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Sign in or register for an accountCreate a supportive learning environment- eg ‘help box’ with appropriate resources in each classroom; folders in classrooms (on tables) containing resources such as word mats; using off-white paper (not black text on white paper); colour coding/ dyslexia friendly environment; working walls and purposeful displays (eg key vocabulary); prompts/ reminders/ ‘to do’ lists; seating selection; visual cues and timetables; timed rewards and consequences; changing visuals (eg Smart boards – changing images, clips, texts and colours); brain breaks.
Differentiation- eg task sheets; providing PowerPoint printouts; timers; breaking down skills; understanding of ‘small steps’ approaches; targeted questions at different levels.
Scaffolding of work- eg task plans; word banks; sentence starters; writing frames.
Promoting independence- eg scaffolding; timers; visuals; sharing expectations; work pitched at pupils’ level; effective deployment of support staff; offering mediation at a lower level first before increasing, where necessary (see Getting Help column).
Staff approaches- eg peer observation, joint planning and support (eg triad delivery model); chunking verbal instructions.
Multi-sensory teaching methods
Repetition of concepts and skills- eg pre-teaching vocabulary; address misconceptions the same day; retrieval practice (last session/ last week/ last topic/ last term); bridging new content and skills with prior learning (eg ‘where have we seen this before?’)
Use effective assessment and monitoring tools to identify all pupils’ learning levels and track progress, eg:
Provide staff and peer feedback that is specific, clear and accurate; which focuses on improvement from previous work; and which supports effort and perseverance.
Arrange relevant training for staff from external support services, where needed.
Staff awareness of the learning hierarchy to support their understanding of the stages involved in developing a skill and identifying which stage pupils have reached/ where additional support to progress may be needed:
Establish good links with home to support learning, eg:
Further assessment of need through observation, collating assessment data, and gathering the views of staff, parents/ carers and pupils, following a graduated approach and assess-plan-do-review learn cycles.
Facilitate learning activities in smaller and targeted groups, in limited distraction environments where possible.
Awareness of pupils who may benefit from additional support at the acquisition and fluency stages of the learning hierarchy (eg strategies such as pre- teaching of key concepts/ vocabulary and increased repetition and over-learning with opportunities to revisit concepts more frequently). See Getting Advice.
Individual and/ or small group interventions with appropriate pre- and post- measures to evaluate progress (examples of specific Literacy and Numeracy interventions are suggested below); good starting points for finding out about evidence-based interventions, programmes and approaches are:
Different pupils will require different types, levels and intensity of adult mediation (approaches and strategies used to support during tasks and activities) to maximise their learning of specific skills and to promote increased levels of independence. The focus of mediation may include:
Modes of mediation may include:
Mediation should begin at the lowest level needed for the pupil; some will need to begin at a higher level than others. Mediation progresses from higher to lower levels as follows:
Use appropriate assessments to identify difficulties early, establish a greater understanding of the pupil’s needs and inform appropriate referral to other services.
Over rehearsal of information to enable pupils to progress through the hierarchy of learning (see General section) eg Precision Teaching (PT) intervention. PT intervention is suitable for those who struggle with working memory difficulties and retaining information and is used as an intensive 1:1 intervention.
Higher levels of mediation during tasks (see Getting Help).
Obtain and record pupil’s views through pupil voice activities.
Obtain and record parental information and views through questionnaires, parents’ evenings, assemblies and social media forums.
Create individual education plans (IEPs) or similar and adapt termly, with progress against targets routinely reviewed by the SENDCo, relevant staff and pupil/ parents/ carers.
Ensure that any Teaching Assistants (TAs) involved with the pupil understand the purpose of the IEP or group plan and support the pupil to achieve their targets.
Use of plan-do-review-learn processes to monitor progress and plan individual support.
School staff, SENDCo, parents/ carers and pupil to continue to liaise on a regular basis – a minimum of three meetings with parents within a 12-month period.
Refer to external agencies for further support around learning and factors which may impact children’s progress (eg Educational Psychology Service (EPS), Speech and Language Therapy (SALT) service, Ethnic Minority and Traveller Achievement Service (EMTAS), Learning Support Service (LSS).
Where a pupil has an EHCP:
Employ strategies to develop pupils’ metacognition and self-regulation (eg the ability to monitor, direct and review their own learning, through explicitly thinking about their own learning, setting goals and evaluating progress) and executive function skills (these are a set of skills and mental processes that develop throughout childhood and adolescence, which support pupils to self-regulate, initiate, attend to and persevere with activities successfully).
