Peer support

Things to consider:

• Introduce the use of the Ordinarily Available Inclusive Practice (OAIP) guide as a classroom tool as part of whole school training. Encourage staff to use the OAIP as an everyday helpful resource. Section 1 details quality first teaching expectations and section 2 provides strategy information.
• Ensure all class teacher and support staff are aware of their SEND roles and that of the SENCO – it can be useful to refer to the SEND Code of practice within this training.
• To support the use of the OAIP, provide staff drop-ins so colleagues can share what they have tried and any barriers they are facing with the SENCO. This can also be a good time management strategy as staff can be signposted to the drop-ins.
• Introduce problem-solving scenario discussions as part of staff meetings.
• Use the strengths of other locality schools. For example, learning visits to other schools to see Quality First Teaching and SEND ownership in practice. The learning school could also showcase something they are proud of as part of ‘skills swap’.
• Build on the school’s strengths and recognise what is going well to increase staff confidence. The school could share example of good practice as part of countywide Inclusion celebrations.
• Introduce the use of a simple planning template that focuses on the Assess, Plan, Do, Review cycle (APDR). Class teachers should be encouraged to work through the cycle a couple of time before seeking the advice of the SENCO. Make sure all staff are aware of what should be recorded – provide support to staff for the use of the template. See Individual Support Plan pages on Tools for Schools for a planning framework.
• Encourage staff and parents to meet for the first few APDR cycle before SENCO steps in.
• SEN [KK1] register and those causing concern – create Individual Learning Plans (ILPs) with staff.
• Consider use of an online platform for parent carers so they can see and comment on their child’s ILP with the class teacher. ILPs then reviewed by SENCO.
• ILPs sent home 2 weeks before parents’ evening so they can discuss the targets with class teacher. SENCO available for more detailed conversations if needed.

Things to consider:

• Request a regular slot on the agenda to update the Senior Leadership Team (SLT) on specific items. If this is turned down provide a solution-based paper to highlight the impact of not attending and include specific examples.
• Provide SLT with the information you would like to discuss along with proposal options ahead of the meeting to make the best use of the time you have.
• Develop a fortnightly panel where pastoral lead / SENCO / behaviour leads meet to discuss children who are causing concern. This allows a holistic view of the child to be considered and joint actions agreed. These can be recorded on an Assess, Plan, Do, Review cycle template.
• Use Governors to encourage SLT conversations.
• Seek a ‘mentor’ approach with key SLT member.
• Encourage discussion through the introduction of ‘How do we know?’ question frames. Evidence can be sought once discussions begin, for example:
• Class teachers: How do we know that the child is engaging in their learning?
• SLT: How do we know that we are being inclusive for children and young people with English as an additional language.
• Provide opportunities to capture the pupils’ view on what’s working well, even better if. There are some useful child centred tools on the Tools for Schools website.
• Partner up class teachers to develop a ‘co-adventurers’ approach to introduce classroom approaches. For example, providing pupils with greater ownership of resources such as making sensory tools available for anyone to use. The ‘co-adventurers’ could share what works well with staff during staff meetings as part of the CPD programme.
• SENCO to spend time in classes with EHCP pupils (book reviews and observations) to provide teaching staff with helpful suggestions for next steps. Could include whole class adaptations such as visual timetables.
• Care is needed to manage change for staff as this can create stress. Book recommendation: ‘Switch: How to change things when change is hard Paperback’ by Dan Heath.
• Consider ‘How will you know that the tide is starting to change?’ Ask staff to contribute their ideas on what they would expect to see as part of this discussion.
• Use pupil voice to influence the change. Pupils to use cameras to capture what best helps them to learn.

Things to consider:

