Education (primary)
Information about Wiltshire based services and learning to support Primary age SEND students.
This information is aimed at children 5 to 11 years, primary school. If your child has started secondary school then you may find more relevant information at Secondary (11 to 16 years).
Are you accessing all the help available for the cost of childcare? Childcare Choices is a Government website that can help you see what you may be entitled to. For more information on free entitlement and the Disability Fund, visit Early years and childcare.
Primary schools, special schools and resource bases in Wiltshire
Information and links for professionals and parents regarding SEND educational placements in Wiltshire.
For more information please visit:
Wiltshire EMTAS is a Wiltshire Council service, supporting schools to meet the needs of learners of English as an Additional Language (EAL) and other minority ethnic children and young people, including Travellers.
The service consists of:
- Bilingual Assistants (peripatetic Teaching Assistants who work alongside learners in the classroom and support with home/school contact)
- Specialist TAs who work to support the achievement of Traveller children and help built strong, effective home/school partnerships
- Advisory Teachers (who support schools with raising their own capacity through advice and training, and who can assess learners and make recommendations about provision)
- A Special Projects worker, who works on specific interventions designed to narrow the gaps for learners
Schools can refer individual children to us via the Specific Agency Referral Form (SARF) or the DART.
For anything else, or for more informal advice contact Steven Donohue:
Tel: 01225 75793
Email: emas@wiltshire.gov.uk
More information is available at Right choice.
Wiltshire Council provides a range of sessions on parenting across various ages and specialities.
Time Out for Parents
No diagnosis or EHCP required.
Children with Special Needs (TOFP) is for parents and carers of children with additional or special needs aged 3-11 years. TOFP courses are 2 hours per week for 7 sessions and are free of charge. A medical or formal diagnosis is not required for parents and carers to attend. Wiltshire Council are working in partnership with the Wiltshire Parent Carer Council to offer these courses.
For further information and how to book courses please visit:
Autism Parent Program
SWAPP is a partnership programme between parents and their child's setting or school that aims to build an understanding of autism and the challenges and delights it can present.
The programme aims to empower families and staff who are closely involved in supporting a child or young person with autism.
Sessions cover all aspects of autism including communication, sensory issues and behaviour.
For more information and booking details please visit:
For further parenting programme details please visit Parenting Programmes.
- sensory needs can be difficulties with any sense. It is most commonly difficulties with vision or hearing. However, especially among children and young people with autistic spectrum disorders, it can also include challenges with sense of touch or reaction to strong smells or noise levels
- social, emotional and mental health needs relates to how children and young people respond to situations and environments they find themselves in and how they form and maintain relationships
- cognitive and learning needs relates to how a child or young person understands, processes and retains information and therefore, how they are able, or struggle, to learn. For example those with dyslexia
- communication and interaction needs relates to how a child or young person expresses themselves and communicates with those around them. It is most commonly associated with challenges speaking, but can also include children and young people who struggle to express or understand their emotions or to make it clear how they feel
- physical and medical needs are those associated with a child's or young person's body or health. This is most commonly associated with challenges in movement or independent personal care. However, it may include a range of illnesses, or bodily difficulties that affect a child or young person in a setting
Personal budget
A personal budget is the money Wiltshire Council allocates to an individual to meet their assessed support needs.
An outcome based assessment will be carried out to establish an approximate figure for how much the council would need to spend to meet an individual's needs.
Types of personal budget:
A personal SEN budget is a sum of money made available to an educational setting by a local council, above and beyond the basic funding settings receive for all children and young people (top up funding), to allow them to meet a child or young person's educational need. This budget will be used to support a child or young person to achieve pre-agreed educational outcomes. The need for a personal budget is considered as part of the statutory assessment. If you have questions about this you can talk to your lead worker if you have one, or call our single point of contact.
You can read the policy information and further guidance on personal budgets in the document library.
For schools, parents, and other commissioners of alternative provision
Alternative provision (AP) refers to something in which a learner participates: As part of their regular timetable, away from the site of the school and not led by school staff or by parents.
AP can be 'Commissioned' by schools/ parents/ carers and learners who have been given a budget to manage their educational needs.
Commissioners refers to: Schools or parents of a learner and/or learner, who has been granted a personal budget to meet the outcomes detailed in the learner's EHCP Note. While schools can commission alternative provision for any learner at risk of exclusion or to reengage learners in their education, only those parents/learners who have a personal budget can commission Alternative Provision.
