4. How will St Mary’s Fields support my child?

In line with the 2014 Code of Practice, at St Mary’s Fields Primary School we have two levels of SEN:

a) SEN Support

Any child who is not making the expected progress over time is placed on the SEN register at SEN Support.  You will have already had a meeting with the SENCo and class teacher to discuss this and we will agree on some targets to support your child.  We will review these targets together with you and your child 3times each year and agree new ones.

Your child will continue to receive differentiated teaching from their class teacher, and may also be part of targeted interventions run outside the classroom in small groups or maybe have 1 to 1 support with a teaching assistant.

If difficulties persist, we will discuss asking a specialist teacher for advice that could help your child.  For a child with a disability e.g. hearing loss, this will involve a specialist observing your child in class and providing the school with clear strategies to help them.

For children who are making slower progress than we would wish, this may include a specialist teacher from the Learning, Communication and Interaction Team (LCI) or the Educational Psychology Service, who will often carry out further assessments with your child.  They are trained to make sure your child is comfortable and often the assessment is presented in the form of games.  This helps to identify any specific gaps in your child’s learning or helps to identify the best teaching methods to best suit your child’s learning style. Using this advice, targets are modified and agreed and will identify the area which your child needs to work on and how we intend to help them to do this.  You will always be asked to give written consent for the school to involve an external agency.

b) Education and Health Care Plan (Statement)

A child with an Education, Health and Care Plan (previously called a ‘Statement of Special Educational Needs') will have more significant difficulties, and will often need a daily timetable that is different from other children for some of the time.  Children with very complex needs often have an EHC Plan.

An EHC Plan can only be given by Leicester City Council, and is based on your child’s individual circumstances.  Sometimes these children will have an adult assigned to them for some or all of the school day.  This adult is trained to help your child achieve their targets.  Children with an EHC Plan must have an annual review meeting.   Together we will look at progress against last year’s targets and any changes to the child’s needs are discussed.  All professionals working with the child will be invited to the annual review. If they cannot attend, it is expected that they will send a report that can be shared at the meeting.