• Provide parent carers with information on the support that the child is receiving, how it is reviewed to determine the impact it is making through the Assess, Plan, Do, Review cycle. It could be useful to look at the Assess, Plan, Do, Review section of Tools for Schools while doing this to help parents and staff know the types of questions that are useful to consider as part of the process. This could also help parents to understand their role.
• Ask parents and pupils to contribute their views as part of this Review section of the Assess, Plan, Do, Review cycle. Include a parent action on the Assess, Plan, Do, Review form.
• It can be useful to record some examples of the support that is in place for the child to help the parent understand the strategies that are being used.
• A visual timetable for EHCP needs assessment requests can be a useful tool to help parents understand what needs to happen in advance of any EHCNA request.
• Explain to parent carers that as part of a successful Education, Health and Care Plan application, the school will need to gather evidence over time.
• Ensure parent carers are aware that the school already has an SEN notional budget that can be used to provide a certain amount of support for the child. An EHCP is only required if a higher level of need can be evidenced.
• Provide information to parents on the range of parent support services such as SENDIAS that will be able to help them understand the EHCNA process and evidence required. Sometimes they may prefer an impartial 3rd party.
• Review the SEND section of the school’s website to ensure information covers their most frequently asked questions and is easy for parents to understand. Ensure there is clarity of expectations with regards to the role of class teacher and SENCO in the child’s provision, including Assess, Plan, Do, Review cycle.
• Provide informal opportunities for the SENCO and class teachers to chat with parent carers before problems escalate. For example, SENCO and teachers are available to chat with parents in the morning on the playground or at the school gate. Once back in school they could email the parent carer with a quick message to reflect on the conversation – a note of this is made on the pupil tracker.
• Arrange ‘drop-in’ sessions for parent carers to discuss any concerns. This could include wider holistic needs for the child. Information on the sessions would need to be shared. This is a useful technique for time management as parent carers could be directed to these fixed times.

Things to consider:

• Consider introducing a solution circles approach for staff use. Model the technique in a staff meeting.
• Pair up staff members as ‘critical friends’, Provide a support framework for coaching conversations. It is often helpful to select pairings to ensure there is relevant support for the pairs’ strengths and areas for development.
• Introduce the use of the Ordinarily Available Inclusive Practice (OAIP) guide as a classroom tool as part of whole school training.
• Train staff on a consistent Assess, Plan, Do, Review model so they are able to complete 2 cycles before SENCO is involved. See Individual Support Plan pages of Tools for Schools for a planning framework.
• Hold an open ‘surgery’ so staff feel SENCO is supporting any problems.

Things to consider:

• Develop a parent carer charter to help parent carers understand the role they have to play in their child’s education – it’s a joint home / school responsibility.
• Organise a ‘6 week in’ session for parent carers, six weeks after children return to school to understand what’s working well, what could be better. You may want to repeat this in the spring and summer term for parent carers of children and young people with SEND.
• Include a parent carer action on the Assess, Plan, Do, Review form.
• Structured conversations training can be useful for staff who are working with parent carers to try and encourage solution focused conversations.
• Organise parent carer coffee mornings with themed input. These could include ‘guest speakers’ to talk on holistic topics such as creating routines, developing independence skills and emotional regulation. Create an informal feel where the kettle is on and cake is available. Parent carers asked to suggest topics ahead of the meeting so ‘guest speakers’ can be invited and encourage ownership.
• A popular topic for parent carers could be ‘How to share diagnosis with children’ e.g. recommended book ‘Amazing things happen’.
• Invite community support groups to parent carer sessions. Examples of external agencies for families could include:
  • Reaching families
  • West Sussex Parent Carer Forum
  • The Local Offer
  • SENDIAS
  • Aspens
• Consider how the school seeks parent carers’ views, how these are used and report back. Parent carers need to be confident that their views will be listened to and acted upon.
• Many schools say they have an ‘open-door’ policy for parent carers. How is the success of this ‘open door’ policy determined?
• Consider the use of survey tools such as Survey Monkey to gain views from parent carers. It is helpful to use specific questions for richer detail for example: how do you currently seek information if you have a concern about your child? Consider the literacy level of parent carer with written questionnaire, consider use of video / audio files for question asking and responses.
• Use surveys and activities to gain views of the child e.g. Lego classroom – summaries are useful to share with parent carers.
• Hold a zoom coffee morning – encourage some parent carers to facilitate the breakout room (given topics of conversation).
• Be aware that some parent carers may have their own literacy needs and therefore less able to access written communications. School communications could be shared by audio files or short videos. Parent carers could also be given the option of sending in audio files to school re pupil updates.
• Co-produce policies and plans with parent carers. It can be helpful to begin with a ‘blank sheet’ and in an initial meeting share with parent carers what policy needs to be about and what it has to cover etc. Parent carers to provide ideas via post-it notes etc. Post-meeting, write a draft and then share at next parent carer meeting for feedback.

