Department Policy and Vision
Patcham High School is a mainstream secondary school. We believe inclusive practice is central to developing quality first teaching practice, with teachers holding responsibility for meeting the needs of all students within their class through classroom organisation, teaching materials, teaching style and differentiation. At Patcham High School we are committed to offering an inclusive curriculum which ensures the best progress for all students regardless of their particular needs or abilities. We offer a wide range of support in order to break down barriers to learning in order to reflect the needs of pupils with communication and interaction, cognition and learning difficulties, social, mental and emotional health and physical or sensory needs.
Definition
The Code of Practice states that “a child or young person has SEN if they have a learning difficulty or disability which calls for special educational provision to be made for him or her”. A young person is considered to have a learning difficulty or disability if he or she has “a significantly greater difficulty in learning than the majority or others of the same age”.
Pupils with a disability have special educational needs if they have any difficulty in accessing education, if they need any special educational provision to be made for them i.e. anything that is additional to or different from what is normally available in schools in the area.
Our guiding policy is inclusion and we aim to expand our provision to include as many children as possible. We have a range of courses and packages that can be personalised to students’ needs. At all times we are focussed on our main objective; the education of young people and ensuring that they make progress in their learning.
Additional Support (offered to students on an individual basis).
This may include:
- Additional small support groups for Maths, English and literacy (led by TAs)
- Additional small support groups for social communication (led by TAs)
- Additional small support groups for speech and language programmes
- Key workers allocated to individual pupils
- In class support where a group of SEN pupils are supported
Community CAMHS – Working in partnership with Community CAMHS
We are fortunate to be part of a project within Brighton and Hove, whereby a Community CAMHs worker will be working alongside the school for a proportion of the week.
The focus of this project is to support parents, staff and pupils in recognising and supporting a range of anxiety and mental health based challenges. This will be done through a range of group based and training activities rather than ongoing 1-1 sessions that are currently offered through the CAMHs process.
There will be a variety of activities including:
- parent workshops on areas such as managing self-harm and exam stress
- 1-1 parent appointments offering advice and support
- 1-1 pupil drop ins offering advice and support
- Pupil workshops on areas such as managing anxiety, dealing with change, understanding emotions and managing exam stress
Parent appointments can be offered on a Friday morning up until 12.00.
Workshop content and dates are to be finalised and will be advertised via the school website and parent mail.
Referrals for workshops and parent appointments can be made by pupils, parents and staff and should be directed to Jackie Lucas via jlucas@patchamhigh.org.uk
SEN Parent Forum
Once per term the SEN Parent Forum meets. The purpose of this group is to raise concerns that relate to pupils with SEN(D) within Patcham High School. Previous activities that have taken place have been: inviting AMAZE representatives to discuss wider concerns; the forming of the SEN homework club; literacy training; support from outside agencies such as the ASC service.
If you are interested in participating in this forum, or have any questions relating to SEN(D), please contact Candice Bocking via Rdyche@PatchamHigh.org.uk
Useful links:
Brighton and Hove local offer
Patcham High School Local Offer
SEN Code of Practice 2014
Special educational needs and disability code of practice
Changes to special educational needs and disability support – Easy read guide for parents