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Which pupils attend Springwater School?
What kinds of Special Educational Need are provided for at Springwater School?
Where are the particular special educational needs of a child or young person identified?
How do we work with parents and carers?
Which agencies do we work with?
What specialist provision and equipment is available?
What transition arrangements are made? |
Pupils who attend Springwater School usually have an Education Health and Care Plan - identifying the need for a specialist setting such as ours.
There are some pupils who attend on an assessment basis, usually a time limited period of several weeks. This may be the case where the nature of their needs are not yet clear, they do not yet have an Education Health and Care Plan or where they are moving into the area from a different country. The assessment placement is reviewed following the agreed period of weeks. This review will usually involve an Assessment and Reviewing Officer, school staff, the parents or carer and any other member of the multi-disciplinary team who have been involved in the assessment period.
Springwater School is a Special School which caters for pupils aged 2 - 19 years. Pupils have severe, complex and multiple learning difficulties. We are always open to discussion about how we can meet the needs of a very wide range of learners including those with medical, physical and behavioural challenges associated with Autism. Most of the pupils have several over-lapping needs and the expert staff team and trained and supported to meet these needs on a daily basis.
The Education Health and Care Plan identifies the needs of a pupil in each of these areas:
- Learning and Development
- Communication and Interaction
- Social, Emotional and Mental Health
- Medical, Therapy and Physical Needs
- Preparing for Adulthood
- An annual review takes place every year to which parents and all agencies involved with the child are invited to attend. We record the meeting on Annual Review paperwork and review the Education Health and Care Plan to see what changes might be required. We are careful to identify 'What is going well?' and 'What is not going well?'. The things that everyone identifies are not going well usually go into the Education Health and Care Plan for the next set of Outcomes. We set specific, measurable and time limited targets as part of this process. These reviews are person centred and include the views of the young person.
- We communicate regularly through Home School diaries
- We participate in and contribute to Multi-agency meetings, Looked After Children's Reviews and Child in Need Meetings.
- There are two Parents Evenings each academic year.
- Each department holds regular departmental coffee mornings
- Planning and Progress meetings take place for some pupils where there is a high level of multi disciplinary working. These meetings take place about a week before the Education Health and Care Plan Review. The purpose of this meeting is to allow more time for discussion with parents and carers.
Pupils may attend full time or as a dual placement with their local mainstream school.
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What is our approach to teaching/ learning and development of children and young people with special educational needs?
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The pupils at Springwater are all provided with personalised opportunities such as:
- Enrichment
- Horse riding and curriculum work at EST Donkey Sanctuary
- Lunch time interest clubs
- Visits out of school
- Physical Education
- Rebound Therapy
- Boccia
- Swimming
- Yoga
- Sports competitions with other specialist settings
- Membership of Special Schools Sports Partnership and attendance at regular multi-school events.
- Accommodation
- Interaction Zone - housing a range of sensory and interactive hi-tech equipment
- Multi-functional rooms e.g. therapy and medical room
- Meeting room
- Library containing books, story sacks, CD’s and DVD’s
- Early years provision with outdoor learning area
- Play equipment which is accessible
- Woodland Walk
- Trampoline
- Swimming Pool
- We use ICT Technology such as iPads and touch screens with specialist programmes such as:
- Cause and effect programmes
- Communication apps for pupils with specific speech and language needs
- Specialist designed programmes e.g. Communicate in Print which creates and adapts text for pupils who need symbols
- Laptops and iPads for pupils’ curriculum use
- Plasma Screen which is fully accessible to pupils who need it to be positioned very close, or at a different angle or level.
- Eye Gaze equipment (on loan from Speech and Language Services)
- There are MOVE trainers in school who develop programmes for improving movement for pupils with physical impairment. We are a MOVE accredited centre.
- We have a specialised sensory curriculum for PMLD students
- We have National Autistic Society Accredited status, which has been recently reviewed and re-accredited in 2016.
A large number of sports are offered which engage and include pupils with a variety of special needs.
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How is additional learning support available to pupils?
How do teachers know how well pupils are doing?
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An appropriate staffing to pupil ratio enables engagement and access for all pupils. Other professionals also provide advice and guidance to support this personalised learning including:
- The specialist advisory teachers for Visual and Hearing Impaired
- Music specialists
- Art specialists
- Sports partnership specialist coaches.
