The Special Educational Needs Co-ordinator's Handbook

A Guide for Implementing the Code of Practice

Garry Hornby, Gregan Davis, Geoff Taylor

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2013
• ISBN:
  9781136159626
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Education
• Subtopic: Education General

In September 1994, the Code of Practice on the Identification and Assessment of Special Educational Needs came into force, and with it a major increase in the expectations placed on teachers in mainstream schools, in particular on the SEN coordinators. This handbook discusses the implications for schools and gives practical guidance on how to implement the code effectively.

Throughout, the book provides:

• Further information, expanding upon that given in the Code
• Examples
• Ideas for dealing with SEN in schools
• Checklists
• Proformas for photocopying and direct use in schools

The book begins by explaining and expanding on the Code of Practice, setting it in the context of recent developments including the Education Reform Act and OFSTED criteria for evaluating policy and provision for children in SEN. It then goes on to provide guidelines for implementing the Code of Practice at each of the five stages which it specifies and discusses issues which are raised by this. Specific chapters cover:

• Identifying and assessing SEN within the school
• Liaison with outside specialists
• Statementing
• Annual reviews
• Knowledge needed by classroom teachers of children with SEN
• Implications and issues at different stages of the education system
• Parental involvement
• Future challenges

The book will be of particular interest to special needs coordinators, but will also be of value to anyone else working with children with SEN, including class teachers, heads, advisers, governors, educational psychologists and education welfare officers.

CHAPTER ONE

Meeting Special Educational
Needs in Mainstream Schools

INTRODUCTION

The Code of Practice on the Identification and Assessment of Special Educational Needs (DfE, 1994) provides the most far reaching guidance on this subject ever aimed at teachers in mainstream schools. The Code presents regulations and guidance for the implementation of the sections of the 1993 Education Act which pertain to special educational needs generally and therefore will affect the whole field of special education. But it is with special educational provision in mainstream primary and secondary schools where its impact will be the greatest. Therefore, this is the major focus of the handbook.

The Code uses the estimate made in the Warnock Report (DES, 1978) that approximately 20 per cent of children in the UK will have special educational needs (SEN) at some stage of their school careers. It suggests that around 2 per cent of these will have SEN of a severity or complexity that Local Education Authorities (LEAs) will be required to arrange special educational provision by means of a statement of SEN. The remaining 18 per cent are expected to have their SEN met by their schools, with the help of outside specialists when necessary, but without the need for statements of SEN.

Where the Code differs from the guidance that accompanied the 1981 Education Act is that it places much more emphasis on meeting the needs of the 18 per cent of children with SEN in mainstream schools. The requirements of the Code place substantially increased demands on teachers in mainsteam schools, particularly SEN co-ordinators whose responsibilities are extensively detailed in the Code. The purpose of this book is therefore to help SEN co-ordinators and other teachers in mainstream schools to address the demanding task of implementing the Code.

DEFINITIONS

The definitions of special educational needs, special educational provisions and learning difficulties in the Code are the same as that used in the 1981 Education Act:

• Special educational needs are deemed to exist if children have learning difficulties which require that special educational provision be made for them.

• Special educational provision is defined as educational provision which is over and above that generally made for children in mainstream schools.

• Learning difficulties are deemed to exist if children have significantly greater difficulty in learning than the majority of children of their age, or, if they have a disability that either prevents or hinders them from making use of the educational facilities generally available to their age peers.

EVOLUTION OF MAINSTREAM PROVISION FOR MEETING SEN

The Code of Practice embodies the assumption that all teachers in mainstream schools are effectively teachers of children with SEN. This was not considered to be the case until relatively recently, as a brief summary of the evolution of mainstream provisions for children with SEN will demonstrate.

The first provisions for children with SEN in Britain were special schools for the blind and deaf which were first opened in the late eighteenth century and continued to be established throughout the nineteenth century (Cole, 1989; Hurt, 1988). Some institutions for children with physical disabilities were opened towards the end of the nineteenth century but provisions for those with learning difficulties were extremely limited until this time. It was the establishment of universal education through the passing of Education Acts in the 1870s and 1880s which focused attention on children with learning difficulties. Awareness grew that a substantial minority of children in ordinary schools had difficulties in learning which hindered the education of other children and led to unacceptable levels of school failure (Hegarty, 1993). There was pressure from teachers to create separate provision for such pupils, which led to the establishment of a gradually increasing number of special schools and special classes during the first half of this century. This trend was given further impetus by the publication of the 1944 Education Act.

The 1944 Education Act obliged LEAs to make provision for various categories of children with disabilities: blind; partially sighted; deaf; partially deaf; delicate; educationally subnormal; epileptic; physically handicapped; and those with speech defects. The Act required LEAs to ascertain the needs of children for special educational treatment and recommended that they should be educated in ordinary schools wherever possible. However, in the years following the 1944 Act, a substantial proportion of children in the above categories were placed in special schools or special classes.

In the 1950s and 1960s numerous studies were conducted in the USA to evaluate the effectiveness of special classes. Despite the fact that the overall result of this research was equivocal, increasingly negative views about special classes and special schools developed amongst professionals in the field of education (Hornby, 1992). Legislation which emerged in the USA in 1974 and in the UK in 1976 encouraged the integration of children with SEN into mainstream schools but did not mandate it. The Warnock Report (DES, 1978) simply re-affirmed the intentions of the 1976 Education Act. Therefore, the 1981 Education Act, which was based on the Warnock Report, stated that children with SEN should be educated in mainstream schools as long as:

• this was in accordance with their parents’ wishes;

• the child’s SEN could be met in the mainstream school;

• the education of other children in the school would not suffer; and

• the placement was compatible with the efficient use of resources.

