The SENDcast

On this week's podcast we will be discussing how to support children with emotionally based school phobia/avoidance. For this conversation, Dale is joined by Dr Tina Rae. Tina is a consultant psychologist with over 30 year's experience working with children, adults and families. We know that our children and young people who already have existing mental health issues will be finding the current lockdown experience particularly stressful and increased levels of anxiety will be the norm. However, it is probably also the case that every child will be experiencing higher levels of stress and anxiety at this time and that when they do eventually return to the school context there will enormous emotional and psychological hurdles to overcome. The need to provide support for increased levels of anxiety and managing the transition to a 'new normal' will be on-going. Resources: Rae, T. (2020) A Toolbox of Wellbeing Helpful strategies and activities for children, teens, their carers and teachers Buckingham: Hinton House Publishers Rae, T., Such, A. & Wood, J. (2020) The Well Being Tool Kit for Mental health leads in schools A comprehensive Training Resource to Support Emotional Wellbeing in Education and Social Care Buckingham: Hinton House Publishers Rae, T. (2019) The Transition Tool Box Nurturing Effective Transition to Secondary school London: NurtureUK West Sussex County Council Educational Psychology Service (2004) Emotionally Based School Refusal: Guidance for Schools and Support Agencies. West Sussex County Council, West Sussex Educational Psychology Service. Anxiety UK 03444 775 774 (helpline) 07537 416 905 (text) anxietyuk.org.uk Advice and support for people living with anxiety. Childline 0800 1111 childline.org.uk Support for children and young people in the UK, including a free 24-hour helpline.

In this episode we are revisiting anxiety and simply asking the question what is anxiety? Alison Knowles returns to help us explore this. Alison is an emotional therapist. This does not mean that she often cries during therapy. She supports emotional resilience. In this episode we are talking about the reality you created and the impact this has on you. Useful Links https://www.facebook.com/OllieandhisSuperPowers https://twitter.com/bemoreollie https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCWDj-PRjboIg2cu-KZsEMVA https://www.instagram.com/ollie_and_his_super_powers

In this episode Dale is joined by Natalie Packer to talk about how to support NQTs to meet the needs of pupils with SEND. With very little Initial Teacher Training around SEND, they have a lot to learn in supporting pupils with SEND. Yet, they will be supporting pupils with SEND from their first day of teaching. Schools need to provide support and training. This is a special episode, it is our first birthday! We are a year old!!! I would like to thank everyone who has been involved with the SENDCast, all our guests and our team who produce the podcast, manage the social media and help make this podcast happen. And finally, thank you to all of you, our listeners. In a year we have had over 30,000 listens!! This is abosultely phenomenal and all the feeback we have received has been amazing and it is great seeing it shared on social media so thank you everyone! Useful Links: Effective SEND practice in ITT - https://www.sendgateway.org.uk/whole-school-send/send-research/ Teachers' Standards: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/teachers-standards Early careers framework - https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/773705/Early-Career_Framework.pdf SEND induction checklist - Natalie Packer (to send) SEN Support and the graduated approach nasen mini guide: https://www.sendgateway.org.uk/r/sen-support-and-the-graduated-approach-nasen-miniguide.html Special Educational Needs in mainstream schools, EEF guidance report - https://educationendowmentfoundation.org.uk/tools/guidance-reports/special-educational-needs-disabilities/ SEN Support: Research evidence …document by DfE: https://www.sendgateway.org.uk/r/sen-support-research-evidence-on-effective-approaches-and-examples-of-current-practice-in-good-and-outstanding-schools-and-colleges.html My book - https://www.amazon.co.uk/Teachers-Guide-SEN-Natalie-Packer/dp/1785830252 Focus On training for staff available at www.nasen.org SEND Reflection framework - https://www.sendgateway.org.uk/send-review/ SEND videos for NQTs (coming soon) – will be available at https://www.sendgateway.org.uk/whole-school-send/find-wss-resources.html Contact Natalie Packer Website – www.nataliepacker.co.uk Email – n.packer174@btinternet.com Twitter – @NataliePacker For more podcast episodes from the SENDcast click below… https://www.thesendcast.com/sendcast-episodes/

In this week's podcast, Dale Pickles from B Squared is joined by Lana Grant to discuss supporting mental health in primary aged children. There has been a history of a lack of support for children's mental health. It needs to change. Lana has a diagnosis of Asperger syndrome and is also a parent of children on the autism spectrum Lana is a specialist SEN advisor and an advocate for SEN children and their families. Lana has worked Lara's first book "From Here To Maternity, pregnancy and motherhood on the Autism Spectrum" was published in 2015. Lana also contributes to various articles, podcast and delivers talks at various shows and events. Over the last 5 years, as a country we have started to realise the importance of mental health, but we aren't always following through. We talk about how important mental health is, but are we making changes to support each other and especially children? There is lots of discussion in the media about how many children are suffering and will suffer due to COVID. There is limited support for those young people. Increasingly the responsibility is being pushed to school staff who are not trained to offer this support and feel that they don't get enough support themselves to deal with this topic. This is a timebomb waiting to explode and with the current pandemic is likely to increase. Mental health should be everyone's business. We need to empower people to know how they can help, what to look out for and when to involve specialist services. Useful Links Young Minds - https://youngminds.org.uk/ Mental Health Foundation - https://www.mentalhealth.org.uk/a-to-z/c/children-and-young-people NHS - https://www.nhs.uk/oneyou/every-mind-matters/youth-mental-health/ Childline - https://www.childline.org.uk/ MindEd - https://mindedforfamilies.org.uk/young-people Contact Lana Grant Website – www.lana-grant.co.uk Email – enquiries@lana-grant.co.uk Twitter – @LanaGrantAutism For more podcast episodes from the SENDcast click below… https://www.thesendcast.com/sendcast-episodes/

