Today, we’re looking at what help is available for children under five with Special Educational Needs & Disabilities (‘SEND’, also sometimes referred to as ‘SEN and disabilities’). Good support for such children, particularly in their formative years, is of critical importance to their longer-term progress, well-being and success. Appropriate support, provided in a timely and tailored manner, can have a real, positive impact on outcomes for children’s lives.
An Environment of Inclusivity
It is important to foster an inclusive environment for children with SEND, including at childcare/early years settings like Little Cedars Nursery. Whatever their differences, we know it’s crucial for all children to feel safe, comfortable, valued, and loved, as well as being free to express themselves. It’s also important that all children, irrespective of ability/disability, are able to make friends and socialise freely. This is therefore nurtured at childcare settings like Little Cedars.
Changes can also be made to childcare environments like ours, where appropriate, to improve accessibility for children with special educational needs and disabilities.
Identifying SEND
Identification of a special educational need or disability is, of course, the first step in being able to properly support a child with SEND. For this reason, good early years providers like Little Cedars Nursery will, as a matter of course, watch out for signs of things that might be challenging for children. As prescribed by the EYFS approach to early years learning and development, such assessment will occur as part of the day-to-day activities at such nurseries, preschools and early years settings, as well as during more formal assessments like the Progress Check at 2. Childcare practitioners, the Key Person allocated to each individual child, and the setting’s Special Educational Needs Coordinator (SENCo) will usually all be involved in all assessment stages.
Parents will be alerted to any suspicions and indeed should alert childcare settings if they have a SEND-related concern regarding their child. After all, parents may well have more insight, as they know their child best.
External professionals including health visitors, paediatricians and professional specialists and therapists can also be brought in to help with assessments if deemed appropriate. Only once a possible special need or disability has been identified and evaluated is it possible to look at appropriate support options for a child.
Developing a Tailored Support Plan
Support plans for suspected or confirmed special needs or disabilities are then discussed and custom-designed for the child. Such plans will be agreed between the child’s parents/caregivers, staff at the early years setting itself and any external specialists or professionals involved in the child’s care. Such programmes will be customised to suit the individual child’s specific needs and may include tailored activities, strategies, resources and so on. Formalisation of the support programme will allow all parties to pull in the same direction, working cooperatively for the benefit of the child.
“Assess, Plan, Do and Review.”
Progress and the effectiveness of support plans will be evaluated continuously. Should the support plan require fine-tuning along the way, then adjustments will be made to suit the ongoing needs of the child. There is also possible recourse to request an Education, Health & Care (EHC) assessment of the child’s needs from the local authority if deemed appropriate and sanctioned by parents. Should one occur, then a new support plan may be devised.
Similarly, if the help of external experts is required, for example help from a speech and language therapist, this can be arranged as part of the support package for the child.
With the right support, “the great majority of children and young people with SEN or disabilities … can find work, be supported to live independently, and participate in their community.” (DfE)
Special Funding & the Area SENCo
In parallel to the SENCo at the child’s early years setting, local authorities also have their own Special Educational Needs Coordinator, known as the Area SENCo. They will also be integral to a child’s SEND support plan, helping with coordination between the local authority, the various parties involved in supporting the child, and in relation to any special funding requirements. If approved, special funding might be required, for example, for an additional member of staff tasked with giving one-to-one support to the child, or to fund extra learning resources and activities for them.
Area SENCos also continue to coordinate support for children with SEND through the transition from early years settings to school.
The ‘Local Offer’ Information Portal
Every local authority publishes information that informs families about the support available in their area for children and young people with special educational needs or disabilities. This is encapsulated in what’s known as The Local Offer. A Local Offer example for Streatham may help to illustrate the kind of help and resources available. Little Cedars Nursery is in the part of Streatham that falls within the London Borough of Wandsworth, and their Local Offer for SEND can be found here.
Funded Childcare for Under-5s with SEND
Parents may be wondering whether any free childcare is available for children with SEND. Here’s a quick snapshot of some of the options:
All 3- and 4-year-olds living in England are eligible for a minimum of 570 hours of free childcare per annum, irrespective of whether or not they have SEND. This is known as Universal Free Childcare or their Free entitlement and is typically taken as 15 hours of childcare each week over 38 weeks of the year, but how it is taken can differ. Learn more here.- In some circumstances, the above entitlement for 3- and 4-year-olds may be extended to 1140 hours per annum, equivalent to 30 hours of free childcare over 38 weeks of the year. This is known as Extended Free Childcare or the 30 hours scheme but, unlike with Universal Free Childcare, is means-tested. Many more eligibility criteria also apply (learn more here).
- 2-year-olds with SEND may also be eligible for free childcare hours if they fall within one or more specific categories (learn more here). These include:
– Receiving Disability Living Allowance (‘DLA’);
– Being subject to an Education, Health & Care Plan (‘EHC’);
– Having received a referral via their local authority’s Portage Service. - Parents of disabled children may be able to claim for free childcare support valued up to £4,000 per year through the Government’s Tax-Free Childcare Scheme. Learn more here.
More information about various Government-funded childcare schemes is available in our rough guide to childcare funding here.
Nursery Places at Little Cedars Nursery, Streatham
Little Cedars is a Nursery & Preschool in Streatham, London SW16
We support all Government-funded childcare schemes for eligible families at Little Cedars. We also endorse all the above support measures aimed at helping children with special educational needs and disabilities. We are officially a good nursery, as benchmarked by Ofsted. Our nursery and preschool are located in Streatham, London SW16 although we are also conveniently close by for families in Streatham Hill, Streatham Common, Streatham Park, Furzedown, Tooting, Balham, Norbury, Colliers Wood, West Norwood, Wandsworth, Clapham and Brixton.
