Amanda

My Summary

My Experience

I act as a support to the teacher when working in a class setting. I work collaboratively under the supervision and guidance of senior teaching staff in a busy and exciting school. I make valuable contributions to the delivery of teaching and provide personal, academic support and mentoring for small groups and working along side an individual student who displays some challenging behaviours while ensuring the vision and ethos of the school is upheld.
I act as a support to the teacher when working in a class setting. I work collaboratively under the supervision and guidance of senior teaching staff in a busy and exciting school. I make valuable contributions to the delivery of teaching and provide personal, academic support and mentoring for small groups and individual students.
Previously, I have worked as a teaching assistant in a nursery unit meeting social, emotional, physical and intellectual needs of children by following planning given by the nursery manager. I follow planning in order to teach and evaluate learning activities and I adapted planning for individuals, groups or the whole class as required. Throughout my career I have worked along-side other staff and management to identify those children who may need extra support or intervention including those on the Special Needs Register. I am flexible and can adapt activities for these children to maximize learning opportunities for them in line with the school SEN policy and with an awareness of the National Curriculum while carrying out half term assessments to support the pupils achievements and developments within the classroom.
I am empathetic to the needs of the children and the school; for example, I adapt how I deal with each child depending on their individual differences and can be discrete in supporting children with intimate medical procedures e.g. in administering insulin. I am most aware that children want to fit in and their medical conditions are only part of the whole child. By protecting their dignity and dealing with necessary procedures i.e toileting and intimate care sensitively while following safe guarding policies of the school. I have worked with children that have moderate medical needs including PEG feeding and children with diabetes. I am competent in taking blood sugar readings, calculating and administering insulin, and a child with epilepsy and can recognise when she was about to have a fit and communicated clearly with emergency medical staff when called to the child. I have encountered a child who had half a heart and needed daily medication and monitoring this included filling in daily medication forms and checking medication was in date and correct labels were applied.
I have knowledge of using CPOMS to record and document any safeguarding concerns, behavioural challenges, medical issues, parental contact and child on child concerns.
I am very flexible and work throughout different school year groups including supporting lunch times and break times both indoor and outdoor.
I regularly create and use resources such as phonic bingo, addition snakes & ladders and road letters to help an ASD child who loves cars with his letter formation. I try to find out what interests’ individual children and personalize activities to spark their interest. I realise that all children are different, and I recognise the value of differentiating activities so that they work for everyone e.g. by adapting worksheets so that lower ability children can be included in the whole class learning but at a level appropriate to them. I use social and emotional stories and sensory bags to help children connect and identify with their own feelings. I also used these strategies with young children who had behavioural difficulties to try and get them to identify how they made others feel. I have experience working with children who have communication difficulties and am competent in using visual timetables, Makaton and PECS (picture exchange communication system) and communication boards in order to support and develop children’s learning and communication skills.
I have experience of leading intervention groups for reading in years one and two and a fine motor group using activities such as Funky Fingers and dough disco to improve children’s fine motor skills. I also regularly take small groups to develop numeracy skills and phonic awareness by using schemes such as Jolly Phonics and more recently Little Wandle letters and sounds.
I prepare for lessons by planning activities and thinking carefully about what will interest children. I create, adapt and gather resources. I am prepared for lessons and make sure all equipment is ready. I plan activities that enable me to assess children’s progress throughout the lessons and provide immediate feedback throughout the activities which is personal to the children to encourage them. I also regularly report progress to class teachers and record progress accurately.
I am aware of my responsibility to safeguard all children and I take this extremely seriously. I support the class teacher in managing difficult behaviour and always act in accordance with the needs of the child and the other pupils as well as in accordance with school policy. Working with children with a range of difficulties has given me experience in working closely with teachers, and other outside agencies such as SALT in setting up and implementing SEN and behaviour support plans and PSPs (pastoral support plans) and referring to the arousal curve document. I have suggested strategies that have help develop children’s learning and behaviour i,e the use of OT programs and distraction techniques.
I am an effective communicator who can relate to teachers, staff, pupils, parents/carers and any other agencies that may come to work in the school. I am calm, approachable and listen well. I have found this has helped me build and sustain positive relationships that have mutually beneficial. I have a collaborative approach and enjoy working as part of a team, recognizing that we all have something to offer. I value the support I have been given by colleagues at all levels within the school and hope that I have also been supportive and that they can rely on me too.
I believe I have an important job because I am helping set children up for lifelong learning and inspiring them to make a positive contribution to change their lives. I take my job seriously and because I am committed to the work I do I find it easy to be motivated, organized and prioritize my time.

My Qualifications

Higher level teaching assistant diploma level 4.
CACHE level 3 specialist support in schools.
I also have lots of SEN and behaviour training. Please ask for more details.

My Availability

My Fees

• Babysitting from £10.00 per hour

Please ask