Mon Sep 6 2010

Special educational needs

The term Special Educational Needs encompasses social, emotional, behavioural

and physical problems as well as educational needs. In many case s these can be dealt with in the classroom. Children who give cause for concern in one or more of these areas, or because they have and unusually high level of achievement, are monitored by their class teacher and the schools Special Needs Co-ordinator who, in consultation with the Head teacher, will decide what action needs to be taken, if any. All such activities now follow a nationally recognised code of practice. The steps in this code are as follows:

 School Action

School, parents and the SENCO (Special Educational Needs Co-ordinator) agree to monitor a Child’s progress. A programme of support may be discussed and agreed and put in place for the child.

 School Action Plus

Additional agencies are introduced. These could be Speech and Language Service, Physiotherapist, Learning Support Team or others. The needs of the child will be assessed and appropriate support programmes will be put in place in the form of an Individual Education Plan (IEP)

 Statutory Assessment

Here, all of the paperwork is sent to a panel organised by the County for assessment. From here, the case may be returned to school to run at School Action Plus level or it may be moved forward to MDA (Multi Disciplinary Assessment) an MDA is a thorough investigation into all aspects of a child’s needs, with contributions form parents and all the agencies who are concerned with the child’s well being.

 A StatementThis defines the help that the LEA will a lot to a child to help meet his or her needs within the school. 

The majority of difficulties that are experienced by children can be catered for by a combination of the school’s own resources and the co-operation of parents. We believe that, without this co-operation the task becomes much more difficult and so when we find a child who is experiencing difficulties, the home – school partnership is vital in trying to remedy those difficulties.

 

If we feel that a child has a special educational need then they will be entered into our school special needs register and a careful record is kept of all meetings, discussions, assessments, decisions and progress made. Parents are involved in this process at all levels and they are given copies of any paper work regarding their child.