You could speak to your GP, school or nursery teacher, the Special Educational Needs Coordinator (SENCO) or the school nurse. You can also contact Special Education Needs and Disability Information, Advice and Support Service (IASM) if you feel you feel you need further help. (Details at the end of this FAQ sheet).

The support available is called ‘SEND Support’ and this support is tailored to your child’s individual needs. It can be wide-ranging. For example, if a child has dyslexia, it might simply involve using pastel coloured paper. If a child is learning at a slower pace, the SEND support could involve some small group work within the classroom. Sometimes these forms of support are called ‘reasonable adjustments’.

Through the Code of Practice 2015, schools and other settings are required to use a Plan, Do, Review approach to measure the effectiveness of the support they have put in place.

• SEND Support replaces school action/school action plus (in schools) and early years action/early years action plus (in early years settings).
• SEND Support is put in place using an approach called • Assess • Plan • Do • Review.
• You should be involved and your views will be needed throughout the process, and you should be kept up to date with the progress made. Young people aged 16 to 25 should be fully involved in designing their own SEND Support and provision. 

It’s useful to find out:

• Whether the school has experience of children with similar needs and what strategies have been effective
• What the school’s special educational needs policy is
• How the SENCO passes information about children to teaching staff
• How your child would be supported in class
• How you’d be involved in supporting your child’s progress and development

There are different types of help available depending on your child’s needs. If you think that your child may need extra help you could:

(a) Contact the SENCO at your child’s school or setting

(b) Contact SEND Information, Advice and Support Service – Manchester (IASM)

Confidential Helpline 0161 209 8356 Mon – Fri 10am to 3pm or

By email parents@manchester.gov.uk.

The Education Act 1996 defines Special Educational Needs or Disability (SEND) as: 

“A child has special educational needs if he or she has a difficulty which calls for special educational provision to be made for him or her”.

A child has a learning difficulty if s/he:

(a) Has a significantly greater difficulty in learning than the majority of children of the same age

(b) Has a disability which either prevents or hinders him or her from making use of educational facilities of a kind generally provided for children of the same age in schools within the area of the local education authority

(c) Is under five and falls within the definition at (a) or (b) above or would do so if special educational provision was not made for the child

A child must not be regarded as having a learning difficulty solely because the language or form of language of the home is different from the language in which he or she will be taught.

For a child over two, educational provision which is additional to, or otherwise different from, the educational provision made generally for children of the child’s age in maintained mainstream schools, in the area.

For a child under two, educational provision of any kind (Section 312, Education Act 1996)

As your child already has identified Special Educational Needs, it is a good idea to ask to meet with your child’s class teacher, form tutor or the pre-school setting leader and the Special Educational Needs Coordinator (SENCO) or Inclusion Co-ordinator. You may already have a review meeting arranged to look at your child’s progress and support. If not, you can ask for one to be arranged.

You can explain at the meeting why you think your child needs more help, perhaps you feel they are not making progress, falling further behind or just telling you or showing you they are unhappy at school. You can ask to see evidence of the progress your child is making and talk through any changes to support that would help. You can look at their individual progress tracker, see which targets your child has achieved and what support helps them learn.

The amount of support you can expect your child to have depends on whether your child receives support at the level called SEND Support or has an Education, Health and Care Plan. Whichever stage your child is at, you can expect them to be given the right level of support to help them learn and make progress.

If your child is not making progress, then perhaps they need more individual support, more targeted support or a different approach to help them learn.

The school could offer increased support or adapt the ways they are teaching them. The school should always be able to show you what support your child is getting and how they are monitoring their progress, who else is involved in planning their support, for example, an educational psychologist or speech and language therapist or a teacher from the Special Educational Need Support Services and how they are following their advice.

An EHC plan is a legal document that describes a child or young person’s special educational, health and social care needs. It explains the extra help that will be given to meet those needs and how that help will support the child or young person to achieve what they want to in their life.

It should:

• State the views, interests and aspirations (wishes) of the parents and child or young person
• Describe the child or young person’s special educational needs and any health and social care needs
• Specify the provision required to meet those needs
• State how services will work together to meet the child or young person’s needs and support the achievement of the agreed outcomes that have been agreed together. The plan should have short, medium and long term outcomes.

A child or young person’s school or setting can make a request, as can a parent. Under the new law, a young person (16-25 years) can also make a request themselves.

In making its decision about whether a child or young person needs an EHC needs assessment, the local authority has to look at what support has already been provided and whether there has been any progress. If a school or setting makes the request, they will be able to provide evidence of support, attainment and rate of progress.

A: The views, interests and aspirations (wishes) of your child

B: Special educational needs or Disability (SEND)

C: Health needs related to SEND

D: Social care needs related to SEND

E: Outcomes (goals) – how the extra help will benefit your child

F: Special educational provision (support)

G: Health provision.

H: Social care provision. (H1 and H2).

I: Placement – type and name of school or other institution.

J: Personal budget arrangements.

K: Advice and information – a list of the information gathered during the EHC needs assessment.  

In very exceptional circumstances a pupil can be put on a part-time table.  There needs to be full agreement from the parent/carer.  It needs to be temporary with a time limit stating when it will end and regular meetings with the school to see how they are going to get the pupil back into full time education.  If the child has an EHCP (Education Health and Care Plan) it may be that an early review needs to be called. 

No. These are classed as illegal exclusions and are unlawful regardless of any agreement from a parent/carer.  Any exclusion of a pupil even for a short period must be formally recorded. 

Each lunchtime exclusion must be recorded as a half day exclusion.  You must receive a letter from the school about this.  You and school should be working together to get your child back into school at lunch time.

The code of practice says educational settings have to use their ‘best endeavours’ to make sure that a child with SEN gets the support they need.  A child with SEN should have a SEN Support plan in place following a four stage cycle Assess, Plan, Review called the graduated approach. The school should review your child’s progress and the difference that the help has made. Every mainstream school gets a basic funding entitlement to support children with SEN.  Arrange a meeting with the Special Educational Needs Coordinator (SENCO) and class teacher at your child’s setting to discuss.

No. This is not correct. There are legal tests and criteria that a local authority have to use in determining whether a child needs an EHCP or not.  This is done on a case by case basis using evidence provided

No. This is not correct. An EHCP is a legal document that details your child’s needs and the provision to support those needs. Legally an educational setting must comply with that is written in the EHCP. It is the local authorities’ responsibility to make sure the EHCP is being followed and legally compliant.

This is your chance to check that everything you expected to be in the plan is there and to tell the local authority Statutory Assessment and Reviewing Team (SART) if you think that there is anything missing or wrong.

Children and young people with medical conditions are entitled to a full education. In the first instance it is the educational setting (school) that the child is on roll at. The governing body must ensure there are arrangements in place to support pupils with medical conditions. The Local Authority (LA) is responsible for arranging suitable, full time education for children of compulsory school age, who because of illness, would not receive suitable education without such provision.  The LA should be ready to take responsibility for any child whose illness will prevent them from attending school for 15 or more school days, either in one absence or over the course of a school year, where education is not otherwise being arranged.  LA should arrange provision as soon as it is clear that an absence will last more than 15 days and it should do so at the latest by the 6th day of the absence.