Our educational provisions will match the four areas of need, as defined in the SEND Code of Practice January 2015:
- Communication and interaction
- Cognition and learning
- Social, emotional and mental health
- Sensory and/or physical needs.
At Early Years we use a 3-tiered approach to SEND and supporting a child’s learning:
Universal
Each child’s development is monitored using the Early Years Foundation Stage framework (EYFS) (2017) as a guide, the child’s key worker will observe the child’s developmental progress on a regular basis and will keep evidence such as pictures, videos and written observations to support their findings. At times there may be a need to include some minor adaptions to match the child’s learning needs.
Each child will receive a settling in report written by the child’s key person after six weeks of joining and after moving to a new room. After this period each Parent/Carer will have a progress meeting with their child’s key person about their child’s development approximately every six months after this and when the child moves to their new room. When a child leaves, you will have both a progress meeting and have a copy of their child’s learning journey.
Each child’s key person will also set them next steps every 3 months.
Our staff will also complete a statutory 2-year progress report for the children who are in 2-3 year old rooms.
Staff plan on a weekly basis for each child’s individual developmental needs and interests and will set their next steps accordingly.
Targeted
It may be appropriate at times to consider making additional short term Special Educational Needs and/or Disabilities provisions, additional to your child’s EYFS targets, to remove or reduce any obstacles to the child’s learning.
If a child needs additional provision to support their individual needs, with the Parent / Carer’s permission they will be placed on to a SEN Support Plan.
This will begin a graduated four part approach of ‘assess’, ‘plan’, ‘do’ and ‘review’:
- Assessing the child’s needs
- Planning the most effective and appropriate intervention via an SEN Support Plan, with Parental involvement and outside agencies (if appropriate).
- The child’s key person will then support the child through their individual targets as set out via an SEN support plan
- Reviewing regularly the impact on the child’s developmental progress towards their individual learning outcomes as set out via an SEN support plan.
The length and regularity of the cycle depends on the needs of the child or family at the time. This is called a graduated approach as set out in the SEND Code of Practice 0-25 (January 2015).
The decision about what should be included in an SEN Support plan will be made together with the Parent / Carer, the child (if appropriate), SENco and Key person and actions agreed.
Your child’s name is then entered into our Special Educational needs and/or Disabilities register and/or into our Speech and Language Therapy register held securely in our systems.
Specialist
On some occasions it may be necessary for us to seek specialist advice from professionals outside Early Years and have regular long-term support from outside professionals in order for us to plan for the best possible learning outcomes for the child. This may include Educational Psychologists, Speech and Language Therapists, Occupational Therapists, Sensory Advisory Teachers and the child development services.
We have support from the Bi-borough SEND team and with parental consent we can contact our Early Years Inclusion Advisor for any support and advice, if appropriate they can visit to observe the child.
If the family lives within the borough we have access to Westminster’s Early Help Service, who can support us in ensuring that we take each child’s individual Special Educational Needs and/or Disability’s into consideration. If your child lives outside Westminster their Health visitor and/or GP will be able to offer advice and support.
A small number of children who have access to these specialists may also have an EHCP (Educational Health Care Plan)