Colin May offers guidance and advice to SEN teachers and support workers, identifying the key elements of successful teaching practice.
Over the past 40 years, I have worked with people with additional needs. I have felt inspired and energised by the children, young people and adults I have taught and worked with but as I am sure you have experienced too, it can be all too easy to become a little disheartened.
A good day can sometimes be tarnished by a difficult end and will be the one thing we reflect upon when we go home. However, now that I have retired from my post as a Deputy in a special school and can relax in my new role as a learning support assistant, I can happily ponder on the fantastic opportunities I have had and the many things I have learnt!
From me to you, here is what I feel is important in teaching and learning.
Getting the right team
There is never one thing that is the golden ticket to successful learning, but I do know that positive relationships are the key to all of our work. Just recently I attended a training day in a large, mainstream community secondary school on restorative approaches and was so heartened that the trainer focused from the start on the importance of developing genuine, empathetic and reciprocal relationships.
To ensure that we are valuing everything that our students bring, leaders must foster and model positive relationships with their team. I have had the benefit of working with an amazing head teacher who quietly demonstrated what she believed in through all of her interactions.
However, it’s important to note that no amount of role modelling can change the approaches of everyone so it is vital to ensure that you surround yourself with the right people from the start. This means people who share the same values, who are able to foster and develop and fundamentally, ensure that the needs of your students are at the heart of everything.
Effective training and learning
Teachers and supporting staff need to have access to regular, high-quality training and CPD. Granted, it is never easy to get people out of class or even attend training after school but ensuring that specialist training is gained, shared and embedded in practice is vital.
However, don’t always think external training is the best option. Good quality in-house training is where you can really ensure that the school’s values are communicated. Outcomes need to be reinforced through day-to-day conversations but nothing replaces those lovely moments in whole school training when you can see the room buzzing with conversation about a new initiative. Some of my most special memories over the years are of short, punchy whole school meetings where we are all together discussing things that really matter.
It’s also essential that you keep abreast of new developments but for me, there have been two fundamental learning initiatives that have formed the bedrock of my practice.
A workshop on Gentle Teaching, led by Dan Hobbs 25 years ago was so enlightening for me. His principle of interdependence, and the importance of loving and caring relationships seemed to encapsulate all that I had felt for years but had never really seen presented as a cohesive programme. When I began to embed the principles and understand the world from our students’ perspective, it really helped.
Equally, seeing the simple, intuitive work of Phoebe Caldwell has been crucial in my understanding of the fundamentals of communication. The importance of being able to observe and move into a young person’s world without imposing your own will or opinion is vital and to me, it’s the ‘Holy Grail’ when it comes to working with children and young people with additional needs.
Over the years, communicating these approaches to my team has been imperative, creating a common way of doing things. Sometimes I feel that we can be swept away by the latest scheme, diverted from what we know best – it is important that we hold on to those things that we know to be right.
Creative planning
An effective, flexible, focused, individualised, child friendly, responsive and meaningful curriculum should be what we deliver, but of course it is so hard to weave all that we feel is important into an integrated whole.
In my current role I am directly supporting children with additional needs. I could spend every evening planning and creating resources for the children I work with. However, to make learning truly individual and targeted, we need huge amounts of resources. But there are many tried and tested approaches out there that can help you.
The attention autism approach of Gina Davis has really helped me find ways to support children to focus and I am still a big fan of the Derbyshire scheme and the work of Charlotte Childs when it comes to speech and language resources.
Trying to fit everything together into an engaging whole is elusive. However, I have always tried to remember the words of education expert Charles Desforges who told us to ‘watch the till’ – make sure that what we are doing is making a difference.
Understanding our children
The progress around neurological research and understanding mental health has helped make huge strides in how we approach our children’s needs. Nobody ‘blames’ children for their anxiety and distress anymore. I have found the work of Dr Margot Sunderland and Dr Andrew Curran truly inspirational and it has had a clear impact on our practice in school. Likewise, the work of Louise Bomber on attachment and the research into early trauma is helping us to create an environment where we can focus on the individual needs of the child and contextualise their experiences.
I have been lucky enough to work at a time when we are really beginning to try and get to the heart of the needs of children with additional needs. There is a wealth of knowledge out there to ensure that we have the right tools and resources to get things just right for our children and young people. But what I do know is that we need to have the right team of people to use those tools, who are supportive, conscientious, reflective and kind. With the right group of people, working to a collective goal, our children and young people can, and will, flourish.
Author: Colin May
Colin May
Colin May was awarded SEN Leader of the Year at the 2021 nasen Awards.
