New SEND Improvement Plan

[Jules]

The government has published the SEND Improvement Plan, after last year's consultation on proposals to improve the accessibility and availability of SEND provision from the ages of 0 to 25.

You can find the full document here. 

And for a quick summary of some of the main points, you could read the Early Years Alliance news item on the plan here. 

[Helen]

It is obviously good that the government is identifying high quality early years provision is essential to support children with SEND, but it needs sensible funding. Until that happens, children, families and early years staff all struggle to access and provide what we all know children need. Increasing nursery funding by a few pennies here and there just isn't going to cut it.

[Stephen]

I agree that it is positive that the early years is highlighted throughout this document as being important.  Providing additional training for SENCOs so that provision is improved also sounds good.  There's lots of talk about equipping the EY workforce to so that they can identify earlier where children might have additional support needs.  In my experience this has never been the issue - our educators are brilliant at noticing when children aren't progressing along typical pathways - the issue is always appropriate funding so that settings can welcome all children through their doors.  It will be interesting to see what actually happens.