SEND
At the heart of the Mckee is meeting need for our vulnerable young people.
Our approach to meeting need is very much about equipping our students to recognise their strengths as well as their difficulties and to recognise that we are most effective when we support our students to work around their barriers rather than removing obstacles for them. In this way we help them find their own best ways to overcome challenge and develop resilience.
At The McKee every student is seen as an individual. All our students have their own story and come to work with us for different reasons. Each student brings to our setting their own needs, difficulties, strengths, situations and aspirations. Given that no two students are the same, our approach is flexible and responsive with the student at the heart of it. We work closely with students, families and carers, wider agencies and mainstream schools to provide the best possible offer to support students in accessing fully education and developing academically, personally and emotionally.
How do we identify and assess need?
We work with families, students and mainstream school at the point of admission to the McKee to get as comprehensive a picture as possible of a student’s needs.
We also complete a range of assessments including baseline and specialist testing around their learning strengths and difficulties once they are at school and working with us. This includes indicators of specific learning difficulties that may have previously gone under the radar in a larger setting.
Our small groups and key working approach allow us to be very responsive to changing need as we can spot early signs of our students struggling. This means we can work quickly with our students and families to put in place the support they need. This might be around their learning, their social communication, or their social and emotional mental health.
How do we support students?
Having a range of provision, including academic and vocational pathways, means that we can find the best fit offer for our students.
A feature of all our provision is smaller groups and access to key working. Our key working sessions allow students to work on issues or difficulties in a timely way, supporting progress and personal development.
Within lessons our staff get to know each student well, checking understanding, adjusting teaching and learning and giving additional support where needed.
Where needed we offer intervention to support progress whether that be learning or social and emotional development.
We work alongside multi agencies including CAMHS, Educational Psychologists, speech and language to support our students getting the best possible outcomes.
Where appropriate we either lead or contribute to submissions for statutory assessment. Some of our students have an Education Health Care Plan (EHCP)
Training and CPD
Training and constantly improving our knowledge, understanding and skills as a staff team is important to us. In addition to internal CPD and briefings we bring in external training on various SEND including from Educational Psychologists for all staff.
– 8 staff have recently undertaken a foundation diploma in neuro linguistic programming to support emotional well-being and personal development.
– Our Deputy Head has the national SENCO award and is a master practitioner of neuro linguistic programming and a trained hypnotherapist.
– Our SEND lead has a Post Graduate Certificate in Teaching Children with Specific Literacy Difficulties and has been awarded a Level 7 Approved Practitioner Status of the British Dyslexia Association approved to teach learners with Specific Learning Difficulties (Dyslexia).
Use the links to get further information on our school SEND policy, the school offer and the local offer.
For any further information on SEND at the McKee contact Hayley Middleton at school.
