As reform reshapes statutory duties, settings need advice grounded in a thorough understanding of how decisions are actually made — so we help you work with each child using a strengths-based approach, giving clear, appropriate support for their needs. Training, consultancy, and funding application support, drawn from four years leading a statutory SEND advisory team.
Make an enquiry →Two major government strategies, published within months of each other, are reshaping what's expected of every school and early years setting in England. Understanding them is now part of the job.
The Schools White Paper sets out a ten-year, £4 billion programme of SEND reform. Its central proposals include a new statutory Individual Support Plan (ISP) for every child with identified SEND — replacing the current variable SEN Support for the majority of cases — a four-tier support model (universal, targeted, targeted plus, specialist), a new £1.6 billion Inclusive Mainstream Fund flowing directly to settings, and a £200 million national SEND CPD programme for all teachers from September 2026.
Existing SEND law remains unchanged until at least September 2029. EHCPs are retained for the most complex needs throughout.
The early years strategy commits £1.5 billion to reforming family services and early years education, with a specific commitment to increase SEND inclusion funding for early years providers and improve consistency of support. It sets a national ambition for 75% of five-year-olds reaching GLD by 2028 — compared with only 19.7% of children with SEND reaching GLD today — and introduces Best Start Family Hubs with a trained professional in each one to specifically support families of children with additional needs.
Both strategies make the same underlying point: inclusive practice needs to become standard practice, and settings need specialist capacity to make that happen. More children with SEND will be expected to have their needs met within mainstream settings. Every teacher will need to identify and support additional needs. Inclusion strategies must be published and refreshed annually. ISPs will require consistent, evidence-informed plans for every child with identified SEND. The reforms create a real, sustained demand for the kind of advisory, training and planning support described on this page — not as an optional extra, but as part of how settings will be expected to operate.
Services are rarely taken off the shelf. Most settings combine elements — training alongside ISP support, consultancy alongside panel preparation — and scale the work to their own priorities and timescales, from a single session to a programme running across a term. Click any tile to go straight to the full service description below, then tell us what would help.
All prices shown are for professional time only and do not include travel costs. Travel will be agreed and confirmed separately before any booking is confirmed. Settings most often fund this work through Pupil Premium, the notional SEN budget, or high needs and top-up funding — more on how settings pay.
Bite-size sessions, full days, online twilights and cluster bookings.
Ongoing or one-off advisory support for your setting or MAT.
For a SENCO new to the role, or a role that is suddenly empty.
Drafting, reviewing and embedding day-to-day.
Built on chairing funding panels — the genuinely rare one.
Statutory deadline: 31 December 2026.
Service 01
Off-the-shelf or bespoke sessions on inclusive practice, individual support plans, and supporting specific needs — drawing on a training model developed and refined across settings, families and college students.
"Jenny's training has always been incredibly relevant, relatable and fun — making it easy for our team to engage with and put into practice."
Read what settings say about the training →
Focused training for your staff team on a specific SEND topic — inclusive practice, ISPs, or supporting a particular area of need. Most topics run as a three-hour bite-size session.
Price on enquiryAvailable as a three-hour bite-size session, a whole day, or an online twilight.
The same depth of training delivered across a cluster or trust, with a lower per-head cost as numbers scale.
Priced per clusterA structured programme in the model of "One Percent Better" — 26 sessions coordinated across education, health and partner agencies.
Scoped to settingA CPD series for Early Years and SEND practitioners.
There is no magic wand to wave and ensure all children with SEND are identified and effectively supported. What there is, instead, is knowledge, skill, and a willingness to look closer — that is what this series is built to give your team. Sessions run as a progression, so staff across a setting end up with a shared language and a shared set of tools.
Each session can be booked on its own, or combined into a CPD programme across a term or a year. Formats and prices are as above — tell us what your setting needs and we will shape a package around it.
The core philosophy in a single session: no wand, no fixing — knowledge, skill, and looking closer instead. Covers the Bucket Theory, Maslow’s foundations, and the iceberg model of behaviour as communication. Works as a standalone INSET day, or as the entry point into the deeper modules below.
Bite-size — three hours each · Up to 20 people · Bookable individually or as a bundle, for Early Years settings, key stage groups or mixed staff cohorts
Blank’s Levels of Questioning, TEACCH and visual structure, literal language, and why unwritten social rules are harder for some children to read than others.