The 1988 Education Act affirmed this aspect of the 1981 Act and stipulated that all pupils with SEN should follow the National Curriculum to the maximum extent possible. The 1993 Education Act with its emphasis on the 18 per cent of pupils with SEN in mainstream schools has again affirmed the notion that the majority of children with SEN are to be educated in mainstream schools.

CURRENT PROVISIONS FOR MEETING
SEN

The Code of Practice states that a continuum of special educational provision is needed in order to cater for the continuum of special educational needs which exist in schools (DfE, 1994, p. 2). Actual SEN provision in the UK currently ranges from placement in a mainstream classroom with no additional help through to placement in a residential special school (Leadbetter and Leadbetter, 1993). A typical continuum of SEN provision available in most LEAs is illustrated below.

1 Mainstream classroom with differentiated work. Children with SEN are catered for by classroom teachers providing differentiated curriculum material. That is, activities are planned in such a way that they can be completed at different levels or in different ways depending on children’s abilities. For example, when teaching mathematics, a number of easier items can be provided for pupils with mild learning difficulties and several more difficult items can be included in order to challenge pupils who may be gifted in this subject.

2 Mainstream classroom with small group teaching. Children with SEN are taught by their teacher in the mainstream classroom but for part or possibly all of the time receive their tuition in a small group of pupils or on a one-to-one basis. For example, the class teacher provides additional tuition to a group of three or four children with reading difficulties while the rest of the class get on with their work.

3 Mainstream classroom with support teaching. Children with SEN receive all their tuition in mainstream classes but are supported in some subject areas by an additional teacher who comes into the class. Support teaching may be carried out by the SEN co-ordinator or other staff with a major responsibility for SEN. However, in some schools support teaching in each subject area is conducted by other teachers from the same department or faculty. Some pupils, such as those with moderate learning difficulties, may be supported across the curriculum whereas others, such as those with specific learning difficulties, may only be supported in their weak subject(s).

4 Mainstream classroom with withdrawal. Children with SEN receive most of their tuition in mainstream classrooms but are withdrawn to a resource room for some subjects in order to receive tuition, typically in basic literacy or numeracy skills, from the SEN co-ordinator or other school staff with major responsibility for SEN. For example, pupils with difficulties in reading and writing may be withdrawn to the SEN department, or a resource room, for individual or small group tuition during their English lessons.

5 Mainstream classroom with assistance from outside specialist. Children with SEN are taught in mainstream classes with the assistance of an outside specialist such as a peripatetic learning support teacher, member of the hearing impaired service, or speech therapist. The specialist may work directly with a child in the classroom, in another room in the school, or have the child attend their clinic outside the school. Alternatively, or in addition, the specialist may provide guidance to the class teacher regarding the child’s SEN. For example, a pupil with specific learning difficulties may have tuition from a peripatetic teacher for one lesson per week and for the remainder of the week work on a programme designed by the peripatetic teacher which is supervised by the class teacher.

6 Unit in a mainstream school with time in mainstream classroom. Children with SEN receive most of their tuition in a unit or resource room within the mainstream school but attend mainstream classes in some subjects and are integrated socially for such things as school assemblies and playtimes. Pupils are typically integrated into mainstream classes for the subjects which are their particular strengths. For example, one pupil may be integrated for physical education, another for geography.

7 Unit in mainstream school. Children with SEN receive all their tuition in a classroom or separate unit within the mainstream school but are integrated socially for such things as school assemblies and playtimes.

8 Special school with mainstream links. Children with SEN receive most of their tuition in a special school but attend a mainstream school for possibly half a day or a whole day per week. Such links provide special school pupils with opportunities for social integration with children in mainstream schools.

9 Special school full-time. Children with SEN receive all their tuition at a special school. Currently, in the UK, most non-residential special schools cater for children with either moderate learning difficulties, severe learning difficulties or physical disabilities.

10 Residential special school with day attendance. Children with SEN attend the residential special school during the day but return home each night and for weekends.

11 Residential special school full-time. Children with SEN receive all their tuition and live during term time at a residential special school. Currently in the UK most residential special schools cater for children with emotional and behavioural problems or severe sensory impairments such as those who are blind, deaf or deaf-blind.

TYPES OF SEN

The Code of Practice refers to eight different types of special educational need: learning difficulties; specific learning difficulties; emotional and behavioural difficulties; physical disabilities; hearing difficulties; visual difficulties; speech and language difficulties; and medical conditions. These are described briefly below. Further details can be found in books which provide an overview of the various types of special educational needs (e.g. Gulliford and Upton,1992; Hallahan and Kauffman, 1991). Also described below is a ninth type of special need, termed ‘gifted underachievement’, which is not specifically included in the Code but which is implicit in the Code’s principles and procedures and is likely to become of increasing interest to schools as the Code is implemented.

Learning difficulties

Children with learning difficulties make up the largest group of children with SEN. Learning difficulties range from mild, through moderate and severe, to profound and multiple learning difficulties. Children with severe, profound and multiple learning difficulties are small in number compared with ...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Half Title page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Contents
• Figures
• Acknowledgments
• 1 Meeting Special Educational Needs in Mainstream Schools
• 2 Overview of the Code of Practice
• 3 Using the School's Resources to Meet SEN at Stages 1 and 2
• 4 Involving Outside Specialists to Help Meet SEN at Stage 3
• 5 Assessment and Statementing Procedures at Stages 4 and 5
• 6 Effective Strategies for Involving Parents
• 7 Skills Needed for Working with Parents and Specialists
• 8 OFSTED Inspection and SEN
• 9 Future Challenges for Meeting SEN in Mainstream Schools
• Reference
• Useful Resources for SEN Co-ordinators
• Appendices
• Index