St Botolph's Church of England Voluntary Controlled Primary School SEN information report - your questions answered

The following section is taken from the Special Educational Needs Code of Practice (January 2015):

xiii. A child or young person has SEN if they have a learning difficulty or disability which calls for special educational provision to be made for him or her.

xiv. A child of compulsory school age or a young person has a learning difficulty or disability if he or she:

• has a significantly greater difficulty in learning than the majority of others of the same age, or

• has a disability which prevents or hinders him or her from making use of facilities of a kind generally provided for others of the same age in mainstream schools or mainstream post-16 institutions

xv. For children aged two or more, special educational provision is educational or training provision that is additional to or different from that made generally for other children or young people of the same age by mainstream schools, maintained nursery schools, mainstream post-16 institutions or by relevant early years providers. For a child under two years of age, special educational provision means educational provision of any kind.

xvi. A child under compulsory school age has special educational needs if he or she is likely to fall within the definition in paragraph xiv. above when they reach compulsory school age or would do so if special educational provision was not made for them (Section 20 Children and Families Act 2014).

xvii. Post-16 institutions often use the term learning difficulties and disabilities (LDD). The term SEN is used in this Code across the 0-25 age range but includes LDD.

At St Botolph's, we carefully and contiuously monitor the progress, attainment and well-being of all children. If your child's teacher begins to be concerned about your child's progress or their ability to cope in school, they will discuss their concerns with you, the parent.

Class teachers may also seek advice from the SENco, the Special Educational Needs Coordinator, who will support in monitoring, supporting and assessing the needs of your child. The SENCo may observe your child's learning in class.

What to do if you are worried about your child:

1. Don't panic! We are here to do the very best we can for your child and we will work with you to support them.

2. Speak with the class teacher to see if they share any of your concerns - if the teacher has not approached you, your child may be coping well in school. Be clear about what you are worried about, to give the class teacher the best chance of supporting you.

3. With the class teacher, discuss and agree what can be done at home and in school. The SENCo will happily attend this meeting if you wish.

4. Keep talking to the class teacher. If your child does not improve following a period of agreed support from school and home, meet again with the class teacher to decide on a different approach. Ask for the SENCo to be present at this meeting.

Each term you will be given a progress report for your child. The first two will be delivered and explained in person at Parent Consulation meetings, then you will receive a full written report at the end of the year.

If you have any questions about how your child is getting on at any other point during the year, please just ask your child's teacher. The best time to discuss this may be after school, so you may wish to make an appointment or request a call back.

If your child has a Learning Passport to support their Special Educational Need, your class teacher will invite you to a review meeting each term. At this meeting, you will discuss how your child has been getting on with their learning targets. You will also talk about what has worked well or what may need to be approached differently next term.

Parents are very important to St Botolph's and we try to help them to feel part of our community by involving them in different ways:

• At St Botolphs we work with parents and carers to create a smooth transition from Playgroup to Reception right through to Year 6 when children will transiton to Year 7 at Hartismere School. We make provision for all children.
• Parents of our new Reception (school starters) children are invited to a new parents meeting to meet the Headteacher and Reception Class teacher and be introduced to the school.
• Each class has a class share each term, in which they share with parents what they have been learning about.
• Mums and Dads, and even grandparents are invited in to school for special lunch days during the school year, when they are given the opportunity to eat and spend playtime with their child.
• Parent-Teacher Consultation meetings are held in the Autumn and Spring term. In addition to this, parents are encouraged to make an appointment to speak to their child's teacher whenever they feel it necesary.
• If your child has a Learning Passport, you will be invited to review meetings to discuss your child's progress at least once per term.
• We have a very active PTA! Please speak to the Office if you wish to get involved.
• If  you would like to volunteer to help in school, speak to the office. It may not always be appropriate to help regularly in your child's class, but if not there may be opportunities to help on trips or elsewhere in school. Volunteers may need to have applied for a Disclosure and Barring Service check first - the Office Angels can advise you about this.
• A Parent Forum is held regularly. Mr Cobbold meets with parents to discuss and listen to their views, as well as to invite them to offer opinions on decisions within school.
• Come along to one of our many events, such as the amazing Music and Arts Festival in July.
• Parent Questionnaires are available to fill out on our website.

