SEND

Children with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND)

SEND stands for special educational needs and disabilities.

A child or young person aged from 0 to 25 years has special educational needs or disability (SEND) if they: 

• have a learning difficulty or disability which makes it much harder for them to learn than other pupils of the same age
• they require special educational provision to be made for them

Mendip Green is an inclusive school. It is a single storey building which is accessible on a large, flat site. The building is accessible by the main entrance or through the individual classrooms. There is a disabled toilet and shower. Mendip Green has a Hearing and Language Resource Base (HLRB) run by a qualified Teacher of the Deaf (Mrs Sarah Barton), an ASD Hub (The Cove) run by a SENDCo (Mrs Lisa House), as well as bespoke cognition and learning hubs, nurture groups, gross motor skill groups and speech and language groups provided by specialist learning support assistants.

Mendip Green Primary School is a certified member of the Makaton Friendly Scheme.

Further details of our mainstream and specialist provision for children with SEND can be found in the sections below. 

Mendip Green SEND Information Report

The purpose of the information report is to inform parents and carers about how we welcome, support and make effective provision for children with special educational needs and/or disabilities (SEND). We are committed to providing equal learning opportunities for all our children regardless of race, gender, special educational needs and / or disabilities (SEND). We are part of the Extend Learning Academies Network (ELAN) and some of our policies that support this document are adopted from ELAN and some are school specific. View document

Our Special Needs and Disabilities Coordinators are Mrs Ashleigh Melhuish, Mrs Lisa House, Mrs Amy Jones and Mrs Kerry Neate.  The SEND team are contactable via the school office.

We plan SEND support for our children using the ‘Assess, Plan, Do, Review’ cycle. This is also known as the graduated approach. The views of the child and their family are prioritised and given careful consideration throughout the cycle. The ‘assess, plan, do, review’ cycle can be repeated as many times as needed to help the child progress. Some children will show good progress after the first round of support is put in place, but those with more complex needs might benefit from the cycle being repeated several times.

If you have concerns about your child's progress at school around any of the following areas the first person to speak to about your concerns is your child’s class teacher: reading, writing, number, social and emotional development, behaviour, communication, physical or sensory.  However, if you still have on-going concerns, you may wish to speak with our SENDCos - Ashleigh Melhuish, Lisa House, Amy Jones and Kerry Neate - who are contactable via the school office. 

If any special educational needs are identified, the SENDCo will work with you and your child's class teacher to plan how to best help your child. The support your child receives and the progress they make may be recorded through an Individual Support Plan (ISP). Parents are offered the opportunity to meet with their child’s class teacher, support staff and an identified SENDCo to review their child’s Individual Support Plan and write the new one at the ISP Clinics. These are a twenty minute consultation held three times a year. 

Our Pastoral Team, Lorraine Young (Pastoral Lead), Sarah Handcock (Pupil and Family Support Worker) and Angie Griggs (Pupil and Family Support Worker) are also available to meet with parents to discuss any social and emotional issues which they feel may be affecting their child’s ability to learn. They can work with small groups and/or with individual children depending on the child’s specific needs. Appointments can be arranged via the school office. 

If you still have concerns that your child's needs are not being met, please contact the headteacher, Mr James Oakley. 

Our ELAN Accessibility Plan and ELAN SEND and Inclusion Policy are available in the Policies section of our website.

In-house SEND Provision

Blossom and Acorn Rooms

Children within these hubs receive a bespoke curriculum to support early reading, early writing and maths at their developmental stage along with nurture. Our Blossom room currently supports children in Year 2 and Acorn supports children in Years 2 and 3.

Children within these groups have an EHCP and are supported through Top Up Funding. Their steps in learning and development are at their own level. Activities are planned that meet each individual's need and stage of development. Communication development is at the heart of all planned activities to support the children in being as independent as they can be. 

Chestnut Room

Our cognition and learning groups for children in Key Stage 2 are for children working at a key stage lower than their chronological peers.

These groups run each morning for English (including phonics/spelling, reading and writing) and maths. Children will attend the group as appropriate. This may be for English, maths or for both. The curriculum for these groups is pitched at an appropriate level to challenge and address any gaps in learning so that children are given the best opportunity to make rapid progress.

Our cognition and learning groups also allow identified children to work alongside peers that are working at the same level as them. 

Speech and Language 

A child naturally acquires language from a very early age and goes through a recognised pattern of learning vocabulary, sentences and concepts to be able to communicate verbally. Add to this speech sound processes, attention and social development and you realise how complex communication is.

When this natural process diverges from the normal pattern, e.g. when a child has difficulty with grammar or speech sounds, poor listening or stammering, it is called a speech, language and communication difficulty. 

We are in the fortunate position to be able to offer targeted speech and language provision on site from specially trained support staff. We work with outside agencies to deliver 1:1 speech and language programmes as well as designing group activities that will cater to children's specific needs.

Our Speech and Language provision also includes delivery of intervention programmes. This includes Talk Boost which is a target intervention for children in Year 1 and 2 focused on narrowing the language the gap between them and their peers.

Nurture

Our Nurture groups provide a focused intervention for children with particular SEND needs that are creating a barrier to learning within a mainstream class. Children attending the nurture group remain an active part of their main class, spending appropriate times within the nurture group according to their need.

Nurture groups assess learning and social and emotional needs and give help that is needed to remove the barriers to learning. Activities provide much opportunity for social learning, helping children to attend to the needs of others, with time to listen and be listened to.  As the children learn academically and socially they develop confidence, become responsive to others, learn self-respect and take pride in behaving well and in achieving.

Nurture support is not limited to the nurture groups - nurturing principles and practice are embedded at a whole school level, providing appropriate support for all children.

Blossom and Acorn Nurture

Our Blossom and Acorn Nurture provision runs each morning and provides children with the nurture provision that is typically given in the early years. 

This intervention is focused on developing social, emotional and independence skills that can be transferred back to the classroom.

These sessions are currently accessed by children from Year 2 (Blossom) and Year 2 - Year 3 (Acorn). 

Our Blossom and Acorn groups also provide bespoke cognition and learning provision for the children each morning.

Afternoon Nurture Groups

These nurture groups run for two afternoons per week and are designed to be a focused, short-term intervention. 

This intervention supports children to regulate both in the classroom and during recreational times. Carefully planned activities afford children with the opportunity to explore social and emotional skills which can be transferred back to the classroom, playground and wider world.

Motor Skills

To support children with a physical needs, we use Smart Moves. This is a programme full of fun activities and games to encourage children with motor coordination difficulties to succeed. Through this programme, we create a simple, effective tailored programme for each child, with more than 100 fun PE activities and games.

Our specially trained staff also work closely with outside agencies to deliver specific 1:1 programmes and exercises from physiotherapists.