SEND

The school SEND offer is the inclusive, accessible provision which supports children with special educational needs and disability to thrive.

As a fully inclusive school, The Mease Spencer Academy is committed to identifying and providing for the needs of all children. Every teacher is a teacher of every child or young person including those with SEND; and all staff are trained in and adhere to our model of good practice.

Children are recognised as individuals, with abilities and development needs which will vary across the curriculum. Class teachers and support staff are able to identify individual development requirements, and to provide lessons and activities which ensure good progress for pupils at all levels of ability.

Where children’s needs require support beyond the level that can be appropriately be provided by the class teacher, the school plays a co-ordinating role which may include working with the local authority to source additional specialist support.

As part of changes implemented by the Department for Education in 2014, all local authorities must publish information about how they support SEND pupils. This is called the ‘Local Offer.’

 

Supporting our children with SEND – The Mease Approach

At The Mease Spencer Academy we believe that every child is unique and we aim to provide high quality provision that meets the needs of all our children.

We are committed to developing cultures, policies and practices that are inclusive.

Our SENDCO is Miss Amanda Iredale, who works with our staff, children with SEND and their parents to provide the very best education for our pupils, allowing them all to achieve their full potential, both academically and socially.

Our small team of experienced and capable Teaching and Learning Support Assistants work alongside our teacher to  support the needs of our children with the highest level of need. This helps to ensure that we are closing the gaps in our children’s learning more quickly.

Any children with SEND are identified and monitored in accordance with our SEND Policy (see the link below) and relevant support and interventions are then put in place to meet their needs. Wherever possible, we try to ensure that all our children with SEND are taught alongside their peers in their classroom and are receiving Quality First Teaching from their class teacher.

As all children progress at different rates, there may be times when a teacher feels a child may benefit from an intervention group that would be in addition to every day class teaching. In some cases, this may be because the class teacher feels a child is not completely reaching their potential and may need ‘a little extra push’; to help a child ‘catch up’ in a particular area; to support an individual going through a tricky time socially and emotionally or to support a child with a physical barrier.

Our Teaching and Learning Support Assistants deliver some specific intervention programmes such as Speech and Language which are reviewed on a half-termly basis. Some interventions will take place outside of the classroom, for example, when a child needs a 1:1 intervention and a quieter area is required for the task such as hearing that child read.

We measure each child’s abilities at the beginning and the end of the intervention so that we can assess the impact on the child’s learning. Should we become concerned with a specific area of a child’s development and feel our support and/or an intervention was having little or no impact, we would always endeavour to include you in conversations around their ‘next steps’.

If you would like to find out more about what we offer at The Mease, please take a look at our ‘Local offer’ which is available on the website (see the link below) or arrange a time to pop in and chat to your child’s class teacher. You can also arrange to see Miss Iredale by contacting the office to arrange a meeting or via email at amanda.iredale@themeasespencer.co.uk.