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If you have a child with speech, language and communication needs, you will want to ensure your child is receiving the best support at school to ensure they can take part, learn and make friends.
We have put together a series of questions below for parents to consider discussing with their child’s class teacher to ensure that there is plenty of support on a daily basis in the classroom for all children with SLCN, in both primary and secondary provisions.
It will be helpful to know about training that they have received as part of an inset day or during staff meetings and it’s important to check that your child’s teacher was there. If the training was some time ago, for example, over two years, ask what training they have planned for the future.
Have a look at the features in the section describing what a classroom should look like to support a child with SLCN. These will help your school provide a communication supportive environment for your child.
There should be changes to the physical environment, including visual clues, extra resources and careful planning of the layout of the classroom. Ideas for supporting children with SLCN should be known by all staff, including those who supervise at lunch-times, those who work in the office and all classroom staff. It is helpful for the same approaches (for example symbols/pictures) and strategies to be used throughout the school as this is less confusing for children with SLCN.
Look out for the features described in the checklist in the answer that you are given. The school should be able to tell you about strategies they’ve used that have worked, the ways they liaise with speech and language therapists and other professionals like educational psychologists.
They should tell you about the support they give during unstructured times such as playtime as well as in the classroom. They should be able to tell you about the ways that they shared information across the school, with all staff and the training that they put in to make sure that everybody understood how to support the child.
The school might say that when the SLT/EP visits the school some of the time is spent working with your child. They should also say that some time is spent meeting with key people such as the class teacher and teaching assistant, sharing information and supporting the way your child is included in the classroom.
An SLT should contribute to an Individual Education Plan that may be written to support your child and there should be opportunity for school staff to contact the professionals for support if needed. It might be that the SLT goes into school to offer training to the staff.
It might be important that your child has individual time to work on their SLCN targets. If this is the case there should be flexibility so that there is some time for your child individually if they need it but also so they have plenty of time with their friends doing group activities or enjoying being in the class.
SLCN targets can also sometimes be supported in the classroom and it may be that individual time is not needed. This should be agreed by the adults supporting your child and shared with you.
The school should be able to tell you how information about your child’s SLCN will be shared with all staff. They should be able to describe how staff pass on information when your child changes to a new teacher, for example, by writing a report or having a face to face meeting to discuss ways to support your child.
Reports and information from SLT and other professionals should be shared and discussed, including information on ideas for support and changes to classroom work. There should be opportunity for you to meet with the school regularly to share information and communication between you and the school should be supported through the use of a home/school diary.
The school should make sure that your child is supported at all times in the day, including break-times. They should be able to tell you about how they make sure the lunchtime supervisors and staff know about any difficulties that your child might have. They should use ideas to help children with the social aspect of playtimes, for example buddy stops (where your child can go if they are alone at playtime and would like a friend) and make sure that staff know how to encourage successful involvement in games for all children. All children should understand about how to have successful playtimes and help others who are finding playtime difficult.
This can be done through circle time activities and discussions about friendships and playing. The school should know how to help your child with their anxiety and make sure your child has the opportunity to talk about this if they need to.
If you have a child with speech, language and communication needs, you will want to ensure your child is receiving the best support at school to ensure they can take part, learn and make friends. We have put together a series of questions below for parents to consider discussing with their child’s class teacher to ensure that there is plenty of support on a daily basis in the classroom for all children with SLCN, in both primary and secondary provisions.
It will be helpful to know about training that they have received as part of an inset day or during staff meetings and it’s important to check that your child’s teachers as well as their form tutor were there. If the training was some time ago, for example, over two years ago, ask what training they have planned for the future.
Have a look at the features in the section describing what a classroom should look like to support a pupil with SLCN as these will help a school to provide a communication supportive environment for your child. There should be changes to the physical environment, including visual clues, extra resources, and careful planning of the layout of the classroom.
Ideas for supporting children with SLCN should be known by all staff, including those who supervise at lunch-times, those who work in the office and all classroom staff. It is helpful for the same approaches (for example symbols/pictures) and strategies to be used throughout the school as this is less confusing for children with SLCN.
The school might say that when the SLT/EP visits the school some of the time is working with your child. They should also say that some time is spent meeting with key people such as the SENCO and teaching assistant, sharing information and supporting the way your child is included in the classroom.
An SLT should contribute to an Individual Education Plan that may be written to support your child and there should be opportunity for school staff to contact the professionals for support if needed. It might be that the SLT goes into school to offer training to the staff.
The school should be able to tell you about the ways staff share information and knowledge about SLCN. They should tell you about training opportunities they have shared and that there are regular opportunities to learn more about speech, language and communication built into INSET programmes.
There should be consistent use of language by all staff, including shared use of positive language. The headteacher and senior leadership team should encourage new developments about language and communication and take on board recommendations and advice from external professionals, for example speech and language therapist.
Assemblies and whole-school events should use the same strategies as are used in classrooms, for example visual supports, signing, etc. The school should be able to describe how the behaviour management system takes a pupil’s SLCN into account.
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