The Gateshead Early Years (0-4)
Assessment and Intervention Team
The Gateshead Early Years Assessment and Intervention Team
works with children aged 0-4 years old who have been identified as
having Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND). The team
works with pre-school children only.
The team consists of a Manager from within the Psychological
Service, three Teachers, two Portage Workers, seven Teaching
Assistants and an Administrative Officer. The Administrative
Officer also acts as administrator for the Pre School Education,
Health and Care (EHC) Panel. The EYAI team is based within the
Dryden Centre and has close working relationships with other
education services, for example the Area SENCO’s.
Purpose and Aims
The purpose and aims of the Early Years Assessment and
Intervention Team include:
•
To offer assessment, interventions, strategies and support for
children from 0 to 4 years who are experiencing significant
barriers to their development and learning, and for whom
specialist intervention is indicated, within a fully inclusive
setting.
•
To establish and develop a partnership with parents/carers in
supporting children with SEND.
•
To support staff in settings to develop their skills and
confidence in working with children with SEND through
consultation and modelling.
•
To liaise with parents/carers and practitioners to develop
appropriate action plans.
•
To develop and support transition into the child’s receiving
placement.
•
To provide information and support for parents and carers to
enable them to make informed choices regarding their child’s
education.
•
To facilitate access to other services.
•
To contribute to the Single Plan process.
•
To provide short term time limited interventions, assessment
and advice (teaching) and coaching and modelling strategies.
•
To maintain data and carry out evaluation for the local
authority.
Referral Process
Referrals can be made by parents, Health Visitors, settings or any
other involved professional. A referral is initially made to the
Gateshead Pre School Education Health and Social Care Panel. This
panel is a single point of referral into services for children and their
families.
Services that may be accessed through this panel include the Early
Years (0-4) Assessment and Intervention Team, Area SENCO’s,
Child Development Team, Educational Psychology Service, requests
for additional support and Social Care services.
The EHC panel discusses the needs of the child and identifies the
appropriate interventions/agencies necessary for the child. The EHC
panel meets fortnightly in term time and less frequently in school
holidays. Through the EHC panel children may receive time-limited
intervention from the EYAIT.
Documentation Needed for Referrals to the EHC Panel
To refer to the EHC Panel a CAF is needed as well as a referral form
and a signed parental consent form. The referral form needed is
titled ”Gateshead Pre School Education Health and Care (EHC)
Referral Panel”. This form should not be confused with the
Gateshead request for Single Plan Assessment Form. Any queries
about the appropriate paperwork can be addressed to Early Years
(0-4) Assessment and Intervention Team, Dryden Centre, Evistones
Road, Gateshead, NE9 5UR.
Prior to making a referral to the EHC panel a referrer MUST
 discuss with the person who has parental responsibility for the
child and obtain their consent to share information about the
child to other agencies;
 complete the referral form and CAF and forward to the
panel administrator and
 register any new CAFs with the Change for Children Team.
It may be that a child will be discussed by the panel on more than
one occasion if it is appropriate to look again at their needs and the
support required. Consent will not be sought on each occasion, but
the panel will aim to keep parents informed of the involvement of
any new services.
The outcomes of the EHC panel discussion may be to:
 Offer advice and recommendations to the referrer
following assessment by one or more of the Education,
Health and Care services who make up the panel.
 Confirm that services being offered/requested are
appropriate and sufficient to meet the child’s needs.
 Agree additional education intervention/support for
individual children with a setting.
 Allocate or turn down a request or resource within the
panels brief.
 Support a referral/request for a specific resource or
Single Plan.
 Identify other agencies who should be involved.
 Identify a way in which agencies may jointly progress
work.
Following the EHC Panel meeting, a letter will be sent to inform the
referrer of the outcome.
Early Years (0-4) Assessment and Intervention Team
Once a child has been identified as needing the intervention of the
EYAIT team they will be allocated to the caseload of an appropriate
team member.
If the child is under 3 years of age the likely allocation will be to a
Portage Worker although, if the child is receiving 15 hours of 2 year
funding, the allocation may be to a teacher to support in nursery. If
the child is over three they will usually be allocated to a Teacher
who is part of the team. The Portage staff and Teachers work very
closely together and at transition times a child may be involved with
both a Teacher and a Portage Worker.
A child who is referred to the EHC Panel may already be known to
the Area SENCO who may already have given advice to the
setting; the EYAIT works closely with the area SENCO’s to
support the development of the child.
The Role of the Portage Home Visitors
Portage is primarily a home-visiting pre-school service for families
with young children who have additional needs. It is well established
in Gateshead and the two Gateshead Portage workers are very
experienced in their work. Gateshead Portage Service is certified
and registered with the National Portage Association. The Portage
Service recognises that parents and primary carers are children’s
first and most important educators. The aim of the service is to
work in partnership with parents and multi-agency services, to
support and encourage the development of young children’s play,
communication, independence and social skills.
Portage provide four possible interventions.
 Core Portage. Following an initial assessment period (six visits)
a Portage worker will visit the home on a fortnightly basis.
