Question

Answer

How does the setting know if children/young people need extra help and what should I do if I think a child/young person may have special educational needs?

Children attending Nursery

Children with significant additional need are usually identified before starting nursery by parents and health care professionals. However, occasionally children are recognised as having additional needs once they begin nursery. These needs may be one or more of the following

• Communication and Interaction
• Cognition and Learning
• Social, mental and emotional health
• Sensory and/or physical

When children join our Nursery, we ask parents/carers to provide a range of information about their child helping us to understand each child’s needs and stage of development. If you inform us you think your child has a special educational need or disability or additional need we will discuss it with you and plan our approach with you. We will carry out regular observations and assessments and share these with you. If your child has an Education, Health and Care Needs Assessment/Plan, we will work with you to support the implementation of that plan.

If our staff are concerned that your child may have a special educational need or disability this may be because they are not progressing at the expected rate for a child in their age range. We will discuss this with you and we will observe and assess them to find out what is causing them difficulty. If we feel we need to, we will ask for your permission to approach the Area Inclusion Co-ordinator or Early Help Team for advice.

For children who attend Nursery between the age of 2 years and 3 years old we formulate Two Year Checks. If you or we have concerns about your child’s development, we will work in partnership with you and your child’s Health Visitor to complete this assessment. The Two Year Checks provide parents with a summary of children’s progress in the Personal, Social and Emotional Development, their Physical Development and the Communication and Language Development and facilitate the early identification of children with special educational needs or disabilities.

Children attending out of school provision

Parents/carers of all children attending out of school provision must complete a registration form, including details of the child’s needs, before their child may use the service. Some children only make occasional use of our setting (e.g. occasional After School Club sessions or one or two days during the holidays). In these cases, parents’ and carers’ input is invaluable to enable us to offer appropriate support to their children.

For children attending Breakfast Club or After School Club on a regular basis, if we identify a particular need we will discuss this with you and, with your agreement, your child’s school SENCO (Special Educational Needs Co-ordinator). If your child has an Early Years Support Plan, Individual Education Plan, Early Help Assessment or Educational Health Care Plan we will work with you and the school to help implement these plans.

How will setting staff support my child/?

The nursery keeps a record of all children with Special Educational Needs and Disabilities and this is updated regularly, ensuring there are excellent records of your child’s progress and their needs.

The manager and Lead SENCO with the support of the deputy SENCO Lisa day are responsible for coordinating all the support for children with Special Educational Needs or disabilities. They will ensure that you are:

• Involved in supporting your child’s learning
• Kept informed about the support and progress towards their targets
• Involved in reviewing how your child is doing.

Staff, including your child’s Key Person, will observe your child, plan approaches and activities that will support your child’s learning and development, and monitor your child’s progress. We will discuss this with you regularly, both formally and informally. For some children, short term, focussed support will help them make progress. For children with longer term or more complex needs we will seek advice from the Area Inco or Early Help Team. If appropriate, the SENCo’s will work with you to write an Early Years Support Plan that specifies next steps for your child and the strategies we will employ to support your child.

If your child is already receiving specialist support from another agency (e.g. Health, Social Care, Children’s Centre, Advisory Teacher) will work in partnership with that agency to support your child.

How will the curriculum be matched to my child’s/young person’s needs

At Half Pint Nursery, we use the Early Year Foundation Stage as the basis for our curriculum. This is underpinned by the principles of supporting the unique child, building positive relationships, and providing an enabling environment to nurture learning and development.

We work to meet every child’s needs by

• Building supportive and caring relationships with every child
• Appreciating the role of parents and carers as children’s first educators
• Using our cycle of observation, assessment, planning and evaluation to learn about children’s individual needs and plan activities to match them.
• Having high expectation for all children attending Penny Bridge Nursery.
• Providing an environment (in doors and outside) is that stimulating, attractive, supportive and well- resourced and offers opportunities for children to learn in lots of different ways.

All our Nursery staff have specialist early years training. The number of staff working with the children in any given session varies according to the number of children present and is decided following the ratio guidelines within the EYFS. Through our staff meeting and supervision arrangements staff support each other to identify and analyse the attainment, progress of children with special educational needs or disabilities and children with any short-term additional needs and plan strategies for meeting their needs.

Throughout the Nursery day children are given a wide range of learning experiences including time to play and develop their own interests and understanding, adult led activities differentiated to meet individual needs, targeted support to support progress in particular areas of development and group activities that support social interaction and shared learning. Children’s individual care/personal care needs are discussed with parents and planned for accordingly.

How will I know how my child is doing and how will you help me to support my child’s learning?

Half Pint Nursery is a child and family centred nursery, so you will be involved in all aspects of our work with your child including sharing your expertise about your child’s development or condition, if appropriate. Where we have expertise, or have accessed training or specialist advice we will work with you on ways of supporting your child further at home.

• We collate Learning Journals for all children documenting progress through observations, photographs, assessments and contributions from home. These are available to parents/carers and children at any time.
• We are happy to make time to give parents informal feedback at the end of a session offer an open-door policy to encourage parents to share information with us when they drop off or collect their child.
• We offer all parents regular, formal opportunities to meet with staff to discuss progress and assessments and review Learning Journals and Next Steps. These are linked to our assessment schedule.
• We carry out termly assessments recording children’s progress and development within Nursery. These are tracked to show how children are progressing.

