The Special Educational Needs and Disability Code of Practice: 0 to 25 years highlights that settings should take a graduated approach to identifying and supporting special educational needs and disability. Four stages of action are outlined: assess, plan, do and review. The ‘Assess, Plan, Do, Review’ cycle should be followed, to identify needs and to ascertain when further support is needed.
Understanding the graduated approach
Where a pupil is identified as having SEN, schools should take action to remove barriers to learning and put effective special educational provision in place.
This SEN support should take the form of a four-part cycle through which earlier decisions and actions are revisited, refined, and revised with a growing understanding of the pupil’s needs and of what supports the pupil in making good progress and securing good outcomes.
This is known as the graduated approach. It draws on more detailed approaches, more frequent review and more specialist expertise in successive cycles in order to match interventions to the SEN of children and young people.
Greater Manchester Ordinarily Available Provision
The Greater Manchester Ordinarily Available Inclusive Provision (GMOAIP) sets out expectations for educational settings to provide for all children and young people through adaptive teaching and an inclusive ethos. It summarises a range of activities, opportunities and strategies that will meet the needs of most children and young people through reasonable adjustments and resources that are ordinarily available in mainstream settings. The GM OAIP has been written in collaboration with Schools/ settings, parent/ carers, children and young people (CYP), Neurodiversity in Education, Local Authority professionals, Greater Manchester Combined Authority (GMCA), Health professionals and other specialists. The GMOAIP has been launched in Wigan and is starting to be piloted in Wigan schools and settings, with practice in each school to reflect their community.
The Wigan Additional Practice Toolkit (APT) for teaching staff and the early years Ordinarily Available Inclusive Provision documents are practical guides for teaching staff and nursery practitioners in settings and classrooms. They describe a range of support, strategies and activities for all learners including those with additional needs. They should be used flexibly and practice will vary between settings, according to the needs of their children and young people, and the systems that are already in place. The APT complements section 2 of the GMOAIP, outlining support beyond ordinarily available inclusive provisions for children with SEND.
The SEND Code of Practice makes it clear that the views of children and young people are paramount at every stage of the SEND graduated approach. School/setting staff need to use a range of tools and approaches to elicit the views of children and young people at every stage of the graduated approach and should take them into account when planning appropriate provision.
EHCP and The Person Centred Connection
The Targeted Education Support Service (TESS) and the Educational Psychology Service (EPS) can offer training to SENCOs, schools and settings and have a range of resources available.
Universal (For all children / young people)
Inclusive Quality First Teaching
All children and young people in Wigan settings have an entitlement to high-quality personalised teaching. This is teaching that is carefully planned and takes prior learning into account. Lessons have a clear structure and include objectives that are shared and revisited during the lesson. Teachers use lively, dynamic, interactive and differentiated teaching methods that ensure all learners make progress.
Therefore, all staff should:
- Implement inclusive whole school/setting approaches where all pupils are welcome
- Promote inclusive ‘Quality First Teaching’ where all teachers are responsible for all pupils
- Use an ‘Assess, Plan, Do, Review’ cycle, to monitor progress and plan to meet needs.
Systemic work can be undertaken by EPS and TESS, working with other agencies when appropriate to do so, to support and develop inclusive practice in schools.
Services that can support and provide training:
- Early Learning and Childcare Team (ELCCT)
- Targeted Education Support Service (TESS) and Educational Psychology Service (EPS): Support can be discussed with the school’s Educational Psychologist or TESS teacher in the school’s Review, Development and Planning (RDP) meeting, and centralised training can also be booked through the Services for Schools (SFS) portal
- Professionals from other services such as CAMHS Link Service, Attendance, Ethnic Minority Achievement Service (EMAS), Specialist Sensory Education Team (SSET) and the Virtual School Team (VST) can also support with universal strategies.
Additional (For some children / young people)
Some children and young people will need additional support that is above and beyond the level of support that all pupils receive at the universal level.
Initially school/setting staff should:
- Undergo an ‘Assess, Plan, Do, Review’ cycle, identifying additional needs and making changes to provision
- Seek support from appropriate agencies to identify need and make changes to provision.
The following services can support:
It is possible that the ‘Assess, Plan, Do, Review’ cycle will highlight that specific teaching/SEMH support is needed. This can be provided by the following agencies when appropriate:
Severe and Complex/Specialist (for a few children / young people)
In following the Assess, Plan, Do, Review cycle and implementing the advice from specialist services, it is envisaged that very few children/young people will require an Education Health and Care Assessment and Plan. The referral for an EHC Assessment needs to demonstrate evidence that advice has been sought and acted on, following ongoing ‘Assess, Plan, Do, Review’ cycles. This evidence should then be able to demonstrate why the child / young person requires this high level of intervention and provision.
The following steps will be followed:
- EHCP process initiated to identify all needs
- Advice sought from appropriate agencies
- Appropriate provision identified as part of the process
- Additional resources put into school to meet identified needs
- EHCP reviewed annually and additional advice sought when needed.
For a few children / young people going through this process the SEND team might consider making a referral to resourced or specialist provision if assessment has indicated that this is necessary, and criteria are met.