Cortisol and the stress response, the Window of Tolerance, the Four Cornerstones of co-production, and a genuine introduction to trauma-informed practice.
Removing the surprise from transitions, the one-page profile in practice, and reframing transition as a bridge rather than a one-off event.
The Behaviour Wall, Covey’s Circle of Influence, and Watching the Curve — recognising escalation early enough to change the outcome.
The eight sensory systems (not five), designing calm without losing joy, and real case examples of sensory triggers hiding in plain sight.
Strengthening the core foundations beneath classroom achievement: the six pre-requisites for life, not just for learning — communication, emotional regulation and behaviour, self-esteem, resilience, independence and physical skills.
Hands-on sessions — staff practise the thing itself, and where there is a template they leave with it completed. Up to 15 people, so everyone gets time on their own children’s plans.
The Assess/Plan/Do/Review cycle, writing genuinely SMART targets, capturing a child’s own voice, and running a review meeting that is co-produced rather than reported.
Turning knowledge of a child’s triggers and early signs into a proactive, shared, written reference the whole team can use consistently.
Genuine co-production in action: writing a profile that is a real starting point for a new setting, not a box-ticking exercise. Everyone leaves with a profile they have started.
How to provide an irresistible invitation to listen and engage — so circle time and group activities work for every child in the room.
For SENCOs, room leaders, setting managers and governing boards — the systems, oversight and culture that make everything else stick. Up to 15 people.
Hackman and Wageman’s six conditions for team effectiveness, meaningful supervision, staff wellbeing, and the key person approach without creating dependency.
The Four Cornerstones in daily practice, unpicking professional acronyms, and sustaining partnership with families through disagreement, not just agreement. Co-delivered with a lived experience contributor.
What the law actually requires of the governing board, in plain terms — and the questions that surface a gap in provision long before it becomes a complaint. Built to fit an evening governors’ or committee meeting.
Grounded in real lived experience rather than generic case studies — this includes a contributor speaking live or by video. Ask them pre-prepared questions, listen to what it was like growing up with SEND and what their SEND made easy — and challenging. Best of all, be inspired by their stories and go back to work knowing the importance of the remarkable work you do. It is the one session in this series that no other training provider can replicate.
Budgets are tight everywhere, so it's worth knowing where this kind of spend can legitimately sit. These are starting points to check against your own school's circumstances, not financial advice — your school business manager or finance team will know what applies to you specifically.
Training and professional development is one of the DfE's recognised "menu of approaches" for Pupil Premium spend — in fact the EEF specifically recommends high-quality teaching and CPD as a top priority for this funding. The link to outcomes for disadvantaged pupils needs to be clear and documented in your Pupil Premium strategy.
Every mainstream school holds a notional SEN budget as part of its core funding, intended to cover the first £6,000 of a pupil's additional SEN support. Training, advisory support and consultancy are recognised, intended uses of this budget — not a workaround.
For pupils whose support costs exceed the £6,000 threshold, schools can apply to their Local Authority for top-up or high needs funding to meet the difference — which can extend to the specialist input needed to support that individual pupil well.
Service 02
One-off or occasional advisory support reviewing provision and advising on process — without committing to a permanent hire. If what you need is sustained support for the SENCO role itself, that is Service 03.
Advisory work reviewing provision, advising on process, or working through a specific challenge with your team.
Price on enquiryCharged as full days. The rate covers professional time only — travel costs are agreed and confirmed separately before booking.
Service 03
For a SENCO who is new to the role, and for the terms when the role is suddenly empty. Your setting keeps its designated SENCO — we put experience alongside it.
The SEND Code of Practice requires your designated SENCO to be a qualified teacher working at your school, so this is never a substitute for that appointment, and we will not pretend otherwise. What it does is keep the work moving: mentoring someone finding their feet, or holding the statutory cycle steady while a post is vacant or covered.
Regular mentoring across a term or a year for a newly appointed SENCO — sitting alongside the NPQ for SENCOs, and the three years you have to complete it, rather than duplicating either. Prioritising the workload, reading the statutory calendar, preparing for the meetings that feel hardest first.
Priced on agreementScoped to how often you want contact, and whether it is on site or by video call.
Capacity alongside your designated SENCO during sickness, maternity leave or a vacancy. Annual reviews, EHCP paperwork and statutory deadlines keep their dates; ISP cycles keep running; staff keep someone to ask.
