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
In deciding whether to make special education provision to support educational, social, physical or emotional needs, we:
- Work in partnership with parents/carers, pupils
- Consult with relevant external agencies
- Use assessment tools & materials
- Use observations
- Use Short Notes
- Other
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
- 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.
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.
The purpose of an EHCP is to make special educational provision to meet special educational needs of the child or young person, to secure the best possible outcomes for them across education (SEND Code of Practice p.142). It is a legal document that describes a child or young person’s special educational, health and social care needs.
For more detailed information see the Local Offer. We currently have one EHC Plan in place at St. Joseph’s.
Details of Identification and Assessment of Pupils with SEN
At St. Joseph’s Catholic Primary School, termly assessment is carried out and by staff who work together to moderate children’s work. This moderation is supported by the Local Authority on a regular basis. The school uses a tracking system to analyse data and to identify gaps in children’s learning and to plan appropriate intervention when required. Different children require different levels of support to diminish the difference and to achieve age related expectations.
Children/young people may join St. Joseph’s with a need already identified, and with parents/carers having a clear understanding of their child’s needs. As a school we see parents as partners in their child’s educational journey. In this case we work together with parents/carers, the young child and education, health and social care professionals to design an individualised SEN Support Plan that describes the child’s needs, outcomes & provision to meet those needs. Parents/carers and the child’s views are integral to this process.
In other cases school staff may identify a concern that parents have not previously been aware of. In these cases, the class teacher, alongside the SENDCo, will discuss the child’s needs and a meeting with parents/carers and the child will be arranged at the earliest opportunity. During this meeting a Short Note will be completed, with agreed outcomes for the child/young person and next steps. A ‘Short Note’ is the step prior to a full ‘Support Plan’ on our ‘graduated approach’ to SEN support and means that we have identified concerns for a child, put interventions in place and made parents aware. The interventions in place will be reviewed at the end of each term (often more frequently) and, depending on impact, children may be given a full SEN support plan. Often these children respond well to interventions and ‘catch up’ sufficiently to allow them to return to ‘quality first teaching’ in class with the majority of their peers. Many children who currently have a ‘Short Note’ in place have previously had an SEN support plan but no longer require a full plan because they’ve made such pleasing progress. However, we continue to monitor them via the ‘Short Note’ in order to ensure that this progress is sustained over time.
For some concerns, we may discuss the involvement of specialist support, for example, Education Psychology, SENDIASS (support for families) or Occupational Therapy. It is important to understand that the involvement of professionals does not always seek to ‘label’ or ‘diagnose’ children but to seek advice or strategies to help them to reach their full potential.
As part of this approach every child with SEN will have an individualised SEN Support Plan that describes the child’s needs, outcomes and provision to meet those needs. Parents/carers and child’s views are integral to this process.
For further information please view or download our Accessibility Plan which can be found in the School Policies section of our website.