- Regular assessment takes place against curriculum and individual targets (individual expected outcomes).
- Teachers set and review Index targets in 4 areas; literacy, numeracy, physical, PHSE termly. Index targets are made available to parents and are placed in classroom so that all staff are aware. Where appropriate pupils are made aware of their targets.
- Tracking and monitoring is done bi-annually with PIVATS (Performance Indicators for Value Added Target Setting) and monitored termly.
- Pupils are assessed in all subjects using P Levels and National Curriculum Levels and these are analysed with the CASPA (Comparison and Analysis of Special Pupil Attainment) programme at the end of the year and Key Stage. It allows for a comparison with national equivalents to allows teachers, senior leaders and Governors to understand what levels of progress children and cohorts are making.
- Analysis is also done against the Government’s Progression Guidance.
- CASPA sets yearly targets for the pupils and progress is measured against these at the end of each year.
- Parents and pupils are fully involved in the annual statutory review of EHCP, recording and sharing their views within the meeting. These are called Person Centred Reviews
- As indicated above, enrichment activities are wide and varied
- The community is used as an environment to learn in.
- All classes are represented on the School Council
- Springwater has a staff team of highly experienced and skilled people
- Staff have opportunities to develop professionally, through a programme at school, including induction. Staff also access relevant training through the nursing team and other professionals. Staff identify their training and development needs through the appraisal process and are able to access relevant training opportunities provided by other experts.
- Staff are trained in specialised areas such as rebound therapy and autism.
- Some staff are trainers of specialised programmes such as MOVE, Communication Aids and Team Teach (a preventative and physical intervention programme).
- The specialist outreach service for pupils with severe learning difficulties is staffed by a lead teachers employed by Springwater. They provide services for pupils with severe learning difficulties educated in mainstream schools. They provide support, advice and review for a wide range of schools. Their expertise is valued by the schools who use this service.
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How do we evaluate the effectiveness of special educational provision?
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Parents are involved through the Education, Health and Care Plan review meetings and this provides the forum for discussion about provision. This is reviewed in terms of what the school (and others) has provided for the needs of the pupil and how effective this is. The focus of these meeting is 'What is going well?', 'What is not going well?'. Adjustments to provision can be prompted through this process.
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How do we provide accessible facilities?
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Springwater School endeavours to pursue the principles of inclusion at all times by providing all pupils with an education that allows for them to achieve, progress and be happy. Equality of Opportunity means that physical barriers are removed and adjustments made so that all pupils with a disability, (such as being a wheelchair user, experiencing sight or hearing impairment, or with sensory needs associated with Autism), can be supported to be in the school building accessing as wide a range of opportunities possible.
Good staffing ratios enable access to a wide range of activities and facilities.
School has use of a minibus which allows wheelchair access. Some staff are MIDAS trained so they can drive the minibuses to enable community experiences to be accessed easily.
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How are the staff at Springwater trained to support pupils with Special Educational Needs?
How are the social and emotional needs of each pupil met?
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- Each week staff development evenings are used for training purposes
- All staff attend the weekly staff development meetings
- Departmental meetings are held once a week for all staff.
- CPD (Continuing Professional Development) is monitored by the SLT and is targeted at identified areas of skill needs and also relates to teachers’ appraisal needs.
- All staff undergo yearly appraisal procedures which identify training needs
- Regular training is given by the medical team for medication and feeding needs for both teachers and support staff.
There is a regular induction programme which is offered at the point staff start at shcool. This is regardless of job role.
- Appropriate curriculum and provision underpins the social and emotional wellbeing of the students
- Pastoral support is given to pupils who lack confidence or have emotional and social difficulties
- Social, Moral, Cultural, Spiritual activities are dentified on Medium Term Planning for each subject
- PHSE is a core subject within the curriculm and the woder life of school, such as assembly time
- Termly Index targets are set and reviewed for every pupil. All staff know the priorities for each pupil in their class.
- Where there are concerns about the social and emotional needs of a pupil, these will be discussed with the parent or carer. There may be a need to request wider agency involvement to support the pupil.
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