People can have many preconceived notions about what additional support for learning looks like or includes. Some people might think it only or mainly happens in specialist nurseries, that it means a full-time one-to-one support staff member for a child, or that it is only for children who have formally diagnosed conditions.

In fact, additional support for learning covers anything you do to help a child who needs some extra support at nursery. It might be a one-off or short-term intervention, or it can be ongoing long-term support.

The different types of support can be grouped under three overlapping headings. We’ve listed some examples under each:

Approaches to learning and teaching

Support from other professionals

Provision of resources

These are only a few examples, and it’s important to remember that often children will need a combination of different supports. Some of those you’ll be able to provide, and other times you’ll need help or input from others.

Each child is unique. Support that works for one child may not work for another who has the same diagnosis or is in a similar circumstance.

For example, one-to-one support might be very helpful for one child, while it may cause another child distress or embarrassment. One autistic child might need a quiet space and some time away from a noisy playroom each day, while another autistic child might enjoy the playroom environment.

The key is getting to know the children well and working with them, their families and your colleagues. Together you can identify what kinds of support will help the most.

For more information about identifying and understanding children’s needs, take a look at our page on Identifying and assessing additional support needs.

For signposting to resources and services to help you identify ways to support children have a look at our page Further information, resources and support.

When you know a child well, you may be able to work out what adaptations you can make to help them get the best from their early learning experiences. You may need to try different things to find out what works best.

When a learner needs more tailored support, this might need to be arranged through a meeting. The setting manager or the child’s key worker will usually be involved in deciding what support would work well for the child, along with the child’s family. In nurseries attached to a school the headteacher or depute headteacher might be involved too. They may consult with other professionals, such as an educational psychologist or health practitioner, to help them decide what strategies to use. A multi-agency team (sometimes called the Team Around the Child, or TAC) might be set up to plan the support. You may be asked to provide information to the multi-agency team about the child.

You can also ask for further input and support from your local authority’s additional support for learning team. The local authority are responsible for making sure that every child entitled to funded hours of early learning and childcare is getting the support they need, no matter what kind of setting they attend. The local authority are also responsible for funding the costs of any additional support in childminders, partnership nurseries, and local authority nurseries, so they may need to be involved if the proposed support has costs involved.

Planning is an ongoing process that helps you keep track of children’s learning and development.

Planning is part of an ongoing cycle, which involves:

You should always involve families in planning, as they will often be able to offer valuable insights. Children should also be involved in the process as much as possible. Can they talk, draw, or use picture cards to show you what they find difficult at nursery? If not, can you watch their body language to understand what things are making them unhappy or distressed?

It can be easy to focus so much on the process that creating the plan can feel like an end in itself. It is important to remind yourself that the purpose of planning is to provide the right support at the right time for the children you work with.

Good planning helps everyone. It helps:

Having a written agreement of the child’s objectives, the support needed to help them achieve those objectives, and when their progress will be reviewed, helps to avoid disagreement and leads to better communication between everyone involved. Regular reviews of a support plan help monitor a child’s progress over time and allows for reflection on whether the agreed strategies have been effective.

Most importantly, effective planning leads to the right support being put in place as soon as possible, which leads to better outcomes for children.

Planning will look different depending on the child’s needs, and the approach your setting and / or local authority takes. It is best if you familiarise yourself with your setting’s approach to planning and what they use different plans for. The local authority’s additional support for learning team can also help you with this.

Children’s support needs will often change over time. It is important to keep their needs under consideration and adapt the support you provide when necessary.

For most children, you will do this as part of your ongoing assessment of their progress.

It can be helpful to meet with parents and carers of children with additional support needs a few times each year to share some information about how their child is getting on, what is working well for them in the setting, and any things the child is still finding more difficult. You can also talk about the strategies you have in place to support the child in the setting, and learn some more about how the child has been getting on at home.  

Children with more significant support needs might have a written support plan which will be reviewed more formally. You may be involved in these reviews or asked to contribute information about the child’s progress. You should be told the outcome of any reviews and advised about any changes you might need to make to support the child more effectively.

A co-ordinated support plan (CSP) is a legal document that sets out how a child will be supported in their education. It is used for children with complex or multiple support needs, when they need a lot of help from education and at least one other service like social work or the NHS, and their needs are likely to last at least a year.

It’s the only type of education support plan in Scotland that has legal status and must be followed by everyone involved.

For more information on CSPs, check out our dedicated Co-ordinated support plans page.