Priced on agreementDepends on the dates, the number of pupils on the register and the travel involved. Cover needs lead time — talk to us as early as you can.
Everyone who comes into your setting holds an enhanced DBS check and has been through safer recruitment checks. We will share the details your setting needs for its single central record before a visit is confirmed.
Service 04
Practical, setting-specific support drafting or reviewing ISPs, and embedding inclusive practice day-to-day — not just in policy documents. Often delivered alongside training or as part of a wider consultancy engagement.
Service 05 — the genuinely rare one
Direct experience chairing local authority funding panels means knowing exactly what evidence makes an application succeed — and what causes otherwise strong cases to fail. This is help building a case that holds up under panel scrutiny, not just paperwork support.
Helping a setting build a strong, evidence-based funding or EHCP application for a child.
Price on enquiryCoordinated assessment drawing on associate specialists — SaLT, EP, physiotherapy input — for cases that need more than one professional view.
Price on enquiryA diagnosis is a beginning, not an ending. We work with settings to translate assessment findings into practical next steps — what needs to change in the classroom, how to talk to families, and what support to put in place so the child actually benefits from the process.
Scoped to need
Service 06 — deadline: 31 December 2026
Every mainstream primary and secondary school in England is now legally required to publish an inclusion strategy by 31 December 2026 — a statutory condition of the new Inclusive Mainstream Fund, which brings ring-fenced funding of up to £48,000 per year for secondary schools and around £14,000 for primaries. The DfE published its official template in June 2026. Schools now have the format. The harder part is the thinking behind it.
Support to develop a strategy that goes beyond compliance — identifying the commonly occurring needs and barriers in your specific cohort, mapping your current provision against the DfE's seven inclusion themes, and setting clear, evidenced outcomes. Written in a way that works for governors, Ofsted inspectors, and families alike.
Scoped to your settingA policy that reflects current DfE guidance, the new four-tier support model (universal, targeted, targeted plus, specialist), and your setting's real approach to inclusion — not a template with your name on it. Reviewed against the SEND Code of Practice and the Equality Act's reasonable adjustments duty.
Scoped to your settingNurseries, pre-schools and childminders are not subject to the statutory inclusion strategy requirement, but all early years providers must have an Inclusion Policy and review it regularly. We offer ongoing annual support to review, update and strengthen your policy as guidance evolves — working alongside your team rather than handing you a document to sign off.
Scoped to your settingSchools that miss the 31 December 2026 deadline will be accountable to Ofsted, and inspectors are now expected to ask for the inclusion strategy as a matter of course under the updated inspection framework. Inclusion is a standalone evaluation area. The EEF published its new Guide to Inclusive Teaching on 6 July 2026 specifically to help schools build evidence-informed strategies before the deadline — we can help your setting use that evidence base to build something that genuinely improves outcomes, not just a document that satisfies a condition of grant.
Staff training and CPD, consultancy, SENCO support and interim cover, Individual Support Plan (ISP) and inclusive-practice support, funding and EHCP panel preparation, and inclusion strategy and policy writing.
Not the statutory role itself — the SEND Code of Practice requires your designated SENCO to be a qualified teacher working at your school, and we will not claim otherwise. What we can do is work alongside whoever you designate and keep everything moving: annual reviews, EHCP paperwork and statutory deadlines, ISP cycles, and the questions staff bring day to day. Tell us the dates and we will check our capacity and talk honestly with you, so neither of us overcommits.
Yes. Every mainstream primary and secondary school in England must publish an inclusion strategy by 31 December 2026. We help you write or review one that goes beyond compliance, mapped against the DfE's inclusion themes and your setting's real approach.
Yes — this is built on direct experience chairing local authority funding panels, so we know what evidence makes an application succeed and what causes otherwise strong cases to fail.
Common routes include Pupil Premium, the notional SEN budget, and high needs or top-up funding. These are starting points to check against your own circumstances with your finance team, not financial advice.
Yes. Everyone who comes into your setting from SEND Experts at Hand holds an enhanced DBS (Disclosure and Barring Service) check and has been through safer recruitment checks. We will share the details your setting needs for its single central record before a visit is confirmed.
Yes. Training can be delivered across a cluster or trust with a lower per-head cost as numbers scale, and consultancy is available for a single setting or a whole MAT.
A short form is quicker than a phone call for a first contact — the right next step (a call, a proposal, or a referral to an associate) will follow within two working days.
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