Additional needs are most likely to be found in some or all of these areas:
- Children with Special Educational Needs
- Children with social and emotional needs and/or behaviour problems
- Children in need or at risk of harm
- Disabled Children
- Looked After Children or Adopted/Previously Looked After Children
- Children who have English as an Additional Language
- Children who may spend long periods in hospital or out of school
- Gifted and talented children
- Refugee children
- Traveller children
Children are not to be regarded as having learning difficulties solely because their language, or form of the home language, is different from that in which they are taught.
A child or young person has Special Educational Needs (“SEN”) if they have a learning difficulty or disability which calls for special educational provision to be made for him or her. A child of compulsory school age or a young person has a learning difficulty or disability if he or she:
- has a significantly greater difficulty in learning than the majority of others of the same age, or
- has a disability which prevents or hinders him or her from making use of educational facilities of a kind generally provided for others of the same age in mainstream schools or mainstream post-16 institutions
For children aged two or more, special educational provision is educational or training provision that is additional to or different from that made generally for other children or young people of the same age by mainstream schools, maintained nursery schools, mainstream post-16 institutions or by relevant early years providers. For a child under two years of age, special educational provision means educational provision of any kind.
Many children and young people who have SEN may have a disability under the Equality Act 2010 – that is ‘…a physical or mental impairment which has a long term and substantial adverse effect on their ability to carry out normal day-to-day activities’. This definition provides a relatively low threshold and includes more children than many realise: ‘long term’ is defined as a ‘year or more’ and ‘substantial’ is defined as ‘more than minor or trivial’. This definition includes sensory impairments such as those affecting sight or hearing, and long term health conditions such as asthma, diabetes, epilepsy, and cancer. Children and young people with such conditions do not necessarily have SEN, but there is a significant overlap between disabled children and young people and those with SEN. Where a child or young person requires special educational provision over and above the adjustments, aids and services required by the Equality Act 2010 they will be additionally covered by the SEN definition.