The purpose of education for all children is the same,

the goals are the same.

The help that individual children need in progressing towards them may be different.

(SEND Policy for St Vigor & St John Church School and The Mill Nursery)

 Welcome to St Vigor and St John Church School SEND page.

We have placed some useful resources for children and parents at the top of this page and moved our usual SEND documents lower down.

Feel free to browse each section, watch the videos and use any resources as you need to!

Take care and keep safe. Mrs Mapstone 

Thrive

At St Vigor and St John Church School we are fortunate to be able to offer Thrive to every single child in our school. The Thrive approach to supporting healthy social and emotional wellbeing in children from birth to adulthood draws on the latest research into brain science, child development theory and attachment theory. It helps us to understand how the brain develops, and how parents, teachers and other professionals can best support this development by providing the best experiences for the children at each stage.

For all of us at St Vigor and St John Church School , our first priority is to care for every child in a secure, friendly environment enabling them to enjoy their time in school and feel confident to learn. In order to maintain this ethos, the staff team work together to support children’s emotional and social learning, we maintain this attitude during lesson times, break times and through all activities that take place throughout the day to make sure our children feel secure in school. This method is called the Thrive Approach.

Not all children can put their needs into words every time they experience a different emotion, but the way children behave can tell us a lot about how they are feeling. The Thrive Approach draws on the latest research – from current neuroscience, recent attachment research, current studies of effective learning and current models of child development – in order to help our school to understand the needs being signalled by children’s behaviour. It gives us targeted strategies and activities to help them re-engage with learning and life.

Unfortunately, (like all of us at some point in our lives), children may face challenges that knock them off course. What is needed then is understanding and support to get them back on track. Many children will respond to the care, understanding and support given by parents, family, friends and teachers. However, some children need a little bit extra to enable them to:

• Feel good about themselves

• Know that they matter

• Become more resilient and resourceful

• Have a positive place in society

• Form trusting, rewarding relationships

• Be creative

• Be compassionate and empathetic

• Be thoughtful and self-aware

• Be productive

• Be able to overcome difficulties and setbacks

Children who need a little bit of extra help are identified through a variety of ways such as our whole-class screening process, by class teachers, or through communication with families. For some children there may be an obvious reason why they need a bit of extra support. This might be bereavement, family break down or an identified medical condition such as ADHD. For others, there can be no obvious trigger to why they are finding some aspects of school and/or home life difficult.  Working closely with parents and class teachers, our Thrive team carry out full assessments of identified children’s social, emotional and behavioural needs. This helps us to build a bespoke Thrive Action Plan of activities to support their needs.

We have two licensed Thrive Practitioners at St Vigor and St John Church School (Mrs Ceri Mapstone and Mrs Suzanne Phillips) and we spend time three times a year reprofiling and evaluating all the Thrive work that we do across our whole school in order to measure its effectiveness with each group of children.

How will my child be involved in Thrive?

We use a tool called Thrive-Online® which assesses, reviews and identifies the
developmental needs of individuals or groups and suggests actions plans to meet these
needs so that children can move forward and fulfil their potential in all areas of learning and life beyond the classroom.

Who receives Thrive support?

Every child will be included in our Thrive – Class Action Plan which will be embedded into learning and teaching as well as our nurture opportunities that we provide our whole class groups. Class teachers and teaching assistants implement these Action Plans through creative and purposeful activities that meet the specific cohorts social and emotional needs.

We have 1:1 and small group Thrive sessions for specific children who require additional support.

Thrive Room

We have a dedicated Thrive space within our school with a range of high quality resources, like puppets, games, books, toys, sand strays and creative materials. We have a comfortable area for sitting together. The space is set up to be a relaxing spot with soft furnishings with a den space and soft lighting.