Early Help Offer
Lacewood Primary School Early Help Offer
Early help is the support we give to children and their families where they have additional needs that are not being met by universal services (services that are available to everyone, like health and education).
When a family has additional needs, we make sure they have access to the support they need at the earliest possible stage, to prevent their needs becoming so great that they require a higher level of more specialist support further down the line.
Working with Barnsley early help offer, early help is available for children and young people up to the age of 19 (25 if they have learning development needs or disabilities) and their families.
If your family needs additional support, you could receive early help from one or a number of services, which could include family support workers, targeted youth support, family centres, school nurses, speech and language therapists, housing workers, community safety workers, NHS staff and services in the voluntary and community sector. Lacewood Primary School works closely with our multi-agencies partners to provide the most appropriate support for our children and families.
Levels of support
We offer early help, either through universal or targeted services, based on individual need, which we identify through an early help assessment of the whole family.
Universal services
Most children will enjoy a happy, safe and healthy childhood with support from their families and from universal services like health and education. These are provided as a right to all children and their families, including those whose needs are also met within targeted and/or specialist and statutory services.
Targeted support
For children and families who face more challenges and may have multiple needs, targeted services provide additional capacity and expertise to address their needs. A programme of targeted group provision and one to one support is available through a referral to the local family centre. Targeted one to one support through a family support worker/EIP worker is available to children and families where an early help assessment is necessary because of the level of the child or family's needs and the number of agencies that may need to be involved in providing support.
The best way to get support is to talk to members of the Inclusion team, Mrs Katie Anson, Mrs Charlotte Searle or Mrs Jeannette Stratton who will be more than happy to talk to you about what additional help is available and how to access it, including the possibility of an Early Help Assessment (EHA). This is an holistic assessment focusing on the child, the family needs and wider influences that may be impacting on family life, such as housing or financial difficulties. The assessment is used across all services who work with children, young people and their families, which involves the professionals meeting with you and your child/ren so that you can tell them what's working, what's not, what support you need and how they can help you.
The EHA process involves recording the information provided during the assessment so that the type and level of support can be determined. An action plan is then created, which sets out this support, so you know what you can expect from the services who will offer support. If lots of agencies are involved, there may be a number of professionals working with you from different agencies, so they'll come together to make decisions. They're known as the Team Around the Family (TAF). A lead practitioner, who will be responsible for liaising with you on behalf of the group will be appointed – this is usually the person who completed the assessment.
A list of support/programmes that school offers is as follows:
Additional secondary transition
Breakfast club
Foundation stage classes, including home visits
Induction sessions for children starting
Solihull parenting course
Special needs support as detailed on our SEND pages
Thrive programme
1:1 emotional support
External agencies that school work alongside include:
Behaviour support
Bereavement support
Educational Psychologist
Occupational Therapist
Physiotherapist
Paediatrician
School Nursing/Health Visiting/Community Nursing team
Social Communication and Interaction team
Speech and Language Therapy (SALT)
Visual/Hearing impaired team
Should you have any questions or feel you would like any support please contact Mrs Katie Anson, Mrs Charlotte Searle or Mrs Jeannette Stratton, who can be contacted through the school office.
To see the full local early help offer please visit:
https://www.barnsley.gov.uk/services/children-families-and-education/early-help-for-families/