The leadership of provision for disabled pupils and those who have special educational needs Janet Thompson HMI National adviser - disability and special educational needs May 2013
The leadership and management of provision for disabled pupils and those who have special educational needs This session deals with aspects of leadership and management of provision, and evaluation of outcomes for disabled pupils and those with special education needs including how these are covered in the inspection schedule.
Local offer local authorities - required to publish a local offer of services for the wide spectrum of disabled children and young people and those with special educational needs. To give families clear, accessible information about what support is available locally from their local authority, schools and health services, and how to access more specialist support if their child’s needs are not being met.
Local offer Highly specialist Specialist Networks/sharing provision expertise ST and LT Joint Access to commissioning Specialists outreach / within schools services Universal adaptations (includes adapted curriculum AP etc) Universal provision within a school Quality and effectiveness
Local offer Ofsted looks beyond what to the quality and effectiveness of what is being offered and how this is demonstrated by the achievement of pupils
Raising standards, improving lives Inspection is primarily about evaluating how well individual pupils benefit from their school. It is important to test the school’s response to individual needs by observing how well it helps all pupils to make progress and fulfil their potential.
Task 1 Video clip of a SENCo interview with an inspector Identify the main aspects of the management of provision for disabled pupils and those who have special educational needs that are covered in this clip. Are there any key aspects missing? Discuss these in twos or threes and be prepared to feedback key points.
The Special Educational Needs and Disability Review (Ofsted, 2010) The identification of special educational needs Around half the schools and early years provision visited used low attainment and relatively slow progress as their principal indicators of a special educational need. Having identified pupils with special educational needs in this way, some providers saw this as a reason for continued low attainment or slow progress. While the providers visited generally wanted to have access to the right support to help children and young people achieve more, in too many cases there was a culture of excuses.
In just over half the providers visited, staff had good or outstanding expertise in special educational needs which meant that their assessment of needs was more secure. The best staff were also clear about their limitations and how to gain access to higher-level specialists when needed. The best practice distinguished clearly between pupils who were underachieving because of weaknesses in provision and those whose particular special educational needs were hampering their learning.
Best Practice Strong teaching and learning Accurate assessment and identification Well-designed curriculum Close tracking and rigorous monitoring of progress with intervention quickly put in place A thorough evaluation of the impact of additional provision (including staff & alternative provision) Clear routes to gain specialist support AMBITION
Does good assessment make a difference? Where assessment was good or outstanding, the achievement of just under two thirds of children and young people was good or outstanding. Where assessment was satisfactory or inadequate, achievement was good or outstanding for just over a quarter of children and young people. However, even where assessment was accurate, timely, and identified the appropriate additional support, this did not guarantee that the support would be of good quality.
Assessment and identification - common features of good practice: careful analysis of progress and development accurate evaluation of the quality of academic and pastoral provision for all pupils staff who could identify frequently found learning difficulties assessments accessible for children, young people, parents and families trust in previous assessments, built upon in a formative way.
The Evaluation schedule expects: accurate information about pupils’ attainment and progress that they make the identification of pupils who are making less than expected progress and/or are unlikely on current performance to make expected or higher attainment arrangements to be in place for these pupils to increase their progress and raise their attainment regular and accurate monitoring of the progress that these pupils are made
The Evaluation schedule expects: rigorous moderation of the assessment of pupils’ attainment levels and target setting effective support arrangements to show that the rate of progress has increased and the ‘gap’ is narrowing regular review of the quality of support arrangements with respect to pupils’ outcomes, and changes made where they are not effective.
The Evaluation schedule expects: a curriculum that is broad, balanced and meets the needs, interests of pupils, and promotes high levels of achievement, good behaviour and successful progression to the next stage of education, training or employment. (Note the prominence of reading, writing and mathematics in the schedule) successful strategies for working with parents to the benefit of pupils, including those who find working with school difficult.
Assessment & identification When a student is achieving below the level expected for their age or making slower progress than anticipated, analyse the effectiveness of generic teaching and systems for support before deciding a student has special educational needs. Look to improving general provision to meet a wider range of needs rather than always increasing additional provision.
How well does your school meet the expectations? Do you know all pupils’ attainments accurately? Is there close tracking and monitoring of attainment and progress? Do you know who are attaining below the expected levels for their age? Do you know which pupils are not making expected progress? How well do you monitor the effectiveness of the support for pupils performing below expected levels for their age and less than expected progress? Has these pupils’ progress accelerated? Do you take into account of the quality of provision when identifying pupils with special educational needs? Is information about the quality of special educational needs provision is obtained from lesson observation? How is this information used to improve provision? Is the above information provided effectively to the senior leadership team and to Governors?
Achievement
Achievement High aspirations and a focus on enabling children and young people to be as independent as possible led most reliably to the best achievement. (SEND Review, Ofsted (2010)
Best Practice
Achievement Requirements for high aspiration: know accurately pupils’ attainment levels know what is aspirational yet realistic progress use close tracking to monitor progress review provision if pupils are not on track consider rigorously the role of the quality of provision to the progress made challenge your own expectations
Evaluating achievement When judging achievement, inspectors must have regard for pupils’ starting points, age and the progress that the lowest attaining pupils are making. Inspectors must take account of the learning and progress of different groups of pupils currently on the roll of the school, including disabled pupils and those who have special educational needs. Evidence gathered by inspectors during the course of the inspection may include case studies of individual pupils, particularly the lowest attaining pupils. In primary schools and some secondary schools, inspectors will listen to pupils read in order to assess their standard and rates of progress in reading with a particular focus on weaker readers.
For those groups of pupils whose cognitive ability is such that their attainment is unlikely ever to rise above ‘low’, the judgement on achievement should be based on an evaluation of the pupils’ learning and progress relative to their starting points at particular ages, and any assessment measures held by the school. Evaluations should not take account of their attainment compared with national benchmarks.
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