On this week's show Dale welcomes back Dr. Tina Rae. Tina is a consultant psychologist with over 30 year's experience working with children, adults and families. Dale and Tina discuss self harm, how we can understand and support our children and young people. Self-harm is an area of concern for all of us who support CYP in order to foster well-being and mental health. There are many myths and general misunderstandings about this topic so it is essential given the current pandemic and increased levels of stress for our CYP that we all feel able to support them effectively. Useful Links: Rae, T. (2014) Optimus Safeguarding Hub 19.9.14. Listening to children: What helps children to disclose? Rae, T. (2015) Optimus Safeguarding Hub 10.4.15 Supporting the well-being of the DSP for child protection: listening to traumatised children Rae, T. (2015) Optimus Teaching and Learning Hub 16.4.15 Helping pupils to manage stress Rae, T. (2016) Introducing the topic of self-harm in schools: developing an educational and preventative support intervention Education and Health. 34(2) Rae, T. & Hershey, G. (2019) Mental health and girls on the autism spectrum, in Carpenter, B., Happe, F. & Egerton, J. (eds) Girls and Autism Educational, Family and Personal perspectives. London: Routledge Rae, T. & Walshe, J. (2017) Understanding and Preventing Self-harm in schools Effective Strategies for Identifying Risk and Providing Support Buckingham: Hinton House Publishers Rae, T. & Giles, P. (2018) The Essential Guide to using cognitive behaviour therapy (CBT) with children and young people Buckingham: Hinton House Publishers Rae, T., Bunn, H. &. Walshe, J. (2018) The Essential Guide to using Positive Psychology with children and young people Buckingham: Hinton House Publishers Rae, T., Such, A. & Wood, J. (2020) The Well Being Tool Kit for Mental health leads in schools A comprehensive Training Resource to Support Emotional Wellbeing in Education and Social Care Buckingham: Hinton House Publishers

This week's show is all about neurodiversity. What does it mean, is it a positive term or is it a negative term. Our guest is Fintan O'Regan, Fintan is a trainer and consultant for schools and school support systems including, Social Services, Health, the Police and Foster carers. He supports them by providing behaviour management strategies for children and families struggling with SEND and behaviour issues. Before this he has worked with a number of organisations including NASEN, Institute of Education, Leicester University, the UK ADHD Network and the European ADHD Alliance. And before all of this he was a headteacher of a specialist school for students with ADHD, ASD an ODD.

In this episode we are talking about the role of the Governing Board in relation to SEND with Kate Browning. Kate is an independent SEND Consultant who focuses on school improvement for SEND. She has been a SENCo, SEN advisory teacher, local authority school improvement officer for SEND and interim Education Development Officer for NASEN. She teaches the NASENCo course for the university of Northampton and lectures for the university of Warwick on their PGCE programme. In her spare time Kate facilitates the SENCo network across Leicestershire, Warwickshire and Derbyshire, supports Governors and is also a Chair of Governors.

In this episode Dale is joined by Alison Knowles to discuss breaking down limiting beliefs and how you can take control rather than be controlled by your emotions. Alison is an emotional therapist. This does not mean that she often cries during therapy. She supports emotional resilience. In this episode we are talking about the reality you created and the impact this has on you. Useful Links https://www.facebook.com/OllieandhisSuperPowers https://twitter.com/bemoreollie https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCWDj-PRjboIg2cu-KZsEMVA https://www.instagram.com/ollie_and_his_super_powers

Natalie Packer, an independent education consultant specializing in SEND, shares insights on ensuring all children have access to high-quality teaching. She emphasizes the importance of teacher responsibility for SEND and the link to effective practices. Topics include assessing true learning, the balance of challenge and flow in lessons, and the pivotal role of engagement. Natalie also highlights strategies for maximizing teaching assistant impact and the need for a whole-school approach to create inclusive environments.

Joining Dale today is Lana Grant. Lana has a diagnosis of Asperger syndrome and is also a parent of children on the autism spectrum Lana is a specialist SEN advisor and an advocate for SEN children and their families. Lana's first book "From Here To Maternity, pregnancy and motherhood on the Autism Spectrum" was published in 2015. Lana also contributes to various articles, podcasts and delivers talks at various shows and events. She definitely outranks Dale when it comes to discussing autism. There have been a number of portrayals of autism in films and TV series. They portray a simplistic view of autism. They are socially awkward, or struggle to socialise, but amazing at maths or recognising patterns. For a lot of the population, this is how they see autism. But this is not how all people with autism present.