In addition to these strategies, if your child continues to make less progress than we would expect or has complex or long term needs we will write an Early Years Support Plan for her or him. This will set down the support your child will receive and identify next steps and targets. We will share these with you and discuss them in regular meetings. If staff access specialist training to support your child we will share this with you.

What support will there be for my child’s

overall well-being?

Half Pint Nursery is an inclusive setting where all children are valued.

• We work closely with parents and carers to through our induction and settling in process to help children feel happy and secure in Nursery.
• We monitor children’s well-being and use information gained within our evaluation.
• Our curriculum embraces all aspects of learning, including different learning needs and styles.
• Our behaviour policy is designed to encourage children to have high self-esteem and value their relationships with others so that they can manage their own behaviour. It describes what type of behaviour is expected within nursery. It recognises that very young children and some children with developmental delay may not understand behaviour boundaries and need patience, consistency and encouragement to develop expected behaviours. It recognises that some children display challenging behaviour and may need additional support systems putting in place such as a reward chart.
• We work closely with parents, child minders and schools to help prepare children for any changes or transitions in their home or nursery/school life.
• All of our staff are DBS checked, trained in Safeguarding, Paediatric First Aid, Safe Food Handling and Health and Safety. We have also had training in meeting specific health needs e.g. in the correct use of Epi pens and how to care for children with Epilepsy and children with Autism.
• All children with health and medical needs have a Health Care Plan. These plans are kept in the child’s personal file, with allergies displayed in the kitchen, children’s toilets, first aid cupboard and the sun cream box. Medicines are stored in the kitchen fridge with locked kitchen door or nursery office medical cupboard
• Inhalers are stored in the nursery office medical cupboard labelled with the child’s name and a picture. Parents fill in a parental consent for staff to administer medication. Staff can only administer medicine that has been prescribed by a doctor.

What specialist services and expertise

are available at or accessed by the setting?

What training is the staff receiving or have completed to support children with SEND?   This should include recent and future planned training and disability awareness

All our staff have early years level 3 and/or teaching assistant qualifications

All our staff have received behavioural training

Sophie Russ has a degree in Childhood and Youth Studies BA

Sophie Russ has a qualification in Autism Level 2

Liz Romero is the ENCO & level 3 SENCO

Liz Romero has additional training in supporting children’s emotional wellbeing.

We have support from the area SENCO Lisa Morley: Speech and Language

How accessible is the setting’s environment?

The nursery is purpose built with all facilities on one level including, accessible toilet facilities for adults and children. It is well lit with natural light. Displays are hung at a variety of levels and are used to promote inclusion. The furniture is designed to be easily adaptable (e.g. the heights of tables is easily altered) to cater for a range of users. There is level access to the outdoor environment.

How will the setting prepare and support my child to join school or to transfer to a new school or the next stage of education and life?

Parents of children starting Half Pint Nursery are encouraged to visit the nursery, Discuss the process of settling in. To raise any concerns with the manager or deputy. Settling in plans are tailored to meet the child’s needs: parents can visit with or without children, they can stay and play with their child, parents are welcome to have as many meetings/discussions with the managers as they wish to ensure they are happy with their child starting nursery.

Information will be gathered regarding any Special Educational Need or Disability or additional need and any necessary support put in place on their entry to nursery. If a child has a health need related to their Special Educational Need or Disability parents/carers will be asked to fill in a Health Care Plan.

When a child moves to a different nursery, we will forward any relevant information to that setting, and provide parents with a new assessment check and their child’s learning journal to show to the setting.

Children are supported throughout their transition into school. All schools receiving children from Penny Bridge Nursery are invited to meet the children in the setting. Children are encouraged to attend any transition visits provided by their future school. Learning Journals and Early Years Support Plans are passed to the future school. Where appropriate the nursery SENCO will meet with the school SENCO to ensure children with SEND receive any extra support they need. We will discuss this with you.

How are the settings’ resources allocated and matched to children’s special educational needs?

The Nursery allocates time and budget to meet the needs of children with SENDs. This may be short term, targeted support, or on-going support according to the child’s need.

Our resources are regularly reviewed and new resources bought when required.

Meeting the needs of children with Special Educational Needs or Disabilities is incorporated into our on-going staff training and development programme.

Staff use individual and group supervision to review how children’s needs are being met.

How is the decision made about what type and how much support my child will receive?

All children listed on our SEND register will receive appropriate support.

If parents or staff identify a short term need, for example a child’s progress is slightly slower than expected, we will develop a short term programme to support your child’s learning and development.

The nursery can request an assessment of your child from Children’s Services if we feel this is what is needed, with parents’ consent. The support needed will be highlighted by this assessment and then implemented in nursery. Children will receive EHCP (Education Health Care Plan) which outlines what support is needed. It will also have long and short term goals for your child.

Each term the nursery analyses the progress. Equality of opportunity is central to the work in the nursery and the nursery has been very successful in closing the gap and removing barriers to learning.