This page will detail how we assess, track and monitor children with SEND.

Rationale

At St Thomas Primary School individual pupil progress and monitoring of personalised targets is at the heart of our daily teaching. This principle applies for all children; regardless of their learning.

Our Approach

Children with Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND) who cannot access Age Related Expectations (ARE) despite signficant differentiation and support, follow a teaching and assessment programme called 'Pebbles' by Chirs Quigley.

Children following this programme:

• - are on the school's SEND register
• - have been assessed by their class teacher and the SENCO
• - have signficasnt and specific learning needs
• - are not able to meet ARE
• - are working above P Levels

The objectives that make up this teaching and assessment programme are taken from the National Curriculum but broken down into smaller, prioritised, chunked steps called Pebbles. These Pebbles gradually build to meet a National Curriculum year group objective, called a Milestone. This approach suits many of our children with SEN who need more time, opportunity, experience and repetition of core learning content and skills to embed and retain them.

For children who cannot yet access Year 1 objectives, we follow the P Level descriptors for both targets and assessment.

What are Pebbles?

The Pebbles cover all areas of the English, Maths and Science curriculum and are grouped through the same strands i.e. composition, decoding, living animals etc.

• - Pebble 1, 2 and 3 work towards achieving Milestone 1 (Year 2 objectives)
• - Pebble 4, 5 and 6 work towards achieving Milestone 2 (Year 4 objectives)
• - Peblle 7, 8 and 9 work towards achieving Miletsone 3 ( Year 6 objectives)

How are they used?

All teachers and SEN ETAs are trained to use Pebbles for planning, resourcing,teaching and assessing. Inclusive, in-class teaching, which mirrors what the rest of the class are learning, is expected when and where possible.

How is progress tracked?

The SENCO collects in Pebbles assessment data across all areas of English and Maths every term and tracks progress against entry levels and end of year targets. An 'expected' level of progress for children with SEND would be 1-2 Pebbles per academic year, but each child's targets are personalised and individual. Senior Leaders discuss, analyse and monitor this progress as part of the whole school assessment cycle. If at any point a child makes excellent progress and can begin to work on their ARE, the teacher will move themback onto the whole class year group objectives and continue to closely monitor their understanding and progress.

*During this period of consultation on SEN Assessment through the Rochford Review, P Levles are still ebing used for children who are not yet accessing the National Curriculum.