If you would like to apply for a nursery place for your child, ask any questions or book a tour with your child, please select an option below:
Independent feedback from other parents is worth its weight in gold. In the last five years, Little Cedars has received only 5-star reviews on Google and Facebook. That’s top marks, consistently for 5 years running.* Comments that accompanied these independent reviews were equally compelling — here are just a few examples:
Little Cedars is a warm, welcoming and nurturing environment. To the babies and children, it very much becomes a home-from-home where they feel safe, valued, cared for and all with wonderful, close relationships with both peers and our childcare professionals. It’s also a place of immense fun where little ones are happy, stimulated and nurtured in order to bring out the best in them.
Little Cedars Nursery is extremely well resourced and equipped, both inside and out. 
If your 2-year-old is eligible for the Government’s free childcare scheme for this age group, rest assured that Little Cedars Day Nursery supports them and this can potentially give your little one 15 free hours of childcare per week for as many as 38 weeks of the year. That’s 570 free childcare hours per year for your 2-year-old!
A Key Person is assigned to each child at Little Cedars Nursery. This is an early years practitioner who ensures that the child’s needs are being catered for and that their care at the setting is tailored to them as an individual. They help children settle in when they first join the nursery and build strong relationships with both the child and the parents. They are therefore usually the natural and key point of contact at the nursery.
We have a very special team at Little Cedars Nursery. Every one of them has been hand picked to ensure they are the perfect fit for the nursery and for the children therein. They’re warm, natural carers who will form wonderful relationships with children and bring out the very best in them. They become the children’s safe, familiar and friendly faces at the setting as well as facilitating top-notch learning and early years education. They also ensure every child is happy and is having fun whilst under our care.
At Little Cedars we do so much more than simply look after babies, toddlers and under-fives. We educate and nurture them too. In fact, we ensure that our little ones achieve personal bests in all 7 areas of 
We previously covered 
Motor dysgraphia is primarily the result of poor fine motor skills and poor dexterity, making the control needed for legible writing or drawings difficult. It may also be the result of poor muscle tone. In contrast to dyslexic dysgraphia, motor dysgraphia may result in poor writing legibility even when the words are copied. Spelling, however, is not adversely affected. Short bursts with unusually high concentration levels may result in better letter and word formation, but the level of concentration needed to achieve this is unsustainable over a longer period.
sgraphic children may also hold their writing instruments in an unusual way or have strange posture when writing;
Diagnosing Dysgraphia
At education settings, additional bespoke learning strategies and interventions, that all teaching professionals can employ, may include:
Childcare/teaching professionals and parents/guardians should always work together and compare notes, so that all parties are fully informed about any challenges the child may have. By doing so, they can share strategies and each work with the child towards the same goals. It’s important to begin such work as early as possible, so that the impact of the disorder on the child’s life is minimised. Early diagnosis is therefore crucial.
Childcare professionals at Little Cedars Nursery will support children with any learning disorders and disabilities as a matter of course. Although dysgraphia normally only manifests itself once children reach the age of about five, we will nevertheless watch out for possible signs during children’s pre-school years at the setting. If suspected, we’ll put in place a customised learning and development plan that will help them to overcome any challenges they may be facing. Our childcare staff, including our Special Educational Needs Co-ordinator (SENCo) will work with parents/guardians to support their children in the best way possible. Our aim is for each child to achieve personal bests in every area possible, so they’re ready and able for school when they leave us to begin their time in Reception year.
In today’s guide, we answer frequently asked questions (FAQs) about Dyscalculia, particularly in relation to children, including preschoolers. Around 5% of children of school age are thought to have dyscalculia.
A few of the possible signs of dyscalculia include:
They may also continue to use fingers to count long after their contemporaries have moved on to mental counting;
Just as with dyslexia, there is no cure for dyscalculia. However, there are many ways to help children cope with its effects. It’s also worth bearing in mind that children with dyscalculia can be very gifted in other areas, for example creativity, strategic thinking, problem solving, practical abilities and often great intuition.
They can also benefit when important words and numbers are highlighted (to draw attention to their importance);
Despite many dyslexic people being highly intelligent, dyslexia makes it difficult for them to recognise words and/or be able to break them down into their smaller components. It is recognised as a Specific Learning Difficulty (‘SpLD’) and can seriously affect their education if not recognised and addressed early.
Such an affliction can have profound implications for a person. It will adversely affect their reading, writing and comprehension, thereby limiting their overall learning capability and hindering overall literacy. These are particularly critical skills during their early years as that’s at the start of their education, when the knock-on effects of such limiting factors will be at their most significant. It will slow down their progress in many topics and areas of education, also leading potentially to lower self-confidence and possibly even getting them mislabelled as ‘slow’ or ‘lazy’ by the unenlightened. Ultimately, it can severely limit their potential careers and life outcomes.
Children finding it difficult to learn the alphabet;
The child describing words and letters as visually jumbling, blurring or even moving around when they try to read them;
There is no cure for dyslexia, but measures to mitigate its effects can be taken by education professionals, parents, carers and even those affected by it. It’s incredibly important, though, for both parents and education professionals to try to recognise it early, for example at nursery or pre-school, so that a suitable teaching programme can be introduced as early as possible.