Together parents, carers and home visitors will plan activities
to encourage and promote their child’s development, with an
emphasis on child-led play, specialist “small steps” teaching and
a family focus. An Individual Action Plan will be developed
which will be reviewed on a fortnightly basis. A Developmental
Journal will be used for initial and continuing assessment so
progression can be monitored. Babies and children seen within
the Core Portage offer often have other specialist services
involved, particularly the Visual/ Hearing Impairment Team,
Physiotherapy, Occupational Therapy and the Speech and
Language Team. Portage Workers will work closely with other
services and carry out joint home visits where possible.
 Portage Plus. This intervention will usually be appropriate if a
child is referred prior to accessing pre-school provision, when
there has been no intervention at Core Portage. Portage
Workers will carry out an intensive, short-term, block of home
visits to identify areas of concern. A Learning Profile will be
devised, incorporating strategies to help parents support their
child’s learning and development.
 Portage Groups The Gateshead Portage Service works closely
with multi-agency partners to deliver group work for babies,
children and their families which can be accessed following
discussions with Portage staff. Groups include “Let’s Start
Learning”, “Let’s Start Moving”, “Sensory Group” and “Splish
Splash Communication Group”.
 Additional Portage In addition to the above, the Portage
Service provide specialist family intervention for all their
families by providing Educational Advice as part of the Single
Plan Assessment Process. They also offer advice and guidance
around individual children to both PVI and Educational settings
prior to and during the transition process, and they are
involved with Team Around the Family Meetings.
The Role of the Specialist Teachers
There are three teachers within the EYAIT who have a wide
range of experience in working with children with a variety of
SEND including Autism, general learning difficulties, hearing
impairment and behavioural difficulties. Although the teachers
have their own areas of specialism and expertise, they work
across the borough with any child who is allocated to their
caseload.
Once a child has been referred to the EYAIT, and it is felt
appropriate for teacher involvement, they will be allocated to a
teacher’s caseload. The teacher will make contact with the child’s
setting and arrange an initial meeting to discuss the child’s
strengths, areas of difficulties and strategies used to date. It is
important that this meeting is held at a time that setting staff
have non-contact time. For a child to be referred to the EYAIT
they will have already been identified by the setting as having
SEN, their progress will be under review in the setting, and an
appropriate plan will be in place to support the child (as outlined
in the SEND Code of Practice 2014).
Following the initial meeting, the Teacher may then carry out
observations and further assessment and, in consultation with
setting staff, may be able to identify effective strategies,
equipment, programmes or other interventions to enable children
to make progress towards the desired learning and developmental
outcomes .The exact nature of the Teachers involvement will
depend on the needs of the child.
The child’s progress will continue to be reviewed and if it is felt
the child is not making expected progress further consultation
with the Teacher may be required or it may be appropriate to
refer back to the EHC panel to request time–limited one-to-one
intervention for the child. A new referral form is not needed, at
this stage but notes from a review meeting will be necessary to
give information about the child’s progress and outcomes that are
being worked towards. If the child is given one-to-one support,
from one of the EYAIT Teaching Assistants, this will be timelimited and will focus on particular learning and developmental
outcomes. An EYAIT Teacher will provide support and guidance to
the Teaching Assistant.
Once a period of one-to-one intervention has ceased there will be
some time to allow consolidation of learning; it is envisaged that
the EYAIT Teacher will stay involved with the child and the
child’s progress will continue to be reviewed. It may be that the
child is discussed again by the EHC panel and a subsequent period
of one-to-one intervention is sought, or that the child goes back
to the EHC panel for further discussion regarding requiring a
Single Plan. On some occasions it may be appropriate to consider
requesting an EHC assessment and plan without one-to-one
intervention from an EYAIT Teaching Assistant.
The Specialist Teacher will usually maintain involvement at some
level until a child moves onto school, although the role may be a
monitoring one. The Teacher will usually be involved in information
sharing meetings to support a child’s transition into school.
In addition to the work outlined above, the Specialist Teachers
will also liaise with other agencies, attend TAF meetings, provide
Statutory Advice and contribute towards Statutory Assessments.
They may also be involved in running parents groups and delivering
training to parents e.g. Early Bird training.
Intervention from the EYAIT Teaching Assistants
There are seven Teaching Assistants attached to the EYAIT who
have a wide variety of experience in working with children with
SEND and who are constantly updating their skills.
Should a child be allocated a block of intervention from a Teaching
Assistant the TA will
 liaise with the EYAIT Teacher involved with the child
 be given any appropriate background information about the
child;
 arrange to visit the setting, usually with an EYAIT Teacher to
meet the child and discuss outcomes for the child;
 where possible meet parents, and
 work closely with the setting to share strategies and
information.
The intervention from the EYAIT, in most cases, will be for a part
of their nursery time e.g. 5 hours a week, and will be time limited.
The EYAIT will work as closely as possible with the settings when
timetabling the intervention with a child, but the EYAIT staff work
across the borough and it may not always be possible to timetable
staff to fully meet the wishes of the setting.
Following a block of intervention evaluations of the work of the
EYAIT will be requested from settings and parents.
Contact Details
Early Years (0-4) Assessment and Intervention Team
Dryden Centre
Evistones Road
Gateshead
Tyne and Wear
NE9 5UR