NSW public schools cater for every student
Our schools have an obligation to ensure that students with disability and additional learning and support needs can participate in education on the same basis as their peers at every stage of their school life.
Parents and carers, teachers and school support staff, allied professionals, the community - and particularly students themselves - all have important roles to play.
Identifying learning and support needs
For some children, additional learning and support needs are identified from early childhood.
For other children, the need for extra support may not become clear until some way into their schooling.
Most students do not need a formal diagnosis of disability to receive extra support in mainstream classes. Every NSW public school has a learning and support team that works with students, parents and carers, classroom teachers and other professionals to identify students who need extra support – at any stage of a student's school life.
However, some students have complex support needs that require targeted assistance. This can be provided in mainstream classes through Integration Funding Support.
The Learning and Support Team
Every school has a learning and support team.
The learning and support team (L&ST) is a whole-school planning and support mechanism. It is formed to address the needs of specific students through the coordination, development, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of educational programs.
The school learning and support team plays a key role in ensuring that the specific needs of students with disability and additional learning and support needs are met.
The team:
- supports teachers in identifying and responding to the additional learning needs of students
- facilitates and coordinates a whole school approach to improving the learning outcomes of every student
- coordinates planning processes and resourcing for students with disability and additional learning and support needs
- designs and implements the supports required to build teacher capacity so that all students access quality learning
- develops collaborative partnerships with the school, parents and carers, other professionals and the wider school community.
LAST - The Learning and Support Teacher
The Learning and Support (LAST) provide direct and timely specialist assistance to students in mainstream classes with disability and additional learning and support needs and their teachers.
Their work emphasises:
- the needs of individual students
- school priorities, and
- evidence-based programs to assist students with additional learning and support needs.
Learning and support teachers use a collaborative and consultative approach so that students themselves and their parents and carers are actively involved in decision-making.
SLSO - School learning support officer
The School Learning Support Officer is a position previously known as Teacher Aide or Teachers Aide (Special).
School learning support officers works under the direction and supervision of the classroom teacher. They provide assistance to students with disability and additional learning and support needs enrolled in Schools for Specific Purposes (SSP), support classes in mainstream schools and mainstream classes.
They can provide assistance with:
- school routines
- classroom activities, and
- the care and management of students with disability and additional learning and support needs.
Itinerant support teacher (hearing or vision)
Itinerant support teachers (hearing or vision) work with students who have a confirmed hearing and/or vision disability prior to school and in NSW public schools.
These specialist teachers support students, their teachers and families from diagnosis through to Year 12.
Other services
Life Skills Courses For a small percentage of students, particularly those with an intellectual disability, a Life Skills Course can be provided in both compulsory and elective subjects in Years 7 to10. All Key Learning Areas (KLAs) Stage 4 and 5 syllabuses contain Life Skills Course outcomes. For students in Stage 6 (Years 11 and 12) specific NESA Life Skills Courses are available. Only in consultation with Parents, Student, HT LS and LaST a student will be placed on a Life Skills pattern of study.
Disability Provisions Carlingford High School supports students by providing Disability Provisions for those students who are unable to access and participate in examinations and assessment tasks without adjustments. Disability provisions are practical arrangements designed to assist students who couldn’t otherwise make a fair attempt to show what they know in an examination setting
Individual Learning Plans These are created for students with additional needs. Students may be assessed either by in-school counsellors or by outside agencies. The ILP is developed in consultation with these agents through formal reports, parents and students. All teachers are expected to access the plans and make an effort to implement the strategies suggested OR other strategies that may work for them in their class. Teachers are expected to report on the efficacy of the plan and the strategies used through the NCCD process; teachers may include the strategy/ies that have worked for them in this document as well