In addition to the schools normal parental communication and engagement methods:

• Conduct a curriculum audit: How colonial is the current curriculum? Consider introducing content in an organic way.
• Celebrate each family’s historic geographical routes – families may come from other parts of UK or aboard – focus on celebrating diversity and something distinct about each region.
• Staff book club – consider reading texts such as ‘Roll of thunder hear my cry’ by Mildred Taylor.
• Consider appropriate texts for children – e.g. Year 6 ‘ A boy at the back of the class’ by Onjauli Rauf; – asylum theme.
• There are also some useful texts on Tools for Schools.
• Ensure all groups are represented on school council.
• Invite targeted parent carers to work with you to design a workshop for parent carers.
• Encourage pupils to design / personalise invites for their parent carers. They are less likely to turn down a personalised invite their child has written than a standard school letter.
• Hold a parent carer session / coffee morning with outside providers – could be a drop in or part of a wider session. Include library staff, local organisations who provide holiday activities, parental support, West Sussex parent carer forum, YES service etc.
• Introduce a parent carer budding system.
• Hold a quiz night or Bingo evening for parent carers. This may help to regain interest to restart a flagging PTA.
• Introduce a parent carer communication approach where parent carers can celebrate a child’s holistic achievement or interests (could be making a cake etc).This could be a way of supporting parent carers to highlight what’s going on as well which will in turn help them to gain confidence in the school and that their views will be listened to.

Things to consider:

• How well do staff understand, know and use the graduated approach cycle (assess, plan, do, review)?
• How confident are staff about quality first teaching (QFT)? Can staff describe how they would see quality first teaching in practice?
• How much time do you think teachers would need to gain a secure knowledge of QFT expectations?
• Learning walks can be useful technique for brief lesson observations – consider how these can be introduced and planned for all staff.
• Encourage staff to video themselves teaching on an ipad and then watch themselves back. Staff could be asked to pick out something that went well (note timing on video) and then share at a staff meeting or with colleague.
• Create ‘tips of the week’ to share with staff – all staff could contribute to this through their learning walks and videos.
• Ask pupils about their learning after the lesson to what understand what enabled them to learn effectively. It is also useful to encourage pupils to reflect on their learning.
• Set specific timespans for learning a concept / skills and review effectiveness of interventions. If the pupil misses some sessions due to illness etc, make sure they are given this time ‘back’ to ensure they have adequate time to develop their understanding / catch up on what they missed.
• Regular review a child’s Individual Learning Plan – ensure it captures how the child learns best, what helps them, as well as what they have learnt and remembered.
• Provide staff and children with opportunities for self-reflection.
• Provide class teacher planning checks – is the learning sequential, objectives well planned, is there differentiation? Does the learning make sense?
• Create ‘tips of the week’ to share with staff.

Things to consider:

• Focus on looking at behaviour as a communication, not just for SEND pupils. What is the behaviour trying to say? Consider those demonstrating withdrawn as well as more challenging behaviours.
• How are seldom-heard parent carers and parent carers of disadvantaged pupils involved in the production of the school’s Behaviour policy?
• How effecting is the school’s Behaviour policy for those with sensory processing and social communication differences? Consider developing a positive policy that has therapeutic thinking at its roots.
• Co-developing a new whole school Behaviour policy will take time. As an interim solution, add a clause into current behaviour policy to say that if a child is experiencing difficulties an individual plan will be created for them.
• Share a selection of behaviour policies with staff at a meeting so they can discuss what they like / don’t like to encourage ownership and co-development.
• Considering merging individual behaviour and learning plans so staff, parent carers and pupils have one plan to follow.
• How are pupils involved in the development of their own individualised self-regulation toolkit?
• Prepare and share de-escalation scripts for staff.
• Research external resource for good practice that will influence language and restorative approaches.
• Schedule time in for staff training with clear dates so staff understand the wider plan.
• Ensure the school has a supervision system to support staff to reflect upon practice. This is particularly important for those who are supporting vulnerable children.

Things to consider:

• What approaches have been used successfully in the school? Could they be adapted to address this difficultly?
• Help pupils to better understand their emotions. For example, use of the Zones of Regulation approach as a whole class tool, emotional literacy techniques.
• [KK1] for assessing emotional vocabulary of the class.
• Use pupil voice to influence the change. For example, pupils could use cameras to capture view of school / Landscape of Fear.
• Develop a Circle of Friends approach.
• Consider the use of social stories. What happened? what could we do differently?
• Consider how staff are modelling language and reflecting this back to pupils.