Special Educational Needs
Special Educational Needs at Broadwater School
Broadwater School is ambitious for all our students and we believe that there is no ceiling on what can be achieved by anyone, regardless of their circumstance or background. We are committed to providing a supportive and inclusive learning environment, giving every young person the opportunity to fulfil their potential now, and in the future.
The leaders at Broadwater School are leaders for all students, enabling our teachers to be teachers of all students. Broadwater School is committed to distributed leadership to secure the best possible provision and outcomes for students with special educational needs. We have the same ambition for all our students, and recognise the importance and impact of prioritising our responsibilities to students with special educational needs.
We work in partnership with students and their families in identifying and providing for special educational needs. Where appropriate, we also work in partnership with other agencies. We recognise the importance of communication being inclusive, accessible and culturally sensitive to achieve effective partnership working.
Graduated Response Diagram
What does it mean to have a Special Educational Need?
A student has SEN if they have a learning difficulty or disability that requires special educational provision to be made for them.
They have a learning difficulty or disability if they have:
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A significantly greater difficulty in learning than most others of the same age; or
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A disability that prevents or hinders them from making use of facilities of a kind generally provided for others of the same age in mainstream schools.
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.
What this means at Broadwater School
- All staff have a good understanding and knowledge of the four main areas of SEND. They will use this to ensure that individual needs are effectively met in the classroom and outside the classroom.
- Some students with SEND will have individualised strategies and resources identified in their Student Passport and staff also take these into account. This could include reasonable adjustments to enable them to access the curriculum.
- Additional adult support is available for some students in their lessons to help them to access the curriculum.
- A small number of identified students will also receive relevant interventions depending on their SEND.
Our SEND Team
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Jason Illingworth (SENDCO) I am fully committed to ensuring that all our students, no matter what difficulties they face, are enabled and supported to fully access school life. This includes removing barriers to learning as well as developing personal and social skills. I am proud to lead a fantastic team of staff who go out of their way to help our students, no matter what difficulties they encounter. |
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Claire Link (Head of the SLCN (Speech, Language and Communication Needs) provision) My role is to ensure that all students with places in the SLCN are given opportunities to access all aspects of school life, that is, the curriculum, extra-curricular clubs and social activities. I work closely with all school staff and families to ensure that they are aware of the barriers that young people with language and communication difficulties have and how we can reduce and eliminate these. |
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Holli Duddridge (Emotional Literacy Support Assistant) Workingone-to-one or within a group, I help both SEN and mainstream students with their social and emotional wellbeing. I provide a safe space for students to feel comfortable sharing their feelings and emotions. I always approach each and every student with a high level of empathy and understanding. |
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Ruth Till (Curriculum Support Teacher) I work closely with the Speech and Language therapists. I devise activities for the students to support their termly targets. For social skills, we use the Talkabout for Teenagers and Talkabout Transitions (Year 10 and 11) schemes of work. We use Shape Coding to improve their knowledge of word groups and sentence structure. Students are taught up to 11 command words to aid their understanding and completion of exam questions. I teach history, geography and PRE to Year 7 students in the SLCN unit. |
Identification and assessment of children with SEND
A student has SEN where their learning difficulty or disability calls for special educational provision, namely provision different from or additional to that normally available to students of the same age. (SEN Code of Practice, 2015)
A learning difficulty is a significantly greater difficulty in learning than the majority of others of the same age.
A disability that requires special educational provision is a disability that prevents or hinders the student from accessing the educational provision generally provided for others of the same age.
Not all students with a disability will be identified as requiring special educational provision. Appropriate reasonable adjustments will be made to ensure we remove or prevent barriers experienced by all students with a disability.
Parents/carers are informed when students are added to or removed from the SEN register. When deciding whether special educational provision is required, we will start with the desired outcomes, including the expected progress and attainment, and the views and aspirations of the student and their parents/carers. We will use this to determine the support that is needed and whether this can be provided by adapting our core offer, or whether something additional is needed.
On entry, we assess each student’s current skills and levels of attainment, which will build on previous settings and Key Stages, where appropriate. We carry out additional diagnostic tests for any student scoring below a standardised score of 90 in their reading assessment. We also carry out speech and language screeners for any students who have come up to the school with suspected language and communication difficulties.
