Introduction
It is critically important that children with additional needs are given opportunities to meaningfully contribute to their plans so that their preferences and experiences are kept central to decision making, and their participation is fundamental to both their safety and their long-term success. Children’s involvement in their plans is not just best practice, but a statutory and ethical necessity. This could relate to children’s Care Plans or Child Protection/ Child in Need Plans, as well as education plans such as Personal Education Plans (PEPs) and Education, Health and Care Plans (EHCPs).
Where children have complex needs, including learning difficulties and may be minimally or non-verbal it can seem challenging to consider how their views might be captured or how they might be able to meaningfully contribute to their plans. This resource aims to support practitioners to consider different approaches to ensure all children are able to contribute in some way to their plans and are supported to share their experiences in a way that is right for them.
Meaningful contribution ensures that a child’s rights, wishes, and feelings are at the centre of any decision-making process.
Ensuring Safety and Wellbeing
Listening to a child and developing an understanding of their experience is a vital safeguarding measure.
Improving Educational and Life Outcomes
Plans that are developed without the child’s input risk being generic and ineffective.
Personalised Learning
Children’s education plans, such as a Personal Education Plans (PEPs) for children in care, must reflect a personalised approach to learning that meets the child’s specific needs and raises their aspirations.
High Aspirations
Meaningful contribution helps professionals promote high aspirations and secure the best possible outcomes for the child's future, including their transition to adulthood and independent living.
Self-Advocacy
Teaching children to contribute helps them develop self-advocacy skills, allowing them to assert their preferences and take ownership of their lives. This can start with simple self-advocacy, such as making a choice between two items or activities.
Ownership
When children are assigned developmentally appropriate responsibilities within their planning, it encourages independence and helps them feel that the plan belongs to them rather than being something imposed upon them.
Corporate Parenting Principles
Local authorities are legally required to encourage children to express their views and to take those views into account to ensure they are safe and have stability in their home lives and education.
Reducing Anxiety
Using tools like visual supports to facilitate contribution helps reduce anxiety by handing over control to the child and providing a structured framework for them to express how they really feel.
Accuracy of Assessment
Using resources to facilitate children’s participation in assessment allows practitioners to gain insights into a child's daily routine, likes, and dislikes that only the child can provide, leading to a more accurate and effective intervention.
Identity and Inclusion
Meaningful participation allows children to express their identity and what is important in their life. By affirming a child's cultural identity and unique needs through their contribution, professionals create a safe and inclusive environment where the child feels valued.
Helping a child take part in shaping their plan ensures their voice and experience guides the process. Without their input, professionals risk losing sight of the individual, their preferences and the experiences that make them.
What are the challenges of seeking children's views and supporting their contributions?
Children with complex needs, particularly those who are looked after or previously looked after, face significant barriers. Pre-care experiences, trauma and communication difficulties can mean their wishes and feelings are not fully understood, leading to poor outcomes.
Some children may be non or minimally verbal and some may have learning difficulties which can make involving them in plans more challenging.
Our shared mission: Building a child-centred environment
To ensure every child is heard, we must build a supportive environment founded on three pillars: empathetic understanding, powerful advocacy and systems to support communication.
Before we advocate, we must listen. Person-centred thinking is a practical approach to capture what matters to a child, moving beyond assumptions to build genuine understanding.
Key principles of person-centred thinking
- Person first: seeing children as individuals, not just as their disability or care status
- Improves understanding, communication and relationships
- What’s important to and for someone: separating a person’s desires from external needs
- Strengths-based: building on a person’s strengths and contributions
- Choice and control: empowering individuals to make choices in their lives.
Observations of children are also fundamental in understanding their experiences. Observations should be objective, recording only what is seen and repeated regularly. Children can be observed in different settings and over time to gain a deeper insight into their world and to ensure their environment is responsive to their needs.
Advocacy ensures a child’s rights, wishes and feelings are upheld. This requires specialised skills and a commitment to empowering the child.
