Plan/do - Cognition and learning

Detailed assessment will provide the necessary information to plan a support package which may consist of further adjustments in the classroom to improve access to the curriculum and/or specific intervention to improve speech and language skills that need addressed.

An intervention needs to be planned and documented in an Individual Support Plan (or equivalent) in order for all adults to be informed of the support that needs to be in place to support the child/young persons learning needs. 

When planning any support, the emotional well-being and confidence of the child or young person should be prioritised, with all adults having a clear understanding of the child or young person’s individual needs.

1. Curriculum Access

Further adjustments may be needed for individual children in order to increase their ability to access the curriculum within the classroom. These following suggestions have been divided into the curriculum content, curriculum delivery and classroom resources.

Curriculum Content:

• The curriculum needs to be individually differentiated in some areas to meet needs
  
  
• Teaching plans will include how child/young person’s needs are being addressed and how progress will be monitored. 
  
  
• Children/young people may need individual learning outcomes in some areas.
  
  
• Teachers need to ensure there is adequate intellectual challenge and stimulation in all lessons (this is particularly relevant for children/young people with higher cognitive skills and lower literacy skills).

Curriculum Delivery:

• The following adaptations to teaching may be needed:
  
  
  • Pre-tutoring of useful vocabulary and key concepts.
    
    
  • Regular reinforcement of instructions.
    
    
  • Personalised feedback given on learning – both teacher led or peer-led.
    
    
  • Flexibility within the timetable to allow for interventions to be implemented
    
    
  • Assisted technology.
    
    
  • Other strategies and teaching methods could be used within the classroom, such as Co-operative Learning (see below).

Classroom resources:

• A range of more specific classroom resources are available in all lessons depending on the learning intentions of the lesson and could include:
  
  Where teaching assistants are used to complement the teacher's planning and delivery, the teacher remains accountable for the child/young person’s learning at all times.
  
  
  • Resources to assist with accessing the content of the lesson such as Reading pens or a reader.
    
    
  • Resources to assist with recording work such as a scribe, IT, dictaphone, talking tins.

Staff Knowledge and Understanding:

• Inconsistent performance is understood by staff to indicate that skills have not been mastered and more skill practice is needed in order to improve the accuracy and/or fluency of the skill.
  
  
• Teachers are regularly involved with intervention planning with the SENCo and time is put aside for this.
  
  
• Teachers are offered relevant training sessions to increase skills and knowledge to support interventions.
  
  

2. Specific Intervention

• Individual pupil targets are based on appropriate assessment results, are SMART and are recorded in an individual plan, which identifies interventions (including who, what, when) and a review date.
  
  
• Appropriate evidence-based intervention are implemented for each areas of need and are noted on the individual support plan.
  
  
• Evidence-based principles of effective teaching and learning are applied for each intervention:
  
  
  • Structured teaching in line with the Instructional Hierarchy.
    
    
  • Daily structured teaching of one skill at a time.
    
    
  • Distributed practice (daily opportunities to practice targeted skills).
    
    
  • Teaching of most useful and transferable skills.
    
    
  • Teaching skills in different contexts to increase generalisation.
    
    
  • Use of direct instruction to explicitly teach targeted skills.
    
    
  • Assessing and teaching for both fluency and accuracy.
    
    
  • Learning is interleaved (new learning is explicitly mixed with old learning to aid understanding and minimise forgetting).
    
    
  • The child/young person understands the purpose of any interventions and are fully informed about their progress.
    
    
  • Please refer to the EEF Teaching and Learning Toolkit and John Hattie's Visible Learning research for more information about effective evidence-based interventions
    
    
• More information on evidence-based literacy interventions can be
  found in:
  
  
  • Professor Greg Brooks ‘What works for Children with Literacy Difficulties’
    
    
  • The Education Endowment Foundation Guidance Reports: Improving Literacy in Key Stage 1; Improving Literacy in Key Stage 2; and Improving Literacy in Secondary Schools.
    
    
  • Staffordshire County Council’s Practice Guidance for Children with Literacy Difficulties (link to be added).
    
    
  • NASEN have also produced some mini-guides: Supporting children with Specific Learning Difficulties in Secondary Schools and Supporting Reading and Literacy in Secondary Schools
    
    
• More information on evidence-based maths interventions can be found in Ann Dowker's What Works for Children with Mathematical Difficulties' 
  
  
• More information on strategies for literacy and numeracy difficulties and thinking skills can be found the DfE research report SEN support: A rapid evidence assessment. 
  
  
• More information on strategies for addressing metacognition can be found in The Education Endowment Foundation's Guidance Report on Metacogntion and Self-Regulated Learning.
  
  
• Schools may be advised to use Precision Teaching to evaluate interventions. Training is available from the Educational Psychology Service and click here for some additional resources for Precision Teaching.
  
  
• Other interventions have been shown to work to improve reading, such as:
  
  
  • Paired Reading (to improve reading fluency and enjoyment)
    
    
  • Reciprocal Teaching (to improve comprehension)
    
    
  • Dialogic Reading (to improve reading of children in the early years)
    
    
• Co-operative learning is also an effective intervention. More information can be found on the Co-operation website and the Kagan Co-operative Learning website.

Records should be kept of all interventions that have been delivered and the impact they had on the child/young person’s progress and be available to be reviewed at regular intervals. The evidence of impact and the level of the child/young person's engagement with tasks needs to be accurately recorded over time to inform decisions about whether chosen interventions promote and maintain effective curriculum access.