Agenda

This session will share how an integrated early intervention approach, that supports the family, the individual and the school, can give a child the best start in their education journey.

‘F’ and his family attended the BeyondAutism Early Years’ Service where his mum was able to build skills, knowledge and confidence to support F in developing communication and language through play and learning essential skills that they can build upon throughout their journey in education. As part of a school readiness programme, BeyondAutism worked with the family to support F’s transition into the classroom and will be delivering staff training to the school, alongside follow up visits, to ensure the longer-term success of the intervention for F and other pupils with SEN.

• Outlining the key features of the Rowdeford Plus Programme, which supports mainstream schools by providing alternative provision placement opportunities for vulnerable pupils with SEND or communication difficulties
• Exploring the aims of the Programme, such as confidence building, developing social skills, and improving mental health, including through utilisation of an outdoor learning environment
• Highlighting the wider benefits of Learning Outside the Classroom (LOtC), and how special schools as well as mainstream schools can seek to embed LOtC into standard curriculum delivery
• Considering how to ensure smooth transition between educational environments, minimising any disorientation for pupils, by prioritising collaboration between all Programme partners

First UK Special School to achieve Gold Award for LOtC work

Winner of Most Innovative SEND Intervention Award, SEND Awards 2019

• Summarising the local authority-commended approach to utilising external partners and agencies to successfully support a body of students that has one of the highest percentages of the borough’s most ‘hard-pressed’ profiles
• Sharing best practice in forming long standing partnerships with other local schools to make use of specialist outreach staff that work with parents and staff to identify and implement pupil support plans
• Increasing capacity to deliver time-bound interventions through an online referral service which pupils can access themselves
• Working with local special school, New Rush Hall, to implement high quality EHC plans, as well as ease the transition, for both parents and pupils, when a child moves from mainstream into special education, or an alternative provision placement

Winner of Best Use of External Professional Award, SEND Awards 2019

• Embedding improvements for children with SEND in the whole school improvement plan, to ensure consideration of staff development and planning is inclusive of diverse needs
• Developing a plan to succeed, by timetabling and prioritising pupil progress meetings, and elements that feed into this including assessments and TA-intervention progress checks
• Ensuring every staff member has an individual Pupil Premium child to ‘champion’ to ensure their progress is build into the whole school approach
• Sharing advice on embedding emotional wellbeing support in the offer all staff provide for children, to facilitate academic progress
• Understanding how to maintain flexibility: Keep your “why” or core basics at heart and get creative with your “how” responses

This session will share insights and lessons learnt from a pre-supported internship programme based in secondary schools and colleges across England. Areas to be explored include:

• Generating supported intern numbers including explaining the benefits of participation to young people and their families
• Delivering effective pre-supported internship activities including workplace exposures and skills development
• Managing the handover process including vocational profiling
• How smoother transitions to supported internship programmes can impact positively on employment outcomes

In this session lessons will be shared on developing a three-stage plan, using the graduated approach, to improve a school’s SEND provision, as part of a whole-school evaluation.

Key Takeaways:

• Learn how to include staff, as well as other professionals, parents and carers, in a review of SEND provision, ensuring the whole process is centred around the young people with SEND and their needs
• Explore a useful timetable of a review process, and how to subsequently build findings into a timely action plan
• Consider how priorities identified for SEND improvements can be matched with efforts in other parts of the school improvement plan, to pool resources where possible, and ensure responsibility for all aspects is allocated

Key Takeaways:

• Increased awareness of some of the areas where fault most often occurs and consider how this can be mitigated, including for EHCPs
• How to use the learning from LGSCO decisions
• Effectively using your own complaints process to prevent unnecessary escalation and ensure complaints are used effectively to help improve services more generally