Our school is all on one floor with accessible facilities for wheelchair users, including a shower and toilet area. The majority of the site and playground is accessible for a child with restricted mobility. There is a terrace area  on the playground that is accessed, in the main, via steps, however this terrace can be accessed  through an alternative route more suitable for wheelchairs and large buggies. We also make every effort to ensure children with SEND are included in activities outside the classroom such as clubs and trips, including residentials.

When a child enters the school with specific disabilities, the school contacts the appropriate professionals for assessments, support and guidance. We also recognise that parents have lots of valuable personalised information about their child which the school can draw upon.

Our school is a close community and our ethos is to support every child as a complete and individual person. The school community works together to monitor the children's wellbeing in all areas of school.

Each term, every class teacher identifies children in their class who might need support with an area of their learning. They decide where adjustments and extra provision may be necessary for these children, and plan how this will be provided using a provision map. All provision maps are monitored and evaluated by the school SENCo.

Follow this link to see an example of a whole school provision map, that shows the types of support that might be in place to support different needs across the school: Whole School Provision Map.(See below for an example.)

Provision will be reviewed and adapted regularly until it meets the needs of your child. If we feel that we need help from a specialist to support your child, we will discuss this with you and refer to an appropriate specialist for advice and support. These are some of the specialists we have worked with recently:

• Speech and Language therapists
• Dyslexia Outreach
• County Inclusive Support Service
• Teachers for the Deaf
• Educational Psychologist
• Family Support Worker
• The Benjamin Foundation (providing emotional and wellbeing support)
• School Nurse

The class teacher and SENCo carefully monitor and assess the needs of your child. Each term, a class provision map is drawn up which outlines what support will put in place for different children, and distributes focused adult support to those children who need it. In partnership with you, they will decide what type and level of support your child may need. Support will be offered in a graduated approach. Where support has been in place and has not proven effective, a different approach may be taken or a higher level of support, depending on what is appropriate to your child.

It is rare for a need to be so great that it requires more support than the class teacher and allocated teaching assistant/s can provide; however, should this happen, the Senior Leadership Team (including the SENCo) will discuss options for next steps and share them with you as the parent. Possible options may include:

• directing additional SEN teaching assistant time to offering additional intervention to your child.
• referring to Outreach Provision, or requestiong a temporary placement with a specialist school.
• requesting an Education, Health and Care Plan assessment.

Each teacher works hard to develop a good understanding of what your child can do and how they learn best. The staff have received a lot of training and support to enable them to adapt, tailor and differentiate activities to suit the needs of individual children. We will always aim to start from where your child is, and to make good progress from their individual starting points. 

Teachers have a good understanding of the building blocks of learning. The learning journey is like a tower of building blocks in that if one layer of learning blocks is incomplete (i.e. the child does not have secure understanding of an aspect of learning), the child's future learning cannot be secure, until previous gaps have been filled in. Teachers seek to identify any gaps in learning and to support the child to fill them and move on to the next level securely. Teachers have a knowledge of the steps of learning across the whole curriculum, from Early Years to Year Six, and will identify appropriate targets for your child, where they differ from the Nationally Expected level. 

A range of resources may also be employed to support your child to make sense of their learning. In maths, this maths include a range of practical resources such as Numicon, bead strings, counters, cubes, number lines, hundred squares, Dienes blocks and many more. In Literacy, your child may be provided with phoneme (sound) mats, word banks, alphabet strips, talk tins or talking clipboards, whiteboards, writing frames and technology. 

Children with emotional, social, mental and health needs may also need adaptations to their curriculum, or arrangements to make their learning more accessible to them, and we endeavour to consider their needs carefully.  

