What helped your SEND child settle into a new school year? Share your advice – you could win a £200 voucher!

[geemumsnet]

Whether it’s a change of teacher, a new classroom, or even a whole school, September can be a nervous time for children with special educational needs and disabilities, and for parents too.

That’s why we’d love to hear from you if you can relate to any of these experiences, and what helped the most (or didn’t) for you and your child during the transition.

Was there a particular strategy, tool or routine that helped? Did a teacher or SENCO go above and beyond?

Your tips or shared experience could really help another parent going through this for the first time.

By sharing, you’ll be entered into a prize draw to win a £200 VEX voucher - so you can spend it on whatever helps your family start the school year off right!

Principal of Whinfell School (Autism School) Paddy Sandham and Suzanne Mulligan, headteacher at Beverley School (SEMH School), will also be available in a few weeks to give their advice on the thread!

I am worried as I the change of routine is massive, it's hard to prepare for tomorrow for a little brain who only copes with today. I have asked school to take my DC to the new classroom, but I know it will be different with new photos and faces. I am speaking a little each day about how the day will go, where the chair and drawer will be with their things, and hope they will settle in quickly.

A pupil passport written as soon as she started high school and badgering the head of year to make sure it was shared with all staff. Learning that when you were on the third email chasing the senco for a response if you copied the head in you'd suddenly get a reply.

Definitely by trying to keep to routine as much as possible during the holidays

I have two SEND children. The six weeks holidays are very tricky to manage and they both struggled with back to school routine. What we found helped was the following:

• transition days before the end of the summer term. Meeting their teacher, the TAs and classroom, and booking in a transition day before going back in September. We usually do a 30 minute settling in session in September before the first day back...this is usually 1:1 with their teacher in the classroom on one of the PD days.

• ask the teacher/ senco / school for a transition social story with pictures of their new teacher & classroom. We use this to look through during the six week holidays & on the day before we go back.

• book in a final send meeting before the end of therm with the SENCO (if you haven't already) to address their EHCP / IEP plan and make any changes or voice any concerns for the new school year.

• if you child has medical needs & needs emergency medication... arrange any medical training with the nurses and get this booked in before the end of the term with their new teachers & TAs. Make sure their medical plan is upto date &, their new teachers are aware of what to look for in an emergency. It's helpful to have their DOB & NHS number on the medical plan for handover with the paramedics.

• Medical needs: repack their hosptial / emergency grab bag for school. We usually pop a spare uniform in, comfy PJs, pants, socks, tissues, wet wipes & sensory toys alongside their hospital passport in the bag which is kept at school. This means if an ambulance is needed they have a bag ready to go (and you don't need to stress about spare clothes etc!)

• arrange a few chilled playdates whether at home or a quiet park with one or two of their class friends. This really helps my son transition back for September.

• the week before going back to school we make sure we don't do anything extravagant or adventurous (days out etc) we try to keep that week very home focused and a strict routine... we'll do a ride past the school every day & talk about our favourite acitivites & memories with friends just to ease us into going back to school.

• we try on uniform and take those "first day back" photos in the middle of August...for us it helps minimise fuss on the first day back. This really helps our family, we also don't do anything special or fancy for the first day of school and we keep the first few weekends of September/ early October very low key.

We do try to put as much support in place but usually the first few weeks back are very tough on all of us.

For our son, one year his teacher orchestrated several 'chance' encounters with his new teacher, which made him become familiar with her and much more confident at the start of term. It made a world of difference to how his yesr started and ended up progressing to a great extent.

I have mixed emotions, it takes my DC's a long time to settle in - the change of routine and a new classroom and teacher is a worry for them, I found that school aided the transitions of my SEN DC by taking them to the new classroom, and showing the seating plan, so they knew where they would go, hang their coats and snack box, and where the layout of the classroom differs from the existing one - really helped. Still had tears though - but it gets easier with every year.

Knowing timetables in advance, seeing where tutor rooms are, meeting teachers, having everything sorted down to the smallest detail

My little boys school send home a booklet with pictures of the new classroom and staff, where the toilets are, where the entrance is, where coats go etc with a simplified visual timetable before the end of term - they also offer a SEN settling in session the day before new year starts- it's 15 mins in the classroom and a chance to re meet the teacher / TA with parents present - seems to really help. We've been very lucky.

Definitely keeping in touch with some school friends over the holidays. Especially with the transition to secondary school. Also seeing non-school friends to remind them that there’s more to life than school.

For the start of year 7 we’re doing some dummy runs of the journey he’ll have to school. Some reading to make sure he doesn’t forget everything he learn in yr 6.

Meeting teachers early at the start of year to discuss needs and approaches.

I have had a LOT of involvement with the SENCO at school, due to DS behaviour, and am lucky that we have got a strategy in place to help reduce the outbursts and keep the focus.
The Senco has helped us with a chart with stickers for the school day which has helped with the back to school build up, and this year I am cautiously optimistic that he will settle quicker and with less outbursts and stress at home.

We made an anxiety iceberg with ourselves and school for our youngest in year 3 we drew images on the iceberg, or encourage them to write simple words. With our older child in year 6 we asked them to write key words and phrases on the iceberg, or do this as a mind map, with ‘school’ in the middle and all the things they’re finding difficult around the outside.
This helped us and school identify worries such as arriving at school, finding the environment noisy or overwhelming, finding lessons confusing, feeling lonely through the day, or feeling uncomfortable during specific subjects. Then strategies were put in place to help with this.

Our journey went a bit like: gaslighting from senco, fighting the LA to get an adequate EHCP, and then the best part of the transition- moving to online school.

I was dreading the transition from year 6 to year 7 - it's massive, from the comfort of a small primary with 300 children to a large secondary with 1200 children.
Being SEN my DC had a 1 to 1 and they had trips there at different times of the day, morning, lunchtime and close time - they did not have a school bus training - although we did a service bus where I asked him to get on and I picked up in town.
One thing which helped was the fact that they had a quiet room for bread times and he, along with other SEN children were allowed to go first for lunch, then go back to the quiet room for break times. The noise and amount of people would have really stressed him out.

Many parents don’t realise that a lot of the “helpful adjustments” schools offer for children with SEND are actually legal entitlements under the Equality Act 2010, not just goodwill.

If your child has a disability (including many neurodiverse conditions), schools have a duty to make reasonable adjustments so they’re not placed at a substantial disadvantage compared to their peers. These rights apply whether or not your child has an EHCP — although an EHCP can make the provision more secure and enforceable.

A barrister’s opinion (Louise Mankau, Doughty Street Chambers) confirms that being able to plan and prepare for a school journey — including through things like accessible information and virtual tours — can itself be considered a reasonable adjustment. This interpretation has now been noted by Ofsted, The Cabinet Office and The DWP.
📄 Read the legal opinion here

If you’re struggling to get the right support in place, you don’t have to rely on what a teacher or SENCO “can” offer — you can refer to your child’s legal rights and, if necessary, escalate via the school’s SEN policy, governors, or ultimately the SEND Tribunal.
You can find peer support and practical advice in the EHCP Support Thread.
Chris W

My mum knitted DS’s favourite stuffed toy a school jumper to match his new uniform and DH got the day off so we could drive him in.
Unfortunately, it’s not worked out long term but both of those things along with the visual booklet that school gave us, really helped in the early days.

My tips - having been through this, my neurodiverse dc went through year 2 to 3 without much of an issue, but behaviours changed from 3 to 4, I knew something was going wrong, so you must go into school, meet with the class teacher - the year 4 teacher was straight out of teacher training and was not able to teach a class of 30 along with a couple of neurodiverse children - it took many visits and strategies to be put in place, including SALT and SULP work.

Just keep going into school if things don't feel right, you know your child better than anyone.

Routine is key, knowing their uniform, being shown the classroom and meeting the teacher, and having the correct school lunch - I have been making the same school lunch for 3 years not - no deviations 😅

I really have mixed emotions - but dealing with a child with ASD is exhausting, dealing with outbursts and protecting my younger child from harm is very difficult during the holidays - so I do welcome the break from this.
When my ND child has moved from class to class the SENCO has rang me to see what can be done to aid this process, for the benefit of the child and the school as disruptive behaviour can be minimised.
They have a transition morning a week before school starts where they go to their new classroom, and I always reassure them that they will be safe and to ask their teacher if they have any problems.

My DC is in year 5 this year and I feel that preparation has been good, and they know the school well - the problem will come from year 6 to year 7 and choosing a new school when they start year 6.
Trips to the new classroom and showing where their coat and lunchbox will go have helped - because these are the questions I have over and over.

When my DS went to year 7 there was a 'buddy' system where a 6th former would help in the first few weeks, helping with navigating the canteen, break times, registration and getting the school bus home.
There were several transition days in year 6 and a practice run during the school holidays.

This helped :-

• Using visual aids and timetables to structure the school day.
• Creating quiet spaces where SEN and neurodiverse students can go if they feel overwhelmed.
• Providing key workers who can offer individual support and guidance.
• Offering passes to avoid busy corridors and for early lunch.

preparing things like checking their timetable, packing bags and laying out clothes the night before. In the morning, focus on the one thing they need to do next as you work your way through the timetable for the first couple of weeks until their new routine becomes more normal for them.

We have - thank goodness a really great SENCO, and Head of Department for the year 5 and 6, they arrange classroom visits for the SEN children, and they get to eat with the teacher at school, on a covert manner so that they eat with all of the other children but have a table which is better behaved and more ordered with lunchtimes. They can also choose to play outside or go to the quiet room -which really helps with the school day.

Your poll is 76% negative which I think tells its own story!