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School SEND Offer for Nursery and Reception

(Classes 1 and 2)

Entry Into school

Early Years undertake an induction programme including letters and visits into Nursery and Reception for parents and children. Nursery children can build up to an agreed number of hours per week according to their needs. 
Where pupils have additional needs on entry to Nursery or to Reception a deferred entry may be agreed in discussion with parents and other agencies.

Transition

Reception pupils with additional needs who join our school either at the beginning of the year or during the academic year will be supported, as appropriate, so that a successful transition is achieved. The school works together with parents and the Local Authority where a child is starting our school with an Education Health and Care Plan to ensure that they are appropriately supported.

Early Years Pupils’ Voice

We at Windmill value the opinion of our pupils and allow regular opportunities for the children to discuss their learning.
Circle Time happens within all of our classrooms and is an opportunity for children to share their ideas with their class mates. This activity may be incorporated for any subject but will occur weekly.

Early Years Parents' Voice

Parents are welcomed into Nursery to attend induction meetings lead by our Early Years Strategic Lead where they can ask questions about their child(s) school life. Nursery staff also invite parents to settle their child into each session and have the opportunity to ask questions and share information. 
Parents are welcome to join the Parent Forum, and to be involved with the school event organising. Parents are regularly informed of events within school through the Windmill Weekly Bulletin, ClassDojo and social media. There is always a member of the senior school staff available on the school playground before and after school to listen to parents’ views.

Early Years Interventions

The school has an Inclusion Team who work closely with the Early Years team to identify concerns and develop strategies for supporting pupils either one to one or in small groups. We recognise that it is important to identify difficulties so that early intervention can take place, for example speech therapy.
Intervention groups are used consistently throughout Early Years for targeting children with areas of concern such as maths, reading and writing. If parents have a concern they are welcome to discuss this at any time initially with the class teacher and then with the Inclusion Team. The Inclusion Team has additional rooms where a small group of identified pupils can access a ‘nurture’ style provision either focusing on learning or behavioural difficulties.
Interventions that are often available within Early Years are:
  • Cool Kids
  • Teodorescu
  • 1:1 Read Write Inc. support
  • Speech and language support
  • Social skills group
  • Occupational Therapy Activities
  • Precision Teaching
  • Social and Emotional Aspects of Learning (SEAL) 'Pups' group

SEND Procedures.

School staff regularly review all children’s progress and monitor children with concerns. Those children with on going concerns may be referred to the appropriate agency with the permission of parents. For example speech therapy, occupational therapy and learning support.
Where children have additional needs they will be supported in accessing the full curriculum.
Individual risk assessments are carried out where appropriate to ensure the safety of children with additional needs.
If concerns still remain once the intervention has been completed the school will request statutory assessment by the local authority.

Early Years Resources

We have a number of resources that are available for all pupils at Windmill Primary School:
  • Sensory room
  • Blue room (quiet room)
  • Writing slopes
  • Pencils and pencil grips
  • Different types of scissors
  • Handled rulers
  • Wobble cushions
  • Outdoor learning
  • Role-play area
  • Gross and fine motor skills equipment
  • Allotments
  • ICT resources
  • Occupational Therapy resources
  • ELKLAN trained member of staff
  • Partridge small group learning room
  • Quiet lunch club
  • Talking Postcards
  • Microphones
  • Visual timetable
  • Emergency inhibulator
  • Fiddle toys

Accessibility

Early Years staff support children with toileting needs, in conjunction with parents. We are a school that can be easily accessed by wheel chair users as we have: wide corridors and door openings, disabled toilets and all outdoor areas accessible.
All classes are fitted with window blinds.

Curriculum

Where children have additional needs they will be supported in accessing the full curriculum through specialist equipment and/or human resources.
The curriculum is planned to be multi-sensory in order to support children’s differing learning styles.

Lunch times and play times

Reception children have a different play time to the rest of the school and have a balance of outdoor and child initiated time.
Where Reception children have additional needs they may access one or more of the following lunch time interventions:
  • One to one adult support
  • One to one Year 6 buddy system
  • Quiet lunch time club
  • One to one Teaching Assistant buddy system
  • Home dinners
  • They can be supported to play in a smaller area of the playground
The catering team offer a wide range of specialist dietary requirement meals e.g. dairy free.
All Early Years and KS1 children have fruit provided daily
As part of the transition programme from Nursery to Reception, the teachers of the Reception classes arrange a home visit to build a strong communication/relationship link with parents.

Training and Qualifications

Mrs Howells is Windmill Primary School's Special Educational Needs Coordinator and has completed the National Award for Special Educational Needs.
The staff at Windmill Primary School have personal experience of working with lots of different children with specific learning or behavioural needs. Many of our staff have attended a wide and varied range of courses and have qualifications in the following:
  • Child Protection and Safeguarding
  • Epi-pen training
  • Autism
  • Epilepsy
  • Lifting and Handling
  • BTEC in special needs
  • Emotional Behaviour course
  • SEN course Level 1, 2, 3.
  • Dyslexia awareness
  • Intro to Autistic Spectrum Disorder
  • Nurture group training
  • Behaviour management
  • Managing Actual and Potential Aggression training
  • Bereavement training
  • Counselling course
  • Working together happily course
  • Engaging children in Autism and complex needs course
  • Makaton training
  • Sensory Inclusion hearing impairment course
  • How to teach dyslexic children
  • Tracheostomy training
  • Colostomy bag
  • Cool kids training
  • First Aid
  • ELKLAN training
  • Brain training/ Brain gym
  • Build to express (Lego therapy)
  • Parent group leader training

Website and Social Media

We have a school website, Facebook page and twitter account where we share our schools news and events. 

Progress and Monitoring

All teaching staff in the school monitor and review the progress of the needs of different children within their class together with the SENCo on a termly basis. Children causing concern are monitored more regularly and referred to relevant agencies where appropriate. Intervention and provision maps are created for children with specific needs to show outcomes and progress over time. These are monitored and reviewed by the SENCo and on a regular basis. At the end of the academic year class teachers pass on relevant information and intervention and provision maps to the new class teacher.