How tangible is inclusive practice? While highly visible ‘additional’ and ‘different’ practices are often the easiest to see, they should also be treated with caution.
Every day, teachers in classrooms and leaders in schools hold themselves and each other to account for pupils with SEND. Whether to serve pupils, families, governors or an inspection framework, education is busy with people checking their own and each others’ practice.
Around SEND, then, what does success look like? If schools prioritise a whole-setting ownership of SEND provision, then every leader is a leader of SEND. And as such, every leader is responsible for the delivery of inclusive provision – in their own practice, and in how they monitor and develop others’ practice. And so, every leader needs to know ‘what a good one looks like’.
But what does good look like?
I argued in a recent blog that the ‘additional to or different from’ agenda can create issues for school leaders. It can risk foregrounding alternative approaches rather than considering how universal approaches can be the cornerstone of inclusive practice – invisible inclusion.
A teacher might, for example, create the right environment, communicate adeptly, check the understanding of all pupils and give help to pupils as and when they need it. To the onlooker, pupils with SEND may not be getting anything additional from or different to their peers. Their support is, to the untrained eye, invisible. But those pupils could well be thriving.
The wrong proxies?
All leaders therefore need to be able to recognise good inclusive practice – and it isn’t always easy.
A line manager might tick off that a child has indeed got a TA sitting next to them; they might not see that now is the right time for that TA to try moving away from the pupil, supporting their steps towards independence.
A subject leader might praise a teacher for providing pupils with a scaffold, without seeing that this particular scaffold negates the need for the pupil to think, and therefore gets in the way of the learning.
A governor might note favourably that pupils with SEND are completing separate work to their peers, without seeing the impact such an approach could have on those pupils’ beliefs about their ability to access classroom learning.
A complex issue
The issue with any potentially unhelpful practices is that many of them are useful sometimes. In the examples above, great provision will typically include some learning support from additional adults in the classroom, some scaffolded resources and some differentiated work.
The answer lies in not looking for quick answers. The answer lies in schools implementing good systems, asking the right questions and developing the right curiosities, so that provision truly meets need:
Implementing good systems – making sure SEND is embedded in professional discussions, meeting cycles, learning walk processes and more, with subject and phase leaders working closely alongside a SENCO to obtain an accurate, expert and shared understanding of practice.
Asking the right questions – are our pupils with SEND able to meaningfully access our curriculum? Are pupils engaged in their learning? Are pupils experiencing success? Are pupils required to think hard about their learning? Are pupils happy? Are barriers being removed?
Developing the right curiosities – I wonder what’s possible if I…provide an example…reduce adult support…break down instructions…find more opportunities for praise…raise the difficulty level…give a bit more time before intervening…give a bit less time before intervening.
These rely on the main thing our sector has too little of – time. But truly understanding the learning experience of pupils with SEND is hard. It’s about pupil and parent voice, but not only that. It’s about summative data, but not exclusively. It’s about learning walk feedback from leaders, but not in a tickbox manner.
The professional curiosity of teachers
More than anything, perhaps, it’s about the professional curiosity of teachers around how they plan, deliver and reflect on their lessons. It’s about how they bring that curiosity to discussions with colleagues, working through challenges, forming hypotheses and considering next steps together, knowing that the most visible strategies aren’t always the most effective.
And as such, it’s about leaders’ ability to provide the time, space and professional support for such discussions to take place. It’s about leaders prioritising deep thinking and careful discussion about the classroom experience of pupils with SEND, so that even the least visible practices get the praise and recognition they deserve.