Key strategies for effective advocacy
- Specialised training for advocates: understanding the specific issues affecting children with disabilities and complex needs
- Non-instructed advocacy: crucial for working with children who have limited capacity for decision making. The advocate’s role is to uphold the child’s rights and ensure their feelings are represented
- Empowering families: providing parents and carers with the tools and support they need to advocate effectively for their children
- Community involvement: work through community organisations to facilitate engagement and trust, especially for families from ethnic minorities
- Cultivate a safe learning environment: ensure that children feel safe and supported when expressing their needs
- Affirm cultural identities: recognise and affirm the cultural identities of children, ensuring their unique needs are met
- Multi-agency collaboration: ensure that different professionals work together to support the child's needs
The path to self-advocacy: Helping children find their voice
The ultimate goal is to empower children with the skills to advocate for themselves, if they have the capacity to do so. This builds confidence and independence.
Practical techniques to teach self-advocacy
- Introduce the concept: model self-advocating by making choices and indicating preferences
- Use role-play: practice advocacy skills in safe structured scenarios
- Encourage independence: assign developmentally appropriate responsibilities to help them assert preferences and take ownership
- How can the child communicate their preferences? Children may communicate a choice with speech or using signs, symbols or visuals.
Children with additional needs and disabilities may have a range of communication abilities and needs. Some children may be non-verbal or minimally verbal and require alternative means of communicating. Some children whilst able to communicate verbally may still need support to communicate their thoughts, ideas and feelings to others. There are a range of communication methods and tools available to support children and young people to communicate, helping them share their needs, preferences and feelings.
Augmentative and alternative communication (AAC): tools that supplement or replace speech
- Communication boards: these boards use symbols, pictures, or photos that children can point to, helping them express their thoughts and needs
- Speech-generating devices: devices that produce speech when symbols or words are selected
- Apps and software: various apps designed for tablets and smartphones can assist non-verbal children in communicating
Visual supports: tools that support children understand routines and make choices
- Visual schedules: help children understand daily routines and transitions
- Social stories: create personalised stories using pictures and simple text to explain social situations and expectations
- Flash cards: use cards with images or symbols to help children express their choices and feelings
Non-verbal techniques: language systems using signs or symbols
- Sign language: teaching children sign language may be an effective way for them to communicate
- Makaton: a language system that uses signs and symbols to aid communication
- Gestures and body language: encourage children to use gestures like pointing, clapping, or blinking to communicate
Interactive activities: using play, music and art to facilitate expression
- Play and imitation: engage in activities that interest the child and use imitation or intensive interaction to encourage communication
- Music and art: allow children to express themselves through music, drawing, painting, or dancing
- Games: play games that involve guessing or choosing to help children communicate their preferences
Create a Supportive Environment
- Consistent routine: maintain a consistent routine to help children feel secure and understand what to expect
- Positive reinforcement: use positive reinforcement to encourage communication attempts
Collaborate with Professionals
- Speech and Language Therapists: work with therapists to develop and implement communication strategies tailored to the child's needs
- Educational Psychologists: collaborate with psychologists to understand and support the child's communication development
How can we support children with complex needs to meaningfully contribute to their plans and share their views about education?
This resource serves as a bank of professional tools designed to prioritise the perspectives of children within social and educational assessments and plans. It outlines a variety of specialised resources, including software, activity packs, and tactile communication aids, tailored to help children and young people with diverse communication needs express their feelings. Many of these programs are specifically geared toward assisting vulnerable populations, such as children in care or those with developmental delays, in sharing their lived experiences.
Ultimately, this resource aims to ensure that child participation remains a central element of practice and decision-making. These frameworks support professionals in better understanding children with complex needs while fostering an inclusive environment for every child to be heard, understood and valued.
Person centred thinking tools Helen Sanderson Associates
Some other examples of Person-Centred Thinking tools:
- One Page Profiles
- All about me forms
- Student Passports
Advocacy and Non-Instructed Advocacy
- Talking Mats: visual communication framework which supports people with communication difficulties to express their feelings and views. In Surrey Virtual School, we have a trained Talking Mats facilitator who can support you if you’re interested in using talking mats with your children and young people.
- Photo Diaries: a photo diary or photo book can be a powerful tool for non-verbal communication, helping children express their feelings, share experiences and convey emotions when they have limited or no spoken language. They can be used for making choices and requesting preferences, sharing experiences (storytelling), expressing emotions, establishing routines, building connections and relationships, developing language skills.
- Communication Boards
- Visual Schedules
- Social Stories
- Picture Exchange Communication System (PECS)