`The key person must seek to engage and support parents and or carers in guiding the child’s development at home’ Statutory Guidance for the EYFS para 1.11
The EYFS places a clear responsibility on practitioners to communicate learning and development needs in order to raise expectations in the home environment; this is even more crucial for children with additional needs.
Remember to keep the whole child in mind and focus on the successes as well as the areas for development
- To best support all children’s learning and development there needs to be a common approach to supporting the child’s needs, learning and development.
- Working in partnership enables intervention to have a greater impact for the child.
- Progress towards targets is able to be measured more accurately if information is drawn from both the setting and home environment.
- As primary educators of their children parents are in the best position to supply information and enable the practitioners to gain a more holistic and balanced picture of the child, this supports planning effective ‘small step’ developments which the practitioners will often be skilled in.
Remember this may be the first time anybody has ever questioned their child’s development and all conversations must be sensitive and professional. The setting SENCO will be able to offer support.
- Induction procedures are an opportunity for early identification of possible needs.
- Parent consultations can be used to identify emerging needs.
- Immediately a need has been identified the key person should consult their setting SENCO and arrange a meeting with parents to gather information and discuss support strategies.
- Communication should continue informally between the key person and parent/carer to share successes and continuing challenges. The cycle of assess, plan, do, review needs to continue in detail for any child below typical development or with any additional needs.
- If an IEP/DAF is required these should be written with the parent, agreeing specific small step targets that state what the setting is doing and how the parent/carer can support this at home.
- Targets should be reviewed regularly. Celebrating success and considering next steps to support progress. The ongoing daily small discussion and support can make a big difference to children’s outcomes. E.g. Explaining the importance of repetition and attention, short burst better than long sessions; give details of what could be done at home and asking how it is going?
By combining practitioners expertise with the parents knowledge of their individual children will be the most effective way of supporting the child’s progress and development
- Support parents to recognise learning opportunities at home which in turn will help children to meet their targets. The home and setting learning environments are very different; learning experiences at home may include eating, bath-time, bedtime, shopping trips etc. While learning experiences at a setting might involve sand/water play, block play, snack time routines, etc – both environments can support learning targets.
- Use learning journals that have contributions from the child, parent/carer and setting can be an effective tool for celebrating the success and progress of the whole child.
- Home-setting communication book, if used, should focus on the positives.
- Create home bags with a range of resources and activities or story sacks that parents can take home
- Share visual timetables and symbols with parents where relevant and useful.
- Give parents resources and activities that can be used at home as well as in the setting to support targets.
- Sign post to children’s centre for services such as parenting classes, family support if relevant.
- Suggest that parents could access other support if appropriate, e.g. Devon Information Advice and support on 01392 383080 or email devonias@devon.gov.uk further leaflets and information online at www.devonias.org.uk also on facebook.