Parent Focus Group – SEND

29^th April 2025

Thank you to the parents who came to our Parent Focus Group this week to discuss SEND provision at Ghost Hill.  It was good to hear from parents of children in different Year groups and at different stages of the journey with SEN.  Mrs Michael led the discussion and began by outlining the process of identifying the SEN needs of children and how they are provided for within school and how and when external expertise is sought.  Support Plans are a record of all extra support a child receives and the impact it has on their progress. 

Mrs Michael then opened the conversation up for feedback on what parents feel works well and what could be improved.

What works well

• All staff are accessible and available to talk to as needed.  Parents especially liked that Mrs Westall is on the gate every morning and felt they could talk about a small thing easily. 
• Parents felt they were supported as well as their children.
• Parents felt all staff knew their child well and they could talk to a teacher, teaching assistant or SENCO easily.
• The new format of additional parents’ appointments to discuss the Support Plan each term is working well and gives more dedicated time to look at targets and provision.
• Transition to the next year group had worked well and information had been passed on.
• The Support Plans give lots of information and are helpful to parents.

Even better if…

• Ideally parents would like more regular feedback in-between set meetings as to how their child is getting on especially if they start a new intervention group or activity.
• It can be hard finding out from a child with SEN what they are doing in school each day, we talked about using the question, “Is there anything you would like to teach me that you have learned at school today?”
• Parents would love the opportunity to see their child at school as sometimes behaviours or incidents are described that are very different to their behaviour at home. 
• It would be good if children that needed it had somewhere they could access when they felt they needed some time by themselves to be calm and regulate ( There are safe and calm spaces we use to support children in school )

Next steps as a school

• Remind all children that if a child is choosing some time out that they should respect that.
• Ensure all staff continue to give sufficient detail on incidents in school so parents can understand clearly any triggers and how best to help their child.

Parent Focus Group 20.11.24– Home Learning

The discussion started around the home learning sent home.

Points raised: -

• The home learning sheet is useful and like the way it is presented. It is a useful way to know what the children are learning about in class. Grandparents also read them and carry out activities with the children.
• Parents stated they also do learning that they know their children struggle with e.g. recapping previous learning which might not necessarily be on the home learning.

It was requested that physical paper copies are sent home at the beginning of each half term in book bags as putting them on the fridge etc is useful for reminding and keeping check.

The discussion moved onto reading and a reading scheme book and library book being sent home.

• Parents said they listen to their child read frequently but don’t always write in the reading record for different reasons.
• Sometimes its hard for children to sit down and read at home after a day at school;  but routines have been established where the child reads then they share a book together.

Numbots was then discussed: -

• Children enjoy this and it seen as important to monitor time spent on the device.
• Not all parents know how to access it.

Parents were happy overall with home learning and how it is presented and communicated.

They said the class/year What’s App groups were really useful for reminders and helping each other – Mrs Hamill pointed out these were not connected with school; but she was glad they were helpful.

There is room for improvement with communication in terms of knowing the support her child is getting; if it is support beyond the classroom.