Becky

Fully qualified teacher and SENCo. Available in person.

With over 16 years’ teaching experience and as a fully qualified SENCo, I have advised, monitored and provided interventions for many children with Special Educational Needs ensuring that they are making progress both in the school setting and at home. I work closely with parents to advise and guide on next steps, and how these might be achieved. I have written many EHC plans, conducted annual reviews and liaised with multiple outside agencies to ensure the best outcomes for children with SEND. I have taught the full National Curriculum with experience in Early Years, at Key Stage 1 and at Key Stage 2. I  also have experience of working with students in Key Stage 3, particularly in the areas of dyscalculia, dyslexia, ASD and developing self esteem. I have taught all elements of the primary mathematics curriculum to the end of year 6 including the 1:1 tutoring of many children, with excellent results.

My skills and experience developing trusting and meaningful relationships with children with SEND: The trusting relationship is at the core of learning for any child and this need is magnified for children with SEND. Throughout my career, I have been able to make connections with children which, over time, develop in to meaningful relationships. Once trust is established, children feel safe enough to take the risk of learning something new.

My specialist skills and experience teaching students with autism:  I have worked with many children at both primary and secondary levels with a diagnosis of autistic spectrum disorder (ASD). As each child with autism presents with vastly different strengths and needs, I have learnt that building a relationship is crucial to children making accelerated progress – in every session I am learning which strategies work well and am tweaking activities to individual interests and learning styles. Many children with ASD need additional support with developing speech and language; this might be by practising speech in tutoring sessions or developing expressive speech to explain or describe thoughts. It may also involve unpicking receptive speech to help the child with increasing their ability to comprehend and therefore to focus.

My specialist skills and experience working with children with anxiety: In my experience, the best way of supporting children with anxiety is by creating a learning climate which is positive, secure and open. I encourage children to try and identify how they are feeling and what might help them if they are struggling. This might be a break, an informal discussion or a more structured approach, for example learning about the whole range of human emotions through Kuypers’ zones of regulation.

My skills and experience teaching children with PDA:  Success in teaching children with PDA comes from the tutor developing a personalised,  flexible approach. Very often, children actually want to do the activity that they have just declined, so it takes patience, kindness and knowledge of the child to find a way around initial refusals. Strategies that can work are in using indirect language e.g. “We could do ….” or “I’m wondering about…”  and in providing choices in activities, resources and timings.

My experience teaching young children with sensory and/or auditory processing needs: Many children with SEND will also have heightened sensitivity to the world around them via the five senses. It is crucial to first identify their sensory needs through discussion with parents/carers as well as recognising early signs of stress caused by sensory overload. Tutoring sessions will aim to minimise sensory overload where possible, and ear defenders (for auditory processing) can be worn as needed.

My specialist skills and experience teaching children with speech and language needs:    I have recent experience of the PACT (paediatric autism communication therapy) approach to developing communication for children with low levels of speech.  I have worked closely with speech and language therapists and followed up their recommendations for 1:1 work with children. I like to weave the speech and language activities into various parts of my lesson, and to keep them varied and fun. I adjust my language to help develop understanding and build in repetition of focus sounds and words to consolidate understanding. I ensure that resources used for developing speech and language are prepared in advance and are of interest to the child.

My experience teaching children social interaction and friendship skills: In a school setting, social interaction and friendship skills can be taught through sharing social stories, running a focused nurture group and taking time to reflect on misunderstandings with peers. In the home situation, I have also shared social stories and used facial emotion recognition resources if needed.  I have also shared scenarios through pictures and video that develop understanding of particular social interactions. This approach can sometimes lead to role play, which offers children an experience of learning how to develop friendship skills in a safe space.

My skills and experience with boosting confidence and self esteem: Establishing a trusting relationship with a child links closely with boosting their self esteem and confidence. As part of my teaching, I give ongoing support and encouragement with meaningful praise. Working closely with the student means that I have excellent knowledge of the small steps they are making in their learning, and the best boost to their confidence is in recognising their own progress. Targets towards increased independence should be clear and achievable, and progress towards these might come in small steps.

My specialist experience providing engaging sessions: My aim is allow children to develop their own agency for learning, and I have found that this is most likely to happen by creating engaging experiences for the children I am tutoring. Wherever there is an opportunity, I will follow the child’s lead. Sessions are bespoke; they are highly resourced and researched and will usually lead to high levels of engagement.

My specialist skills and experience supporting students to develop their independence: As sessions gain momentum and the child begins to make progress, it is important to develop the child’s awareness that the change is, in fact, down to their own efforts. In this way, I can draw attention to the fact that the child is gaining skills and ultimately developing their own independence. Carefully planned trips in to the community can also give children important new experiences to develop their independence.

My specialist skills and experience teaching students with dyslexia: I have developed insight into the needs of children with dyslexia and plan my sessions according to the areas that remain insecure. Precision teaching is a highly effective method of teaching reading to children with dyslexia. This technique involves teaching a group of the same words in multiple different ways, so that over time recognition becomes fully embedded. I have also found that matching texts to children’s interests is often highly motivational. Teaching reading to children with dyslexia will often include high levels of repetition – the challenge to the 1:1 tutor is to make sure that the teaching remains interesting and fun.

