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.
Early Identification of Need
A special educational need can be a number of different things. For example, a child may be having problems with reading, number work or behaviour, which can be helped by putting extra support in at school and by working in partnership with parents. It may also be due to a disability which makes it harder for a child to use the same educational facilities that the school provides for the majority of children. For some children this may be a temporary difficulty, while others may have a long term need for special help.
Types of special educational needs can include:
- General Learning Difficulties – children whose learning progresses at a slower pace
- Social and Emotional Difficulties
- Cognition and Learning Difficulties (difficulties with reading, writing and spelling or maths)
- Communication and Interaction Difficulties
- Speech and Language Difficulties
- Delays with gross or fine motor skills
- Other Physical or Medical Needs/Conditions
All of our children’s needs are identified and met as early as possible through:
- observation, assessment, target setting and monitoring arrangements (cycle of assess, plan, do and review)
- listening to, and following up , parental concerns
- listening to and taking into account the child’s views, wishes and feelings
- the analysis of data including baseline assessments linked to the EYFS to track individual children’s progress over time
- reviewing and improving staff understanding of a wide range of needs and effective strategies to meet those needs
- liaison with schools and other settings on end of year transfer
- exchanging information from other services across education, health, care and the voluntary sector
- involving an external agency, and the Educational Psychology Service (EPS) as a minimum, where it is considered that a special educational need may be significant and long term and may require more in-depth and frequently reviewed cycles of assess, plan, do and review.
- data on progress is stored and analysed through iTrack. Pupils needs are discussed and decisions are taken as to which intervention is needed.
SEN Support
Teachers at Delves Lane Primary make regular reasonable adjustments to their daily practice in order to support as many children as possible. When these reasonable adjustments are proving to be insufficient, then a decision may be made to add the child to the school’s SEND register and to implement a SEND support plan. At Delves Lane Primary, we follow a graduated support approach, which is called “Assess, Plan, Do, Review”. This means that we will:
- Assess a child’s special educational needs
- Plan the provision to meet your child’s aspirations and agreed outcomes
- Do put the provision in place to meet those outcomes
- Review the support and progress
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.
Children, parents/carers, teachers and any other relevant professionals regularly discuss and agree upon desired outcomes for children with SEND. These are recorded on a SEND support plan.
What We Offer:
- regular informal review meetings with children, parents and teachers, as necessary
- an open door policy for parents of SEND children. Wherever possible parents are involved in pen portraits and My Story entries
- where applicable and always at their level we offer one to one sessions so children’s views can be incorporated into their support plan
- termly review meetings led by the class teacher with parents present. At this meeting the focus is the child’s SEND support plan where progress is measured and new outcomes are agreed for the following term
- an annual review meeting for pupils with a statutory assessment or those with an Education and Health Care Plan
- consultations with the school’s SENCO
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.
Having followed cycles of plan, do etc if the gap is widening or not making progress or an identified need we may seek and EHCP The school will provide the evidence about the child’s progress over time, documentation in relation to the child’s SEN and any action taken to deal with their needs, including any resources or special arrangements in place. Currently we have 2 children on roll who have an EHCP
For more detailed information see the Local Offer
Details of Identification and Assessment of Pupils with SEN
If teachers have a concern about a child this is recorded on a short note.
A short note is shared with parents who can respond to the teacher’s concern and add their own (if applicable)
If children receive more than one short note across the year it is discussed with parents whether they may need a SEND Support Plan. In agreement with parents, the child will then be placed on SEND register and given a plan with outcomes on.
Children may be taken off the SEND register if they make progress or their needs change, this will always be discussed with the parents
How we respond to parental concerns
We always encourage parents to come in and discuss any concerns with us face to face. Children who are working with number of agencies will have termly review, even if they don’t have an EHCP so that parents have a chance to discuss any concerns about the provision their child is receiving. All parents of children with SEND are invited in three times a year to speak to staff. We strive to ensure access to appropriate high quality teaching, differentiation and intervention for all of our SEND children. All planning is monitored by the SLT, books are collected in frequently and learning walks take place daily across the school to ensure high standards for all of our learners, including those with SEND
How we assess pupils with SEN
- We ensure high quality teaching for all children through learning walks, book scrutinies, observations and shared good practice.
- The ADPR cycle is reviewed termly with parents and children where applicable.
- A child with Special Educational Needs and/or Disabilities will have a SEN Support Planwhich sets out outcomes that are currently being worked on and what additional provision is put in place for that child. During this process parents are continuously communicated with.
- Outcomes are most likely to be linked to Literacy and Numeracy. However, for a number of children they will link to social interaction, communicating with children and adults, emotional difficulties, overcoming physical issues (for example problems to do with fine motor control) … the list is endless! The most important factor when writing a support plan or EHCP is that the outcomes depend on the need of the child.
- The school offers many different forms of additional provision. This can include: additional in-class support; additional out-of-class support; one-to-one support; flexible groupings (including small group work); access to specific resources; mentoring; counselling; and access to a wide range of outside agencies. Like with individual targets, the most important point is this:additional provision depends on the needs of the child
- Wherever possible the teacher will plan activities based around children’s interests. Teaching strategies are constantly being adapted and personalized so children are taught in a way that will allow them to reach their full potential despite any difficulty or disability they may have.
- Where applicable, Year 6 children with SEND can access special requirements in order for them to take the test. This can include additional time, scribes, movement breaks etc (see Accessibility plan)
- Depending on the area of SEND the behavior policy can be adapted to meet the needs of the child (see school’s behavior policy)
- We encourage SEND and non-SEND children to take part in our wide ranging after school club provision. We encourage ALL children to apply for positions on various committees throughout school including school council, science ambassadors and eco-warriors.
- Risk assessments are used to keep children safe in school strategies used to respond to challenging behaviourare reasonable, and proportionate to the risks presented by the behavior (see accessibility policy and behavior policy)
- The attainment of the SEND group in school is tracked as a distinct cohort throughout the year from starting points in September through to end of year attainment in July. This allows us to evaluate the impact and effectiveness of our provision by comparing the attainment of this group of children with the different cohorts within school and at a national level.
- The SEND register is updated termly and high-quality training or specific staff meetings take place depending on the current SEND trends of the school. This is an ever-changing picture.
For further information please view or download our Accessibility Plan which can be found in the School Policies section of our website.