We access and identify key professionals as needs arise in school. Here is a list of some of the specialist services and expertise most commonly accessed by schools:

• Speech and Language Therapy
• County Inclusive Support Service
• Outreach, such as Dyslexia support
• Family Support Worker
• Social Services team
• Occupational Therapy
• Teachers for the Deaf
• Educational Psychology
• CAMHS - Child and Adult Mental Health Services
• School Nurse
• Professional colleagues in local schools.

Our school is a close community and our ethos is to support every child as a complete and individual person. The school community works together to monitor the children's wellbeing in all areas of school.

School strategies to encourage the children to support each other:

• Friendship Stop on the playground for children who have noone to play with
• FAB leaders to support play at lunch times
• Year 6 Buddies for new Reception children - older brother and sister figures to keep a watchful eyes

Whole school and in class strategies:

• PSHE - we are currently rolling out the PATHS programme across the school which focuses on self-esteem development and emotional literacy.
• Assemblies
• Visitors
• Circle time

Intervention for specific support:

• Time to Talk
• Socially Speaking
• Lego Therapy
• County Inclusive Support Service
• Family Support Worker
• Circle time
• Social stories
• CAMHS

We pride ourselves on delivering excellent transition opportunities to our new Reception children and to our Year 6 leavers.

We have a good relationship with Botesdale playgroup, whose children regularly come over to spend time in Reception Class with Ms Reynolds and Mrs Dawson and their fantastic team of teaching assistants (Mrs Guest - fondly known as Mrs Mess, Sandra and Tracey). They are invited to special school events like Christmas plays. New starters from alternative nurseries or playgroups are warmly encouraged to join us on two specific transition mornings in July, when they are given the opportunity to get to know the school and staff.

In addition to this, the Year One and Two teachers participate in a story swap on one afternoon a week during the last half term. This gives the Year One teachers the opportunity to read a story to their new class and build a relationship with them.

The whole school has a move up day in July, when they spend a day getting to know their new teacher and their new classroom. Additional transition support, such as transition books, and extra time to meet and get to know unfamiliar staff, may also be arranged for children in need of a little extra. 

When joining or moving on to a new school we can arrange extra transfer visits for your child. Parents are encouraged to visit the new school.  The Special Educational Needs Coordinator (SENCO) and/or headteacher will always communicate with the new school to ensure that all information is passed on about your child. If a CAF (Common Assessment Framework) is in place, staff from the new school will be invited to a meeting, so that the parents can have the opportunity to speak with them together with any other professionals involved.

For transition to Hartismere High School or any other high school in the area, any child on the Special Educational Needs and/or Disabilities register or any child with an additional need is discussed both with the Year 7 liaison teacher and the SENCO from the high school. Usually the specialists at the high schools are keen to meet or have a discussion with parents and these usually start towards the end of Year 5, especially if the needs are complex and additional provision would need to be put in place to support transition.

Throughout Years 5 and 6, all children have many opportunities to visit Hartismere High School either through curriculum activities, planned transition events or to watch activities put on by the older students.

Our teachers regularly attend a range of training courses. We are also very lucky to have some very skilled teaching assistants working with us at St Botolphs. Our teachers and TAs have received training in many areas, including the following:

Planning in the Moment

Dyslexia identification and support

Supporting children with maths difficulties

Catch Up Literacy

Elklan Speech and Language Support

Early Literacy Support

Brain gym

Hand gym

Autism Spectrum Disorder support

Supporting children with hearing difficulties

Letters and Sounds Phonics

Makaton

Safeguarding

Effective Assessment

First Aid

School Safe

All staff receive regular training as part of Professional Development days. On our April PD day, we received training from the British Dyslexia Association about Dyscalculia and how to support children with specific or significant difficulties in maths. In June, the County Inclusive Support Service will be delivering training for all staff, including midday supervisors, on Autistic Spectrum Disorder and also how to support children with particular behavioural needs.