Special Educational Needs & Disability Information

We believe it is every child’s right to achieve their full potential - to be able to aspire, grow and flourish and are proudly a school which has signed up to the Telford and Wrekin SEND Working Together Charter.

What is SEND?

SEND stands for 'Special Educational Needs and Disability'.

A child or young person may have SEND if they have challenges in learning or have a disability that means they need extra help in their education.

The intent, implementation and impact of SEND at Meadows

intent implementation and impact for send.pdf

What is a learning difficulty or disability?

A child of school age or a young person has a learning difficulty or disability if:

Learning is much harder for them than for most others their age.
They can’t use the same school resources as other pupils their age because of a disability that gets in the way.

Is Meadows a Special Educational Provision?

At Meadows, we are committed to ensuring the inclusion of all of our children, however we are a mainstream Primary school, not a Special Educational Provision. A special educational provision is a provision that is different from or additional to that normally available to children of the same age, which is designed to help children and young people with SEN or disabilities to access the National Curriculum appropriately.

SEN Support for All

Each child is unique, and on their own educational journey. Sometimes your child may need extra help in class, but this does not necessarily mean they have special educational needs, we call this 'SEND Support'. Teachers in class will regularly check how well children are doing and look for anything that might be making it harder for them to learn. Teachers change how they teach to help each child individually.

Adjustments may include:

Guide/prompt sheets for reading and writing.
Working with a partner.
Small group work with adult led instruction.
Information presented in different formats.
Pen grips/writing slopes, wobble cushion.
Task planners.
Teaching that focuses on next steps.
Social stories.
Explicit instruction from an adult. Steps can be presented in varied formats.
Visual supports.
Concrete resources in maths.
Tactile objects/real references.
Memory games.
Breaking learning down into small manageable chunks.
Environment adaptions.
Emotional Literacy support.
Coloured overlays.
Different options for how to do work.
Use of ICT.

If the strategies, with time, don't seem to be working, the graduated response is a way of making sure that the help and support given to your child are checked regularly to make sure it matches their need.

What the graduated response looks like:

The school assesses your child and works out what they need.
Then, we make a plan to help with their need.
The school puts the plan into action. We do it!
After a while, we review how well your child is doing and decides if they need more or different help.

Click here to view our Whole School Provision Map for SEND

My child has SEND - so should they have an EHCP?

An Education Health and Care Plan (EHCP) is an official document that talks about a child or young person’s special educational needs, the help they require and all the goals they want to reach.

Most children who are found to have SEND can get the help they need in school, without having to create an Education Health and Care Plan (EHCP). If extra resources/reasonable adjustments aren’t needed, then an EHC Plan might not be necessary, and the needs can be met with the regular funding that is assigned to a school (notional budget).

An EHCP doesn’t mean your child gets an adult with them all the time. Instead, it’s made to help your child become more independent and make progress on their own.

If you would like to discuss whether your child would benefit from, or could be applicable for an EHCP, please do get in touch with our SENDCo.

Following the submission of an EHCP, the timeline is as follows:

Click here to view Telford and Wrekin's EHCP Assessment Timeline

The Special Educational Needs and Disability Code of Practice (Chapter 9.16) allows Local Authorities to develop criteria for deciding whether to undertake a statutory assessment for an EHC plan. The criteria are flexible, adaptable and not applied as a blanket policy. Whilst the criteria are used to support decision making, each case is considered individually. At all times the local authority applies the statutory tests as described in section 36(8) of the Children and Families Act 2014 to determine the appropriateness of a request for an EHC assessment of need.

To view the EHCP Criteria for Telford and Wrekin, please explore the below four documents:

Sensory and Physical Early Health Care Needs Assessment Guidance

Social, Emotional and Mental Health Early Health Care Needs Assessment Guidance

Communication and Interaction Early Health Care Needs Assessment Guidance

Cognition and Learning Early Health Care Needs Assessment Guidance