Each educational establishment will have a strategy to support SEN learners and may use their budget in different ways, if they access AP it will be to choose available provision best suited to the individuals needs where possible. For learners with an EHCP there may be additional budget allocated to allow for specific support dependent on reviewing the learners needs. This can be discussed in annual reviews or during initial evaluations. EHCPs always include a section for the voice of parent/carers and the individual to suggest support they feel might benefit them, these suggestions are taken seriously and included with discussions around the plan.
Wiltshire Council has a directory which can be found via Right Choice of providers which have had a level of quality assurance vetting, this helps commissioners get a head start but does not replace the commissioner responsibilities (information can be found in the AP guide). The directory is not definitive, if you have links with a provider that you might like to work with and they are not listed on the Wiltshire Approved Alternative Provision directory, please ask the provider to contact alternativeprovision@wiltshire.gov.uk for further details.
The most up to date information and support can always be found on the platform for Wiltshire SEN professionals: Right Choice: Alternative Provision resources
Email alternativeprovision@wiltshire.gov.uk to answer any further questions not covered by the Right Choice materials.
All mainstream primary schools have Enhanced Learning Provision (ELP).
This is for all the learning needs described in the SEN Code of Practice under the headings Cognition and Learning, and Communication and Interaction.
For example specific learning difficulties such as:
- dyslexia
- dyspraxia
- autistic spectrum disorders
- language and communication difficulties
- moderate learning difficulties
Universal and targeted support
Parents / carers told us that they often have to rely on word of mouth to understand what 'good' education support looks like. Every educational setting will approach support for young people with special educational needs slightly differently, but we have worked with schools and educational specialists to capture a standard offer. This includes mainstream, special and independent schools.
Specialist Support
Children with long-term or complex special educational needs will need specialist support. This is the kind of support provided for children who meet the statutory threshold. These are the children who have an Education, Health and Care plan.
This type of support is completely person-centred, which means it will vary depending on an individual's needs. A separate section on EHCP explains how this works.
The following services all support learners to access the education they need. This may be by providing training to supporting professionals or parent/carers, they also cover a wide range of specialisms in equipment and holistic practices.
The Specialist SEN Service (SSENS) is a team of Specialist Advisory Teachers, supporting children and young people as part of Wiltshire Council's 0 to 25 SEND Service. We specialise in practical and realistic teaching and learning strategies which are underpinned by current educational research. Each Specialist Advisory Teacher has extensive experience and has undertaken specialist training.
We help schools and settings understand and meet the needs of children and young people with identified or suspected special educational needs and/or disabilities. All of the SSENS Team are expert and enthusiastic about minimising the impact of additional learning needs in the classroom.
You can read more by visiting the services home page, they also have a resource area with learning guidance helpful to parents/ carers and professionals:
The Behaviour Support Service comprises a team of specialist teachers and trained behaviour support assistants with extensive skills and experience of working with Wiltshire maintained schools, academies and independent schools to develop and maintain a positive behaviour support ethos and to promote pro social pupil behaviour and emotional wellbeing.
You can find more information and contact details on the teams Right Choice page, please visit:
Every Wiltshire maintained primary school and academy has a named behaviour support teacher. Contact the Behaviour Support Teacher allocated to your school to discuss any support for the school.
Support for learners with visual impairments to gain independence and mobility skills
Registered Qualified Habilitation Specialists (RQHS), train Children and Young People (C/YP) in any aspect or activity of day-to-day life that may be tricky due to Vision Impairment (VI), to help them to acquire new skills and to enable maximum levels of independence. Habilitation involvement is based on a continuum of proactive support rather than reactive intervention.
For more information please visit:
The Hearing Support Team is part of the Sensory Impairment, Physical and Medical Service within the Special Educational Needs and Disability Service. We are a team of specialist staff, comprising qualified teachers of the deaf and teaching assistants working to promote the educational inclusion and achievement of children and young people with a diagnosed hearing loss.
For more information please visit:
The Physical and Medical Support Team aim to improve provision, support and resources for Wiltshire Children and Young People who have a Physical Disability or Complex Medical need in settings. Support is available for the child and young person, their family and educational staff.
