FEATURE FOCUS: SEND
How has your CPD changed since the pandemic?
Jo Hill - North Star: There is certainly an increase in the numbers of children suffering with SEMH and Speech and language problems post pandemic. We are currently seeing a vast difference between pupils who were in education pre-pandemic and those who missed out on being in a school environment. For example, current year 3 pupils have lacked the social interaction with other children of their age or being in language rich environments such as nursery. We consider the pandemic as an ACE, which has caused trauma to some pupils which has significantly hampered their learning and development.
Therefore, our CPD has a sharper focus on speech and language therapy post-pandemic due to the surge of pupils needing this support. All our staff have training in working with speech and language therapy needs. We also now have increased staffing for speech therapy assistants as the level of need is so impactful.
Emma Hampton -Transform Trust: The pandemic had a massive effect on children. For younger children, it is about getting them ready to be in a school environment. There is a nationwide issue regarding the impact on children’s speech and language development. Many children missed out on the basic level of social interaction and communication and without being in a school setting, their needs were not met, nor were they tested. So now there is a considerable backlog of children still waiting to get the skilled support they need. As a Trust within mainstream education, we acknowledge the big strain on the external agencies to provide the specialist support our children need. We are meeting the needs of our
children through additional CPD to upskill our staff where necessary.
We have worked hard on our personalised curriculum CPD as we needed to provide our schools with a different lens to look through to support our complex children. More children are coming in with complex needs, so it is vital we give our staff the toolkit to help these children to thrive and achieve.
What does success look like?
Jo Hill - North Star: I still find it hard to believe that with the number of children in education today with complex needs that there is very little in the way of SEND training for teachers right from entrance into the profession. For us, we would like to see this change in the very near future and are doing our best to raise the importance of this. We want to be part of the solution.
We will continue to share our expertise in order to help and support the greatest number of young people we can, being specialists in this area, means we have a moral duty to share and support others and that is a core belief of North Star Trust.
Young people often come to North Star with a very negative view about education, they feel they have been left behind, disregarded even. We want to make sure every pupil within our schools know they can achieve as much as their mainstream peers. We encourage them to have high expectations of themselves and of the impact they can make positively on their community. We want them to have amazing morals, values and determination to be best they can.
Emma Hampton – Transform Trust: Success for Transform is when a CPD session has
occurred, and you can see the change happening within the schools. For example, seeing a staff member who has attended a session on personalised curriculum being able to explain it fully when we visit them in their school – and they are able to evaluate the effects it has had on a particular child’s development is wonderful to see. It is also about setting out the expectations of our Trust. By having a successful CPD provision, that will empower our staff to improve their practice and support our children more effectively.
I would say they have gone from a place of just attending CPD to viewing CPD as integral. Staff now ask for specific topics to go over and have a more becoming even more proactive. They are able to adapt and change to the needs of their children. Last year we saw an increase in mobility, and we received a high number of children with complex needs. This did not deter our staff from providing the support these children needed both holistically and educationally.
Our CPD focus for the upcoming year is how to provide additional provision in classrooms and what that looks like, to enable all our children with complex needs can learn life-skills and self- regulation amongst their peers.
As Jo explained, every child is unique. Even those with similar challenges around SEMH will vary in their needs – and those needs are everchanging. I also concur with Jo that new teachers coming into the sector should have a real base level understanding of these complex needs. This will mean that the CPD we offer will be able to build upon that knowledge which will take some of the strain away from the school. This will also ensure our new teachers are better prepared and know what to expect when they start their careers in school.
32
www.education-today.co.uk
October 2023
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44
