Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND)

How we support children

Supporting children with SEND.

SEND is an acronym for Special Educational Needs and Disabilities. 

Within the nursery there is a lead professional for SEND (Our Assistant Setting Manager), a second support professional (Our Room Manager in Panthers and Out of School Club) and several other members of the team who are also SEND qualified.  When a child is registered at nursery with SEND or when needs emerge during their time here we work with the family to draw up a plan of support for both the child and family.  Our team supports the child and family through their individual journey and are able to offer expert advice and guidance through all the stages from signposting to outside agencies to the child’s transition to school.

Observation, evidence and review

We start with gaining evidence - so lots of observation both at nursery and at home working with practitioners and parents. This evidence helps to form a picture of where the child requires support.

The evidence helps to highlight what the child enjoys as well as the things they may struggle with or dislike. This helps to form a pattern or picture about the child. If we feel that a child is struggling in a particular area such as speech then it may be that we suggest to the parent to access an external agency - through the Rainbow clinic for an assessment on their speech.


2 year oldprogress reviews

When a child starts with us before their 3rd birthday we will complete a written 2 year progress review

All 2 year reviews will be shared with the local health visiting team.

At the point of completing the review if we feel a child is not meeting certain milestones then we will arrange an integrated review where the review is completed with the parent and the health visitor along with the nursery and together strategies will be put in place and decided together. We may find that further support from external professionals is required and we will support the family in accessing these (SALT, sleep right, dietician, portage, occupational therapy are just a few of the services available to us and the family).

Supportand Early help

The support or intervention we decide is needed is always talked through thoroughly with the parent and consent accessed before we can go any further. We may need to ask for early intervention from the area SENDCO (Special educational needs and disability co ordinator) which again parent consent is needed. Any form that is completed by the nursery is always shared with the parent/s so they can approve the content. The Area SENDCO will attend the nursery to give a fresh pair of eyes to assess the child's needs and they will work with the key worker to set some targets to support the child and the parent. These targets are assessed every 8 weeks depending on the child's attendance at the nursery.

It may come to a joint decision that support is required through Early help. Early help is about ensuring that children and families receive the support they need at the right time, by bringing together professionals who listen and work with the whole family to make things better for everyone. Early help is available for everybody in the family and its parents choice whether to have it or not.

If you would like further information about this please use this link https://fis.peterborough.gov.uk/kb5/peterborough/directory/localoffer.page?familychannel=8

EHA - As a parent you may have worries about your child or you might start experiencing changes or difficulties that you just cant manage yourself. Whatever it is there are a number of ways Early support can help you and your family so that small concerns don’t become big concerns


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