Managing SEND, Part 4: Supporting Staff - Support Network

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Well-trained and experienced SENCOs are a precious resource. According to the SEND Code, providers should be able to expect support from their local authority area SENCOs, backed up by online information as part of the ‘local offer’. But with fewer LA area SENCOs working on the ground than there were five years ago, and with many of these under pressure, it is hardly surprising that nurseries can feel out on a limb.

At Kiddi Caru in Plympton, manager Tracey Callan says LA training and support needs to be prioritised as much as funding. She says, ‘Where we achieve funding for one-to-one support for a child, we are then faced with the problem of how we access it. Where the funding only covers limited sessions each week, it is very difficult to find the right people to come in for those periods. Often we have to pull our own qualified staff out of ratio to provide the care.’

IN-HOUSE TRAINING

One way to minimise expense is to bring training in-house, says Kinderland Day Nursery in Croydon. Of its 145 children, eight are officially supported for special needs and another three are currently being monitored.

Assistant manager and SENCO Nihala Zaida says, ‘All staff can be involved, and we don’t have to worry about them taking time out. Our team recently attended an in-house training course delivered by Croydon’s Best Start inclusion officer. We’ve also accessed our LA’s practical guidance course for new SENCOs and regularly use Laura Henry training.’

MANAGER vs SENCO?

Staff confidence is vital for identifying and following up on children’s needs. Where managers lack direct experience of SEND, they may have to rely on their SENCO to guide them. The dynamic between manager and SENCO is key, says early years consultant Kay Mathieson.

‘It can be challenging to enable staff to feel confident about working with children with SEND if you don’t feel confident yourself. Some managers have got to their role without much hands-on work with children with SEND; they may be relying on their SENCO, so the balance between these two roles is crucial. [It can present] many challenges to leadership skills. I’ve seen cases where the SENCO is an advocate for the individual child while the manager is guarding the funding and the poor room leader or key worker gets caught in the middle.’

One way to ensure that staff are not working behind battlelines is having the correct processes in place. ‘A secure, well-used supervision system is essential. Working with children with SEND is challenging to us personally and professionally, so being able to access emotional/professional coaching can be a life-saver’, says Dr Mathieson.

According to the EYFS, supervision ‘should foster a culture of mutual support, teamwork and continuous improvement’. Crucially, according to experts such as Chris Pascal, it is a two-way process, with managers able to receive feedback as well.

Working on being truly open as a manager can be beneficial in other ways. ‘Managers who are confident in their role tend to be more outward looking and able to build links with other settings (including schools). They will also feel able to encourage links with other professionals so that care plans are realistic and practice is adapted most effectively’ says Dr Mathieson.

THE RIGHT TRAINING

Confidence also comes into play when deciding what training to invest in. The range of training, and the lack of a benchmark, can make it confusing. There is no statutory national SENCO award for PVI sector practitioners, which is in marked contrast to the MA-level National Award for SENCO Co-ordination, which SENCOs working in schools and maintained settings have been required to take since 2009.

Independent early years trainer and consultant Janice Darkes-Sutcliffe, who developed an accredited programme for early years SENCOs in 2015 while working for School Improvement in Liverpool, would like to see a national award developed along similar lines. Well over 20 practitioners have achieved the City of Liverpool Early Years SENCO Award.

‘It adopted an action research approach which offered new learning, reflection and dialogue and, importantly, reflected the early years experience of Level 3 practitioners,’ she says.

Nursery nurse Lesley Lomax says achieving the award provided a huge boost to her confidence. ‘At the time I was working with a little boy with autism and I had no experience of it. We were given access to an educational psychologist and a network of professional contacts who included experienced practitioners and support groups in local settings. Understanding terminology and knowing how to talk to outside professionals is key, and ultimately the course enabled me to get past the label and see the child for himself.’

COUNCIL VIEW

At Torbay Council the priority is to ensure early identification of individual children’s needs and that there is targeted support in place, according to Judith Thomas, advisory teacher for inclusion. Ms Thomas visits 35 nurseries each term and is available to 80 childminders. She says she has a ‘very large’ email inbox and is on-call on her mobile.

She says, ‘Our early years training programme includes termly forums for SENCOs and training in evidence-based interventions, such as include Makaton, I CAN Early Talk Boost for speech and language support and the Portage Small Steps to Learning, all offered at reduced rates. There are also associated kitemark schemes that nurseries can participate in.’

Torbay Council is also keen to hear from settings about what training they require. ‘The greatest demand is for support for autism, speech and language and positive behaviour intervention,’Ms Thomas says. ‘In response to the latter we recently teamed up with an educational psychologist service to deliver a positive behaviour course, which was well attended by both PVIs and schools.’

She adds that supporting children with SEND in early years settings is now focused on working with practitioners in settings rather than directly with parents, and is ‘strategic’ rather than ‘responsive’.

SUPPORT AND INTEGRATION

Acorns Pre-School, which testifies to ‘fantastic support’ from Torbay, has 44 children out of 96 currently receiving additional support, reflecting the fact that the seaside area has a high level of disadvantage. Manager Debbie Stephens says continuity of contact with Judith Thomas for many years has played a big part in its SEND development and facilitated every type of training.

‘Because we are a large nursery with a high number of children with special needs, we have our own supernumerary, communication and language and intervention specialist, who is based in the setting,’ she says. ‘Speech and language support is by far the biggest area of need here. It is a challenging issue, but we’ve always used a graduated approach, and we find that if we can get the parents on board, that’s half the battle.’

However, according to Dr Mathieson, one-to-one support has to be carefully implemented. ‘One of the dangers is that managers look to one-to-one support for children with SEND too readily. The importance of the social connections a child with SEND makes cannot be over-emphasised, and allocating one adult to one child can lead to isolation of both. It is understandable – managers are trying to balance addressing staff anxieties and a child’s needs – but it is essential as stated in the Code of Practice that all staff remain responsible for all children, including those with SEND.

‘If a member of staff sees their job as related to the progress of behaviour of the child, that can cause anxiety. This can lead to the adult reducing the opportunity for the child to mix with certain children so that difficult situations are avoided – rather than managed. The ultimate failure of this dependence is when staff feel that the child can only attend if the support adult is present.’

WARWICK UNIVERSITY NURSERY: STRETCHED RESOURCES

Manager Debbie Castle says the nursery gets effective one-to-one support, once a week, from Coventry Council’s complex needs team for a four-year-old diagnosed with autism. At the same time, she says, budget cuts have meant that longstanding relationships have been severed and funding has disappeared.

‘The referral system has changed but, more important, support staff we have built relationships with over many years have now gone or been redeployed,’ she says. ‘We’ve also seen a downturn in training offered for areas such as autism, Down’s syndrome and speech and language, and everything now has to be paid for.

‘While we are covered by Coventry Council, our nursery straddles the boundary between Coventry and Warwickshire and our children come from both areas. My fear is that because of cuts, Coventry will not offer support for children from Warwickshire and we will have to start working with two authorities. This would create a greater risk of children slipping through the net.

‘If I was to name one challenge it would be finding time. We are a busy nursery and don’t have the financial resources to have a supernumerary SENCO, or provide constant one-to-one support for individual children.

‘My team includes an experienced SENCO and all staff are well-trained. They seize opportunities for CPD, although we still need specific training tailored to the needs of particular children. We currently have a child with Down’s syndrome who has a stoma bag and our key person required training in this. He has just started walking and apart from this his needs are no different from any other 18-month-old.’

For the rest of the articles in this series, see our management guide