Guest Post: Meeting the Needs of Early Years Children with SEND
In this guest post, Karen Jones, acting Head of Early Years SEND and Early Years Inclusion Support (EYIS) for Birmingham, shares an update on behalf of the Local Authority EY SEND Leads Group on meeting the needs of early years children with Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND), prior to their transition to reception.
*Guest post written by Karen Jones. If you have any issues or questions arising from the content of this post please direct them to the author and not BEYN: Karen.A.Jones@birmingham.gov.uk
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A group of representatives from the Local Authority SEND Specialist Support/Advisory teams and the Educational Psychology Service meet regularly to reflect on and share best practice, and to support any development work relating to Early Years (EY) children with SEND.
Each person is also a member of the Inclusion Support in Early Years (ISEY) Moderating Group, and we are involved with the Early Years Developing Local Provision (DLP) project as representatives on either the steering or reference group.
We support cross-agency work such as the current project around transition for EY children with SEND and have team members involved with the introduction of the Balanced System for Speech, Language and Communication and the development of the neurodevelopmental pathway for children with emerging social communication needs.
Current Challenges
As a group, we have become increasingly aware of the number of settings sharing with our teams that they are facing challenges in meeting the needs of children with SEND.
Some settings have told us that they consider that they are ‘at capacity’ for the number of children, with the most complex needs, that they can admit if they are to fully meet the needs of all children in their provision.
This is, understandably, set against the backdrop of the impact of the pandemic. Many children are delayed in respect of typical developmental milestones as a result of their experiences since March 2020.
Whilst most of these children do not have SEND they do, nevertheless, require additional support and changes to how you once implemented the EYFS.
Further to the impact of the pandemic on EY children, which is increasingly widely documented, children and young people with SEND have also been identified as significantly more affected by the lockdowns. Many have missed key assessments and the early interventions critical to their progress.
Inclusive Ethos
The Early Years sector in Birmingham has a really positive ethos around inclusion and there are so many examples of best practice.
Many parents share positively about their child’s EY experiences and the progress they make in settings.
The commitment to include is widespread and many sector representatives are known for their passion and tenacity around seeking best outcomes for all children.
Historically it has not been hard to find places for children with SEND to access their Early Education entitlement where this has been what parent/carer(s) want.
Funding
Most settings reference funding when sharing challenges with us. It is therefore really positive news that there is a commitment from both the Dedicated Schools Grant (DSG) Early Years and High Needs funding blocks, to increase the ISEY ‘pot’ over the next three years.
Settings eligible for funding through ISEY will have the opportunity to join a discussion around the use of the additional funding in March. Nursery classes in schools are not eligible for ISEY but can request funding for children with an SEND Support Provision Plan (SSPP) at any time in their nursery year.
In the Autumn and Spring Term, this funding matches ISEY funding allocated to children in Private, Voluntary and Independent settings (PVIs) and Maintained Nursery Schools so that there is parity across these different settings.
In the Summer Term, all settings can apply for funding for children with an SSPP and, rather than being a flat rate, money allocated relates to the child’s profile of need.
There is also an increase to Disability Access Fund (DAF) funding from April 2022. Senior LA officers accept that funding for mainstream provision across all phases needs to be addressed if we are to increase and sustain the capacity of all settings to meet the needs of children and young people with SEND. Early Years is definitely included in discussions about this.
Other Challenges
Aside from the impact of the pandemic and funding, we hear of other reasons that increase the challenges around inclusion. These include:
Retention and recruitment
Confidence of skills and staff to meet needs
Time required to partner with and best support parent/carer(s)
Time that managers and SENCOs have to commit around SEND-related administrative tasks (which is essentially taken away from direct work with children)
The Early Years DLP project has the potential to address some of these and we look forward to seeing the impact of your projects.
Next Steps
This article has been written to assure you that you have been, and continue to be, heard by the teams with a specific role around SEND, as well as already being heard by our colleagues in the LA Early Years and Childcare team with whom we work closely.
Having acknowledged the collective voice, we are beginning to collate feedback from settings sharing their individual circumstances with us.
We appreciate that where this is being shared, it comes from a position of wanting to include all children.
Wider consultation
We are considering how to consult more widely and it may be that we do this through a questionnaire later this term.
Thank you
In the meantime, we want to thank you all for the ways in which you welcome our teams and invite us to partner with you to meet the needs of children with emerging and identified SEND in your settings.
Karen Jones
On behalf of the LA Early Years SEND leads Group