Most children and young people with special educational needs (SEN) can have their needs met within an education setting's own resources with support from commissioned services.
SEND support is the extra help offered to a child or young person to enable them to learn and make progress in their learning, alongside other children of the same age. Any provision or support should be provided in line with the needs of the child or young person and is not dependent on any formal diagnosis.
It might be:
- adapted teaching methods and materials to suit the child's style and rate of learning and or
- other provision as described in the ordinarily available provision guidance such as input from specialist outreach services
SEND support is tailored to a child's particular needs and should be agreed with parents and carers in a SEND support plan. This plan should be regularly reviewed.
For further information read chapters 5 and 6 of the SEND Code of Practice 2015 – GOV.UK.
Read about how your child's place of learning supports children who have special educational needs in their setting's SEND information report.
How SEND support works
You and your child should be at the centre of any decision-making. This is called person-centred planning and can include person-centred reviews. It may be useful for a one-page profile to be drawn up so your child's voice can be heard.
The early years' keyworker or teacher, and the place of learning's special educational needs and disabilities coordinator (SENCO), will all work together using the graduated approach to create a SEND Support Plan.
This plan identifies your child's needs, the action needed and planned outcomes.
Some children and young people will make progress and no longer require SEND support. Other pupils may well need continued support and start the cycle again. However, if your child's needs are severe or complex, they may go straight to the next step and request an education, health, and care needs assessment.
What SEND support may include
In H&F we have a SEND Support pathway for professionals.
Settings will provide support as part of the graduated approach outlined in your child's SEND Support Plan. This will include a range of provision set out in the Council's Ordinarily Available Provision Guidance. This document refers to the support that all H&F early years, schools and post 16 settings should be able to provide for children and young people, including those with SEND, from within their own resources. To find out what you can expect from educational settings, please visit the ordinarily available provision guidance.
If settings or professionals find they need further advice, they can contact the SEND Advice Line (ASK SAL). This early advice service for SENDCos, SEND managers and other professionals will support settings with an early conversation to help guide them through the graduated approach and signpost to next steps and resources to support meeting needs.
The council's Local Area SENDCO will triage referrals and provide advice to settings on different strategies, approaches and resources to meet needs.
Where the child or young person's needs are more complex, they may schedule the case at the next SEND Support Panel. This is a panel which is attended by multi-agency professionals. The panel will agree next steps and recommendations. This may include support from other services or Inclusion Funding to provide short-term targeted support. Other support could include:
- educational psychologists
- child and adolescent mental health services (CAMHS)
- speech and language therapists
- occupational therapists
Reviewing the SEND support plan
The education setting will review the SEND support plan regularly. The review will help identify whether your child's progressing and if the amount of support needs to change.
Involving you and your child
You and your child are central to deciding what action to take, what you want it to achieve and whether it's working.
The education setting should:
- work closely with you and your child to identify your child's needs and support
- take into account you and your child's concerns, views, agreed outcomes and next steps
- include you in any decision to involve specialists
- share details of the support plan with you and agree a review date
- ask you and your child for your views when reviewing the SEND support plan
If you feel your child is not making progress
Please discuss your concerns with the educational setting the child attends. Should you feel that your concerns aren't being addressed then you may want to escalate this through your educational settings complaint policy.
SENDIASS can offer impartial advice on your situation. They can support you in getting your views across. Find out more about SENDIASS
Education, health and care plans and assessments
For those that have tried many different support options and adjustments but still need more help, the next step could be to apply for an education, health and care (EHC) assessment. Find out more about Education, Health and Care (EHC) plans and assessments.
Other support available
The Early Help service can provide initial support for families with children aged 0-19 who are facing challenges including mental health, domestic abuse, drug and alcohol use, school attendance and behaviour issues and other challenges where the child or young person may be having difficulties.
The Virtual School is in place to support all children looked after, aged 3 to 18 years who attend school in Hammersmith & Fulham, and also those who are the responsibility of Hammersmith & Fulham and live and attend school elsewhere.
For young people looking for work please see Help for young Disabled people looking for work
For adults, the H&FALS (adult learning and skills) service supports residents to gain employment skills and offers learning courses. For further support, the H&FALS special educational needs provision offers preparation for work and helps with personal development.
Visit the Living Independently service directory for information about learning, employment and volunteering options using that filter.