My specialist skills and experience teaching students with working memory difficulties: Common to many specific learning difficulties are problems with working memory. The job of the 1:1 tutor is to help the child to recognise and develop strategies that support their short term memory. These might be, for example, working with short pieces of text then checking understanding before moving on, sequencing next steps very clearly, asking the student to unpick and explain questions, asking a student to read then teach me, highlighting key words and/or taking notes. Through practise and repetition, children develop the combined skills they need to improve their short term recall.

My experience teaching Study Skills and Executive Functioning skills: Many children with SEND will need additional support with developing study and executive functioning skills. I have wide experience of making clear to children how they learn – this is known as metacognition, or having an understanding  of how we learn best as individuals. Children may benefit from explicit instructions on next steps, timetabling, revision techniques and how to meet deadlines comfortably.

My specialist skills and experience teaching students with global developmental delay: I have experience of tutoring children with global development delay including Down’s Syndrome. Some of these children had very limited speech and I have made multiple different visual and aural adaptations to ensure that I could advance their understanding. Children I have taught with global developmental delay have made measurable progress in their learning. This progress is underpinned by developing trusting relationships with children and  and teaching to individual strengths and interests. The planning of sessions needs to be completely personalised so that children can build on the small steps they have just made.

My specialist skills and experience teaching English: I have taught many children whose primary need is their difficulty with developing skills and understanding of English. This includes 1:1 experience of teaching phonics and early reading, right through to developing fluency and skills of deducing and scanning texts for key information. I have helped many children who find decoding reading relatively easy, but need help with developing strategies for understanding what they have read, discussing  it and answering comprehension questions. As the building blocks of reading take shape for children, their writing skills develop alongside. The joy of supporting writing 1:1 is to provide children with writing stimuli that they find exciting, then to teach them ways of remembering the rules of writing that are personalised to the individual.

My specialist skills and experience teaching maths: I have supported many children who struggle with maths, some with a diagnosis of dyscalculia. Underpinning the difficulty for all of these children is understanding number, and the number system. So following an initial assessment, number work needs to become secure through high levels of repetition –  often using concrete materials to aide visualisation. Children with dyscalculia also have exceptional difficulty recognising mathematical pattern and many carry enduring misconceptions relating to the four operations. The success I have had working with children who struggle with maths has been in unpicking their misconceptions then reteaching with high levels of repetition until understanding is consolidated. Functional maths is key to the planning and teaching of mathematics so that dyscalculic children can become proficient in dealing with money, telling the time and reading timetables. My over all aim is to demystify mathematics for children, and most importantly, to show them that they have the skills and tools to tackle new problems independently.

My specialist skills and experience with working with children with ADHD: I have wide experience of teaching children with ADHD both in the classroom and in a 1:1 setting. The strategies I have found to be highly effective are teaching to a child’s interest where possible and offering short, interactive activities to break learning down into manageable chunks. I often alternate the teaching of preferred subjects with less preferred subjects and, if problems arise, I agree adjustments with the child so that we can reframe the work and find a way forward. Children with ADHD want to learn, so my priority is to find what works best with individual children and to use non-confrontational ways to get around difficulties. Communication is key to success, and I  always aim to communicate kindly, clearly and with consistency.

My skills and experience teaching children with medical needs: In my career to date, I have worked with several children with medical needs that required hospital treatment and adaptations of the school environment. I am accustomed to working within a multidisciplinary team to ensure the best possible outcomes are available for children with medical needs.

My specialist skills and experience teaching students with processing difficulties: I have wide experience of supporting children who take time with processing information. Led by my observations of working with the child, I provide the support they need to understand content before moving on. Effective strategies for this include giving plenty of time, checking for full understanding via questioning, providing summaries and asking questions interspersed through the session – some of which are games, and fun!

My specialist skills and experience teaching children with social, emotional and mental health (SEMH) needs: It is common for children with SEND needs to also have a SEMH need. In each case, I have worked closely with the student to understand how they are feeling, which triggers may contribute to this, and the strategies that might help them. I have worked with children who were able to make accelerated progress once a containing, trusting relationship has been formed. I have worked closely on recommendations from educational psychologists and liaised with CAMHs to ensure the best outcomes for children with SEMH needs.

My specialist skills and experience supporting students with SEND in the community – forest schools, soft play etc: Learning does not need to be confined to the classroom or home – many formative learning experiences happen in our local communities or even further afield. I have supported many children with SEND in overcoming obstacles and attending school trips, such as museums and residential outward bound trips. I have also supported SEND students with swimming, cinema trips, at soft play facilities and outdoor learning venues such as forest school.

My specialist skills and experience teaching students with writing, grammar, spelling and punctuation challenges (SPAG): I have helped numerous children to improve their writing skills by analysing their next small step, then providing meaningful stimulus to practise the identified areas. I have wide experience of teaching grammar, spelling and punctuation (SPAG) with a proven track record of students achieving excellent results in end of year 6 assessment. To support younger writer’s progress I use a mix of  strategies  – whatever engages the child – including  playing word games, completing story boards and using colourful semantics.