To find out more about this service please visit:
The Vision Support team are a team of specialist staff, comprising of Qualified Teachers for Vision Impairment (QTVIs) and Specialist Sensory Teaching Assistants (SITAs) and a Habilitation Specialist. We work to promote the educational inclusion and achievement of children and young people who have a diagnosed vision impairment.
To find out more about this service please visit:
Educational psychology (Word doc) [24KB] (opens new window)
Our OPAL resource is an interactive web-based resource, with supporting development network, which defines what provision education settings should ordinarily make available for children and young people.
You can find out more by visiting:
To find more specific statutory information or guidance for parent/ carers or professionals supporting SEND please visit our SEND resources section which is linked below:
Teaching hubs provide a range of specialised expertise to support schools across a range of topics. In Wiltshire schools can utilise the following:
Ramsbury English Hub
Ramsbury DfE English Hub is based at Ramsbury Primary School, Wiltshire and provides support for infant, junior, primary and special schools across Wiltshire and surrounding areas.
They provide fully funded school to school support which is centered on 3 priority areas:
Age-appropriate phonics provision: encouraging best practice in Systematic Synthetic Phonics (SSP) teaching from Reception to the end of Key Stage 1, and as the primary teaching strategy throughout the school.
Promoting a love of reading: encouraging reading for enjoyment through a whole school reading approach; reading to every child at least once a day and encouraging reading at home; developing teachers' knowledge of children's texts and reading practices.
Early language development: providing evidence-based approaches to early language development and closing the word gap in school-based early years settings.
Their focus is on supporting the slowest progress children in Reception and Year 1 to ensure every child is successful, regardless of background, needs or abilities.
For more information please visit:
Mobius Maths Hub
Möbius Maths Hub is led by The Willink School and with the support of a number of strategic partners they aim to develop and spread excellent practice in the teaching of mathematics, for the benefit of all students. Using the unique Work Group format along with Teaching for Mastery, the programme is a collaborative process allowing all schools involved to understand and implement excellent teaching practice.
Möbius Maths Hub is one of a network of 40 Maths Hubs in England, working together within the Maths Hubs Programme, which began in 2014. The programme is funded by the Department for Education (DfE) and coordinated by the National Centre for Excellence in the Teaching of Mathematics (NCETM). Over the last 7 years the success of the Maths Hubs programme can be seen in the progression students have made at all stages of education with mathematical knowledge.
For more information please visit:
Swindon and Wiltshire Teaching Hub
Swindon & Wiltshire Teaching School Hub is a designated centre of excellence committed to providing high quality training and development to all teachers and leaders across the region. They are building a network of partners so that all teachers will be able to access the very best training and support whatever stage of their career they are at - from ITT right through to the new suite of leadership NPQs, through to the golden thread of teacher and leader development. They will be delivering the Early Careers Framework, National Professional Qualifications as well as other evidence informed CPD alongside access to the well-established networks and curriculum hubs across our region.
The Hub has a SEND CPD programme which you can find out about here: Swindon & Wiltshire Teaching School Hub SEND CPD programme. For more information about the Hub please visit their homepage:
Right Choice offers a wide variety of support services to all education providers, including Schools, Academies, Further Education Colleges, Early Years Providers, Childcare Settings and Local Authorities.
We want to ensure that educational settings have access to high quality services and expertise that enables them to focus on delivering educational excellence to all children and young people. We are committed to making a difference to children and young people in Wiltshire and increasing educational attainment for all students.
Wiltshire's Accessibility Strategy for Educational Settings
Our aim is for every child and young person in Wiltshire to have the opportunity to develop the skills and knowledge necessary to respond effectively to challenges of the future. We are committed to closing attainment gaps for disadvantaged learners and ensuring they reach their full potential.
Our Accessibility Strategy for Educational Settings 2016-19 (PDF) [514KB] (opens new window) sets out how we will further develop the accessibility of early years and childcare settings, maintained schools and under certain circumstances academies, for pupils parents carers and staff. Through engagement with children and young people, parents/carers and partners, our focus will be on access to:
- curriculum - increasing the extent to which pupils with SEND can access the Early Years Foundation Stage and schools curriculum to meet their potential and ensure progress
- environment - improving the physical environment of Early Years settings and schools to increase the extent to which pupils with SEND can take advantage of education and associated services
- information - improving the delivery to pupils with SEND and their parents and carers of information about the Early Years setting and school.
Primary schools information
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