SEND Specialist Expertise
SENCO and SEND Staff
Our SENCO is Mrs Claire Baker and she can be contacted by phone on 0191 5864049 or by email at blackhallprimary@durhamlearning.net . Mrs Baker holds the statutory National Award for SEN Coordination qualification required of all SENCOs and also has a Postgraduate Certificate in Vulnerable Learners and Inclusion from Bath Spa University. She regularly attends Durham County SEN network meetings and training courses.
More details of the SENCO’s role can be found in the SEN Policy which you can find in the School Policies section of our website.
Our Teachers and Teaching Assistants attend a variety of county run SEN courses and staff training workshops in school and are encouraged to keep their knowledge of SEN up to date.
External Specialists and Other Bodies
The school enjoys good working relationships with a wide range of people who provide services to children with SEND and their families.
The external specialists may:
- Act in an advisory capacity
- Extend expertise of school staff
- Provide additional assessment
- Support a child directly
- Suggest statutory assessment is advisable
- Consult with all parties involved with the child
How We Secure Specialist Expertise
Our Additional Needs Budget is used to support children and young people with SEND. If a child has complex special educational needs, we could also receive additional funding from the Local Authority to meet the agreed outcomes.
This is used to support children and young people with SEND by:
- Providing staff training
- Buying resources to support children
- Enabling staff to run intervention programs
- Paying for assessment and advice from outside agencies e.g. Cognition and Learning Team
At Blackhall Primary school, we liaise with the following agencies depending upon the individual child’s needs:
- Autism Social Communications Team
- One Point
- CAMHS
- CAMHS Neurodevelopmental Pathway
- Cognition and Learning Team
- Crisis Response
- Education Psychology Service
- Emotional Wellbeing for Effective Learning Team
- Learning Difficulties and Disability Support Service
- Mental Health Support Team
- Movement Difficulties Service
- Occupational Therapy
- School counsellor
- School Nurse Team
- Social Care and Health Team
- Speech and Language Therapy
We encourage these professionals to visit school as often as possible to work with our staff and share their expertise. Wherever possible, staff implement programmes of work linked to these professionals e.g. speech and language programmes, exercises recommended by physical therapists etc.
