Early Years Identification

A reminder: Definition of Special Educational Needs and Disability

A child or young person has SEN if they have a learning difficulty or disability which calls for special educational provision to be made for him or her. 

A child of compulsory school age or a young person has a learning difficulty or disability if he or she: 

• has a significantly greater difficulty in learning than the majority of others of the same age, or 

• has a disability which prevents or hinders him or her from making use of facilities of a kind generally provided for others of the same age in mainstream schools or mainstream post-16 institutions.

For children aged two or more, special educational provision is educational or training provision that is additional to or different from that made generally for other children or young people of the same age by mainstream schools, maintained nursery schools, mainstream post-16 institutions or by relevant early years providers. For a child under two years of age, special educational provision means educational provision of any kind. 

A child under compulsory school age has special educational needs if he or she is likely to fall within the definition above when they reach compulsory school age or would do so if special educational provision was not made for them (Section 20 Children and Families Act 2014). 

(SEND Code of Practice 2015 pp15-16)

The SEND Code of Practice (2015) introduced a single category of SEN Support which involves a four-part cycle of ‘Assess, Plan, Do, Review’ also known as the graduated approach. 

This graduated approach should include consideration of whether a family might also need Early Help support in the form of a Strengths & Needs form. Early Help Forms/Tools - Oxfordshire Safeguarding Children Board (oscb.org.uk)

In the SEND Code of Practice, SEN difficulties are divided into four areas:

Communication and interaction (C&I)

Cognition and learning (C&L)

Social, emotional and mental health difficulties (SEMH)

Sensory and/or physical needs (S&P)

These areas give an overview of the range of needs that schools and settings should plan for, however individual children often have needs that cut across all these areas and their needs may change over time. For instance, speech, language and communication needs can also be a feature of a number of other areas of SEN, and children with Autism may have needs across all areas. The special educational provision made for a child should always be based on an understanding of their particular strengths and needs and should seek to address them all, using well-evidenced interventions targeted at areas of difficulty and, where necessary, specialist equipment or software. This will help to overcome barriers to learning and participation. Support should be family centred and should consider the individual family’s needs and the best ways to support them. (SEND Code of Practice 2015 p.85 5.33)

This guidance provides practitioners with descriptors to help identify children and young people’s barriers to learning. Other sections offer guidance on the assess-plan-do-review cycle and advice on supporting wider outcomes, staff training, and sign-posting parents to further support.

This guidance should be read alongside Oxfordshire’s ‘Ordinarily Available Toolkit’ SEND Ordinarily available toolkit (oxfordshire.gov.uk) and Oxfordshire’s School Readiness strategic plan Oxfordshire School Readiness and Lifelong Learning Strategic Plan.pdf

School Readiness: Oxfordshire has a number of resources to support school readiness.

https://www.oxfordshire.gov.uk/residents/children-education-and-families/working-children-and-young-people/what-school-readiness

Click below to find out more about Gross Motor Skills and Fine Motor Skills: