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What does 'special educational needs' mean?
Children who are having difficulties at nursery, pre-school setting (playgroup) or school, and need extra support, are said to have Special Educational Needs.
Special Educational Needs (SEN) may include:
- a developmental delay - this means they may not be learning as quickly as other children;
- a known disability or health problem - such as a hearing loss, a visual impairment, a physical disability or a medical condition;
- a speech and language delay or disorder - meaning they may have difficulties communicating or understanding what people say to them;
- emotional or behaviour difficulties which affect their ability to learn;
- a learning difficulty such as dyslexia.
As many as one in five children may at some time need extra help with their education but there are different levels of special needs and it depends how serious your child's difficulties are as to how much help they will need. Some children may have severe problems in learning and need to have special kinds of help over several years whilst others only need a little extra help from their teachers.
Your child will be assessed using a staged process called the 'Special Educational Needs Code of Practice' that was issued in November 2001 by the Department for Education. This process helps early education providers and schools find out if your child has special educational needs and if so, how they can help your child and if any specialist support is needed. To find out about the assessment process in schools, please see Parents' step by step guide to special educational needs.
Most children with special educational needs attend mainstream schools but a very few children, with the most severe and complex needs that cannot be met in mainstream schools, require the specialised teaching and educational aids available in special schools and classes.
For more information about the term 'special educational needs', please see the Definition of special educational needs according to the Code of Practice.
What you can do
Types of special educational needs
For information about the different types of special educational needs, please see the websites on the
Voluntary organisations for children with special educational needs page.
More information by age group
Important
The pages in this area of the web site contain the information expected of Surrey County Council to fulfil the requirements of providing special educational needs information. (
Statutory Instrument 2001 No.2218)