Class teachers make regular assessments of progress for all students and identify those whose progress:
- Is significantly slower than that of their peers starting from the same baseline
- Fails to match or better the child’s previous rate of progress
- Fails to close the attainment gap between the child and their peers
- Widens the attainment gap
- demonstrates high levels of dysregulation
This may include progress in areas other than attainment, for example, social needs. Attendance and behaviour data might also be used to identify which students require additional support.
Slow progress and low attainment will not automatically mean a student is recorded as having SEN.
Student Passport
A student passport is a regularly reviewed document that contains the needs, strengths and individual strategies for every student with an EHCP or on SEN Support. These are developed in partnership with students and their parents/carers. Where appropriate, they might also include strategies recommended by other professionals.
Example of a Student Passport:
Learning Plan
Some students who require more specialised support will have Individualised learning plans to complement student passports. For example, an individualised learning plan will be used to:
- Track progress against long-term outcomes in Educational, Health and Care Plans (EHCNAs) for students working below age related expectations
- Inform medium-term and daily curriculum planning and provision where children are accessing adapted curriculum pathways
- Inform intervention planning
Please see example of an Individual Learning Plan below:
Mentoring Record
Intervention Record
Universal provision – high quality teaching
Broadwater School ensures that a universal provision of high quality teaching is able to address gaps in foundational knowledge and skills. Through evidence-informed classroom routines and a well-planned curriculum, teachers are able to address reading fluency and accuracy, communication and language skills, writing composition and number facts.
Our carefully selected and sequenced curricula ensure foundational subject-specific knowledge is secure at every step. For some students, effective in-classroom targeted support ensures gaps are identified and tackled quickly through our responsive and adaptive classroom practice.
Targeted support
At Broadwater School, we have the following interventions:
● 1:1 and small group literacy support (including Fresh Start, Direct Instruction and Reciprocal
Reading interventions)
● 1:1 support from a SpLD (Dyslexia) teacher
● 1:1 numeracy support
● Small groups for pre-learning key vocabulary
● 1:1 and paired support for speech and language difficulties
● Individual, paired and small group support for social skills (incl. social communication and
interaction)
● 1:1 and small group emotional literacy support (ELSA)
● Support for students with mental health difficulties, including small group work and counselling
● Individual and paired pre-teaching.
● Behavioural support.
● More bespoke interventions linked to provision outlined in a student’s EHCP
Specialist support
At Broadwater School, we work in partnership with a range of external agencies, and they will support the planning and delivery of specialist interventions. This might include mentoring, specialist speech and language therapy sessions focused on speech sounds or access to specialist mental health support. Where appropriate, teachers are made aware of the focus of any intervention so that they can support students to generalise the skills learnt back to the classroom. Interventions are reviewed at least every half-term to check the impact against the intended outcome. Where the intervention is not having an impact as expected, changes will be made to the intervention.
Staff training
Our SENDCO is a teacher with a significant level of experience working with students with SEN in different settings. The school prioritises time for the SENDCO to be able to work alongside other staff in the school to build expertise in the classroom, for example, through coaching so that all teachers build their confidence and competence.
There is also a team of Learning Mentors who receive regular training with a particular focus on the effective mentoring of students and maximising their impact in classrooms.
Some staff members also receive additional training in a particular specialism, such as Literacy Intervention staff who have received specific training for Fresh Start and Reciprocal Reading.
SEND-specific training has been delivered in the following areas:
● Effectively delivering Ordinarily Available Provision
● Supporting PDA (Pathological Demand Avoidance),
● Student’s mental health
● Supporting speech, language and communication needs in the classroom.
Useful links
Teacher Handbook: SEND
With contributions from specialists across the sector, the handbook is a comprehensive resource for teachers and parents to use over time. It brings together practical examples of high-quality teaching - placing focus on removing barriers to learning, getting to know and understand individual learners, and bringing to life the graduated approach. To access this free resource click on the link below and sign up to Whole School SEND:
https://www.wholeschoolsend.org.uk/teacher-handbook
Whole School SEND Online CPD Units
Free, flexible online learning to help develop inclusive practice. https://www.wholeschoolsend.org.uk/page/online-cpd-units