What can children and young people expect schools to provide through the Special Educational Needs (SEN) Graduated Response?

What can children and young people expect schools to provide through the Special Educational Needs (SEN) Graduated Response?

High quality teaching, differentiated for individual pupils, is the first step in responding to pupils who have or who may have SEN. Schools should regularly review the quality of teaching for all pupils, including those at risk of underachievement. In deciding whether to make special educational provision, the class teacher and the SENCo (Special Educational Needs Co-ordinator) should consider all of the information available within the school/setting about the pupil’s progress, alongside national data and expectations of progress. Any child may require some additional input at one time or another and class teachers are expected to provide this, working with literacy or numeracy leads as well as the Special Educational Needs Co-ordinator (SENCo). This may include small group or individual, one-to-one targeted interventions aimed at helping them to progress and to be able to attain at the levels expected of children of their age.

If a child requires support that is additional to, and different from the provision provided to most children and young people, then schools will make this available from a wide range of additional strategies.

When there is evidence that a child is not making the expected progress, even though they have had support generally available within school, or where a child’s disabilities may be shown to create a barrier to the curriculum, support for children with special educational needs may be made available. This should always be discussed with parents first and the involvement of parents throughout is essential for monitoring, re-enforcing learning and planning what happens in the future.