At Guildford Grove, we believe that our teachers are teachers of children with special educational needs. It is not unusual for a child to receive additional support in their learning and the support we offer is carried out in a caring and supportive way. High-quality teaching is our first step in responding to pupils who have SEND, which will be differentiated for the individual needs of the child.
We work within the SEND Code of Practice: 0-25 years SEND Code of Practice to ensure a clear process for identifying, assessing, planning, providing and reviewing for children who have SEND, alongside both the children and their parents/carers.
Once a child has been identified as having a special educational need, we develop a more personalised programme to support the child’s learning, and this will be recorded on their Individual Provision Map which is updated and reviewed regularly throughout the year.
Our school promotes the involvement of all our children in all aspects of the curriculum including activities outside the classroom. We have an Accessibility Plan in place and as such we consider our environment to be fully accessible. The school is well equipped with a disabled toilet, hoists, ramps, and other specialist equipment. We are vigilant about making reasonable adjustments. Our policy and practice adhere to the Equality Act 2010.
All of our extra-curricular activities and school visits are available to all our children, including our before-and after-school clubs (numbers permitting). We ensure that all children are able to go on our residential trip(s) and that they are able to take part in other activities such as sports day and school productions. Where children with a disability cannot fully access an activity, we ensure that we provide an experience that is as similar as it can be to the rest of the class, ensuring equality of opportunity.
We take on board advice given by other professionals e.g. speech and language therapists and we build this into a child’s regular day. On occasion we provide an individual curriculum to meet a child’s specific needs. When a child needs additional resources e.g. a writing wedge or adapted scissors, we use our SEND budget to buy the right equipment.
We have many areas of expertise amongst our staff, and we are able to draw on this in order to get the right provision for each child. When we notice particular needs arising, we endeavour to train key staff accordingly e.g. ELKLAN (language provision) and ELSA (Emotional Literacy Support Assistant).
All staff have a good knowledge of deaf awareness. More information about The Lighthouse specialist centre for deaf pupils can be found under the Information tab on our website.
We monitor the languages spoken by families in our school and, where possible, we try to ensure that non-English speakers or those who struggle with written English understand the content of letters that go home. When required, translators are asked to attend meetings and school productions, particularly for our deaf families.
For any SEND queries, please click here for Surrey’s parent/carers guide for pupils with additional needs and/or disabilities or contact our SENDCo Mrs Z Jones via info@guildfordgrove.surrey.sch.uk