At Stanley Primary School, we can make provision for a range of frequently occurring special educational need without an Education, Health and Care Plan, for instance, we are currently supporting pupils at SEN Support level with the following needs: dyslexia, speech and language needs, visual impairments, autism, learning difficulties and social, emotional and mental health needs.  There are other kinds of special educational need, which do not occur as frequently and with which the school is less familiar, but we can access training and advice to support us in meeting those needs. 

Our admission arrangements for pupils without an Education, Health and Care Plan do not discriminate against or disadvantage disabled children or those with special educational needs and follow the normal school admissions procedures, which are managed by the Local Authority.

Places within The Peartree Centre are allocated by the Local Authority. The school does not control or have input into the admission process for the specialist provision for Autistic pupils or pupils with Social/Communication difficulties. Admission into Stanley Primary does not lead to a place at The Peartree Centre, or access to the unit via the mainstream school.

Outlined below are the different types of support that are offered to children with SEND.

a) Quality First Teaching (QFT)

Stanley Primary School strives to ensure all pupils receive high quality teaching in their classroom.

For your child, this means:

• All teachers are teachers of SEND and have the highest possible expectations for your child and all pupils in their class.
• All teaching is based upon building on your child’s strengths and what they already know, can do and understand.
• Different ways of approaching teaching and learning are in place so that your child is fully involved in learning in class. The SENDCOs and Leadership Team liaise closely with teaching staff in order to support with QFT strategies and assess the effectiveness of strategies on an ongoing basis. At times, additional advice on QFT strategies may be sought from external professionals.

• An ongoing training and support program for all staff to further develop classroom approaches and strategies to support learners with additional needs.

b) Specific Targeted small group work (sometimes called Intervention Groups in school)

For your child, this means:

• Your child’s teacher will have carefully checked on your child’s progress and will have decided that your child has a gap in their understanding/learning and needs some extra support to help them make the best possible progress.
• Programmes of support will be put in place, in partnership with the Year Leader and/SENDCO, on a short-term basis to help your child to make progress.

These may be:

• Run in the classroom or in the shared year group area.
• Run by a teacher or most often a Teaching Assistant under the guidance of the teacher/SENDCO.

This type of support is available for any child who has specific gaps in their understanding of a subject/area of learning.

Examples of interventions currently on offer at Stanley Primary are; Precision Teaching, Lego Therapy, Colourful Semantics, Attention Bucket, Social Thinking, Language for Thinking, Read Write Inc phonics groups, ELSA, Pre-teaching, booster groups.

c) Highly personalised support, called SEND Support in School

For your child, this means:

• In consultation with you, your child will have been identified by the Class Teacher, Year Leader and/or SENDCO as needing extra specialist support in school in addition to high quality teaching and intervention groups.
• You will be asked to come to a meeting to discuss your child’s progress and help plan the focused support for your child through writing a SEND Support Plan (previously known as an IEP).
• Personalised support through specific strategies (which may be suggested by the SENDCO or specialist professional) are in place to support your child to learn and make progress.
• A Teaching Assistant or Teacher may run small group sessions using the Teacher’s plan or the advice from specialist professional.
• You may be asked to give your permission for the school to refer your child to a specialist professional such as a Speech and Language Therapist, Occupational Therapist or Educational Psychologist to help the school and yourself understand your child’s individual needs in order to provide focused support.

The specialist professional will work alongside school staff to understand your child’s needs and make recommendations, which may include:

• Making changes to the way your child is supported in class, for example, some individual support or changing some aspects of teaching to support them better.
• Support to set individual targets for your child.
• A group run by school staff under the guidance of the outside professional, for example, a social skills group.
• A group or individual works with the outside professional.

This type of support is available for children with specific barriers to learning that cannot be supported through Quality First Teaching and intervention groups. This is called SEND Support in School. Not all pupils at SEND Support will require the input of outside professionals.

d) Specified Statutory Individual support

This support is usually provided via an Education, Health and Care Plan (EHC Plan).

• This means your child will have been identified by the Class Teacher and SENDCO as needing a more intensive level of specialist help that cannot be entirely met from the resources usually available to Stanley Primary School through the delegated budget to provide SEND Support. This type of support is appropriate for children whose learning needs are complex, pervasive and deemed likely to be long-term needs.

For your child this means:

• The school (or you) can ask the Local Authority for an Education, Health and Care (EHC) needs assessment for your child. Information about how to request an EHC Plan can be found on Achieving for Children’s local offer website.

• Requesting an EHC Plan is a legal process. If the Assessment concludes that your child needs an EHC Plan, the plan sets out the provision and level of support that will be provided for your child. If an EHC Plan is in place for your child, the school and associated professionals are responsible for ensuring this provision is in place and that your child makes progress against the outcomes agreed on the plan. Process and procedure around the implementation of support at this level is carried out in accordance with the SEND Code of Practice September 2015.

• At Stanley, we use a team approach to deliver the provision on an EHC Plan.  Your child will have key adults that will support their needs whilst building their independence.