned and tracked to ensure progress is being made.
SEN Support
As part of this approach every child with SEN will have an individualised Support Plan that describes the child’s needs, outcomes and provision to meet those needs. Parents, carers and children’s views are integral to this process. When the child’s Support Plan is reviewed comments are made against each target to show what progress the child has made. If the child has not met the target, the reasons for this will be discussed, then the target may be adapted into smaller steps or a different approach may be tried to ensure the child does make progress.
Assessing and Reviewing Progress
If your child has SEN, it is important for us to carry out formal assessments to identify their strengths and identify their needs accurately. To do this, we will use a range of methods depending upon their needs. When your child enters our school, their current attainment is assessed to give us a ‘baseline’ from where they will progress. In addition to the assessments that all children take part in and depending upon their needs, other assessments may be needed. These could include:
Cognition and learning (MLD, PMLD, SLD, SpLD)
- Subject specific assessment
- Education Psychology Assessments – which may include memory, understanding, reasoning, logic, and general skills assessment.
- Nessy Dyslexia Screener
Communication and interaction (SLCN, ASC)
- Assess through observations of pupils
- Speech Therapy Assessments – which may focus on sound production, language understanding, or other relevant assessments of your child’s needs
- RWI assessments
Social, Emotional and Health Difficulties
- Assess through observations of pupils
Sensory and/or Physical Difficulties
- Handwriting and copying skills baseline assessment
- Assess through observations of pupils
- Occupational Therapy assessment
Your child will be assessed against age related expectations for children who are working on the National Curriculum (i.e. the same as the majority of other children in their year group), or they may be assessed against other measures for children who are not ready to work on National Curriculum Levels (i.e. the steps before the National Curriculum). Aspirational targets are set for all children to ensure that all children make good progress, including those not ready to access the National Curriculum. The outcomes of all assessments are shared with parents and carers at our Parent Evenings. If other agencies are invited to work with your child, you will be invited to attend a meeting where the outcomes of these assessments and their next steps will be shared with you. If parents have any concerns then these can be shared with the class teacher and or SENCO who will arrange a meeting to discuss and resolve any difficulties.
For further information please view or download our Accessibility Plan which can be found in the School Policies section of our website.