Our expectations
We'd expect a school or other education provider to do everything they can to ensure your child or young person has the opportunity to progress and access the same learning as their classmates. This is known as reasonable adjustments. You'll find more information on this in Our Ordinarily Available Provision guidance for schools (pdf 838kb).
That might include:
- quiet working areas and sensory breaks
- regular opportunities and support to develop social/language skills
- flexible approaches to the timetable, including break and lunchtimes
- arrangements to make taking exams easier
- the use of visual supports for classroom teaching and learning (e.g. visual timetables and now and next boards and other visual prompts)
- making changes to the classwork to make learning easier
- adapting language to make communication more accessible
- the use of multi-sensory approaches
When a child or young person needs more specialist support, we'd expect a range of approaches which may include:
- specialist training for support staff such as Teaching Assistants
- additional support plans for your child eg.individual education plans, risk assessments, pen profiles
- organisations all working together to support your child
What other support is available?
The neurodiversity hub is an advice service offering support, signposting and guidance about a whole range of things including ADHD, Autism, distressed behaviours, anxiety and school.
SENDIASS provide an impartial information service for parents, carers and young people.
The Children and Young People’s (CYP) Speech and Language Therapy service offers a child- and family-centred approach to support CYP with speech, language, communication needs (SLCN)
The Autism Education Trust aims to improve educational access, experience and outcomes for autistic children and young people.
Schools can refer to the Special School Outreach Team for advice and support, focussing particularly on addressing concerns over learning.
Page was last updated on: 28/11/2025 09:51:45