Carleton Rode VAP School
Special Educational
Needs Policy
Date Examined by Curriculum Committee
Date agreed by Governing Body
Date to be reviewed
5th October 2010
30th November 2010
October 2011
Signed by N. Parsons - Chair of
Governors
What does Special Educational Needs (SEN) mean?
The legal definition from the SEN Code of Practice is that:
Children have special educational needs if they have a learning difficulty which calls for
special educational provision to be made for them.
Children have a learning difficulty if they:
a) Have a significantly greater difficulty in learning than the majority of children of
the same age; or
b) Have a disability which prevents or hinders them from making use of educational
facilities of a kind generally provided for children of the same age in schools within
the area of the local educational authority
c) Are under compulsory school age and fall within the definition at (a) or (b) above or
would do so if special educational provision was not made for them.
Children must not be regarded as having a learning difficulty solely because the language
or form of language of their home is different from the language in which they will be
taught.
Special Educational Provision means:
educational provision which is additional to, or otherwise different from, the
educational provision made generally for children of their age in schools maintained by the
local education authority, other than special schools, in the area.
S.E.N. in schools
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At Carleton Rode we believe in effective differentiated curriculum support in every
classroom and recognise that this is an entitlement of every child.
All teachers in our school are teachers of SEN and are constantly monitoring and
assessing the progress of each pupil against their planning to ensure that all
children are able to access the curriculum fully and achieve success. Occasionally
children will need curriculum support over and above what is offered in the
classroom to the majority of children. This is considered to be a Special Educational
Need.
Overall responsibility for S.E.N. provision lies with the Headteacher and the
Governing Body.
The Headteacher and Governing Body delegate day-to-day responsibility for S.E.N.
to the school SEN Co-ordinator (SENCo). The school’s SEN provision is monitored
by the Governing Body via the SEN Governor.
At Carleton Rode the SENCo. is Julie Sandford and the SEN Governors are Claire
Matthews and Tracey Davidson.
Identification of S.E.N.
• At Carleton Rode this is based on the fundamental assumption that all children make
progress at different rates.
• The key test for the need for S.E.N. intervention is evidence that current rates of
progress are inadequate. This evidence can come from many sources, including
formal and informal assessments, teacher observations and information from
parents.
• Where progress is not considered to be adequate, it is necessary to take some
additional or different action to enable the pupil to achieve. Children are then
placed on the SEN Register at either School Action or School Action Plus.
School Action
• This is the stage in the Code of Practice where the majority of children on the
S.E.N. Register are placed.
• This level of intervention takes place entirely within school and follows a programme
that has been designed by the school to overcome the specific barriers to learning
that are being experienced by the child.
• An Individual Education Plan (I.E.P.) is created for the child, detailing specifically
the intervention that will take place within school.
• Most children either remain at School Action or are removed from the S.E.N.
Register once it is agreed by staff, the pupil and parents/carers that the barrier(s)
to learning has been removed.
• At Carleton Rode we aim for children to remain at School Action for a maximum of
two terms. The majority of children are placed on the SEN Register as a short-term
measure for a specific difficulty and once resolved, they can then be removed
completely.
Individual Education Plans (I.E.P.s)
• These documents record that which is ‘additional to’ or ‘different from’ the
provision for all children.
• At Carleton Rode an IEP should contain 3 or 4 very specific short-term targets that
match the child’s needs. These targets are drawn up by the class teacher with
support from the SENCo and intervention teachers. All IEPs at Carleton Rode will
have clear success criteria and be written in child-friendly language to ensure full
engagement and ownership by the child.
• At Carleton Rode, all IEPs are reviewed termly at individual meetings with the child
and their parents/carers. Once agreed, IEPs then become working documents which
detail the commitment of both school and home towards meeting the targets.
• An example of a Carleton Rode IEP can be found in Appendix 1.
School Action Plus
• This is the stage of the Code of Practice that follows School Action.
• Children are placed on the SEN Register at School Action Plus where either it has
been identified that they are not responding to school-based intervention or their
individual needs have changed.
• At School Action Plus, the school consults with outside agencies and external
support services for more specialist input. These agencies include the School
Support Team (Educational Psychologist and Advisory Support Teacher), Sensory
Support, School Nurse, Family Solutions, Speech and Language Therapists, Social
Services, Physiotherapists and Occupational Therapists.
• Parents must agree to any involvement by outside agencies.
• All provision at School Action Plus must be documented on an IEP, as at School
Action.
Statutory Assessment
• If all parties involved with a child at School Action Plus agree that there is a
significant cause for concern, then the school will make a request for statutory
assessment. This requires the collecting of all IEPs, professional reports and other
evidence about the child and making a case for a full Statement of SEN. At Carleton
Rode this process is undertaken by the SENCo.
• The Single Area Panel of the Local Authority decides whether a child will receive a
Statement of Educational Needs, based on the evidence put forward by the school.
Occasionally they will require that further assessments take place before a decision
can be made.
Statements of SEN
• A Statement of SEN details a child’s specific needs and outlines their entitlement.
• Some Statements (but not all) are quantified with additional funding for individual
or small group support. Allocation of any additional funds takes account of the
child’s individual needs and is at the discretion of the Headteacher. This is then
monitored by the Governing Body.
• A child with a Statement of SEN will continue to have arrangements made for them
as at School Action Plus plus additional support that is provided using any funds
made available in the Statement.
• There will be an Annual Review of all individual Statements of SEN. These meetings
will be chaired by the SENCo and involve reviewing the appropriateness of the
statement, the school’s provision and recommending any changes to either the
Statement or funding levels to the Local Authority.
How is S.E.N. funded?
• All schools currently receive an amount of money annually (known as School Specific
Funding) for S.E.N. pupils at School Action and School Action Plus in their devolved
funds. It is the school’s decision about the allocation of such funds. They are usually
used to fund classroom support and intervention strategies. At Carleton Rode we
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use this money to provide quality intervention strategies such as Sound Discovery
and Catch-Up Numeracy.
Any funding for statemented pupils (known as Pupil Specific Funding) is specifically
earmarked in the school budget for their support and usually pays for additional
staffing to ensure that any statutory entitlement set out in the child’s Statement
of SEN is fully met.
From September 2009 any SEN statements providing less than 20 hours support
will not be funded by the local authority and schools will have to fund the support
from their budgets directly. School Specific Funding for School Action and School
Action Plus children has not been increased to meet the difference.
Monitoring and Evaluation
• The SENCo monitors the IEPs of all pupils on the SEN Register.
• In January and July, the SENCo will provide information to the Governing Body
about the number of pupils on the SEN Register. Additionally the SENCo will report
on any whole school developments in relation to SEN and inclusion, ensuring that the
governors are kept up to date with any legislative or local policy changes.
• SEN and Inclusion will be a standing agenda item at all Curriculum Committee
meetings of the Governing Body and reported back to Full Governing Body meetings
via committee reports.
• The SENCo will meet with SEN Governors twice a year to discuss any issues or
concerns. One of these meetings will take the form of a Governor Monitoring Visit
and include sampling, observations and data analysis.
• This policy will be reviewed annually by the Curriculum Committee of the Governing
Body.