Explicit teaching of metacognitive strategies, following the seven-step model:
Organise and structure classroom talk and dialogue, including ‘Socratic talk’, talk partners and debating.
Teacher modelling of own thinking and understanding at a whole-class level (eg modelling self-talk when preparing for a task, making mistakes or monitoring reading comprehension).
Use of open questioning to support pupils’ thinking around a task (eg ‘what do we have to do here?’ ‘how might we start?’)
Use of structured planning templates (eg visual task plans or check lists), teacher modelling, worked examples and breaking down activities into steps.
Access to key information (eg subject specific vocabulary, key spellings, number facts etc.) visually to promote independence and reduce working memory loads.
Use of verbal and visual cues/prompts to direct or redirect attention – access to opportunities for movement breaks and different modalities of teaching and learning.
Promote dialogic teaching at a whole-class and small group level, which emphasises dialogue through which pupils learn to reason, discuss, argue, and explain.
Explicitly teach pupils how to organise and effectively manage their learning independently – provide guided practice. Provide exam preparation and self-study support in small groups for targeted pupils.
Use of self-evaluation and feedback tools such as ‘exam wrappers’ (a pre and post-exam self- evaluation tool).
Teach and model working memory and recall strategies within small groups (rehearsal and chunking of information, visual memory strategies and creating narratives).
Gather observational data and conduct targeted assessment to further clarify strengths and needs (eg Working Memory Rating Scale (WMRS) / Automated Working Memory Assessment).
Provide explicit instruction and targeted goal-setting with individual pupils/groups around key skill areas (eg self-management or self-organisation skills).
Regularly cue pupils to remind them of the skills they are focusing on before initiating a task, and recognise and reward progress.
Small group/individual interventions to develop targeted skills (eg access to small group sessions to practise attention and listening skills, working memory instruction/practice: Cogmed/ Jungle Memory). Complement computerised interventions with strategy-based practice within the classroom.
Use of personalised work areas/stations with clear systems for organisation and planning (eg using task boards or in-out trays).
Provide regular opportunities for short breaks and use of individual items to support attention and concentration within agreed boundaries across lessons (eg brief movement breaks and/or access to fiddle items).
Access to a highly personalised curriculum incorporating additional support to enable ‘readiness for learning’ (eg self-regulation, planning, preparation, and organisation).
Targeted intervention, clearly linked to IEP objectives, for key competencies (eg time, inhibition control, working memory intervention eg Jungle Memory, Cogmed). Use of pre/post measures to monitor impact and progress.
Use of evidence-based approaches to teaching literacy (eg Education Endowment Supporting Literacy in Secondary Schools guidance).
Collaborative learning and peer tutoring approaches (eg Paired Reading, Cued Spelling).
Reading buddy/ peer support/ joint learning.
Class literacy programmes which can be differentiated for individuals eg
Access to books with low reading age and high interest, eg Rising Stars.
Cross-curricular embedding of basic Literacy skills.
Targeted assessments eg IDL, Lexia, PiXL CODE, SNAP SpLD, Accelerated Reader, Nessy, Connective Learning.
Use of standardised assessments such as PhAB2.
Small-group support for pupils struggling with literacy, eg
Use of technology such as Clicker 8 and online software such as Dyslexia Gold and Lexia Power Up Literacy.
Introduce accessibility tools on Microsoft Word, eg Immersive Reader.
Explore alternative methods or recording such as voice to text, using a keyboard.
Use of a reading pen.
Bespoke homework clubs/ online homework.
Training NASEN.
Interventions to develop literacy skills, based on principles of repetition and over-learning, with support to generalise skills (eg Precision Teaching, Toe by Toe). See General section.
Very small group/ paired/ individual interventions to develop literacy skills, eg:
Access to resources such as aurally encoded dictionaries.
Use of evidence-based approaches to teaching Mathematics (eg Education Endowment Foundation Improving Mathematics in Key Stages 2 and 3 guidance report).
Collaborative learning and peer tutoring approaches such as Paired Maths.
Cross-curricular embedding of basic Numeracy skills.
Use of appropriate assessments to identify strengths and areas of need, in order to target intervention at an early stage. This may include standardised assessments (eg Sandwell Numeracy Test) as well as formative, criterion-referenced and curriculum-based assessments such as Precision Teaching baseline probes.
More specialised interventions, eg
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