Joint Assessment Meetings
The purpose of the Joint Assessment Meeting is to collaborate the professional advice as part of the Statutory EHC Needs Assessment process. JAMS involve working with parents, carers, setting staff and other professionals to jointly produce a description of a child's strengths and barriers to learning.
We ask all those involved about what they feel it would be important to achieve in the next year or two and we work together to shape these into clear, realistic and measurable outcomes. We then jointly plan the strategies and interventions that are necessary in order to achieve these outcomes.
Prior to the meeting, the Educational Psychologist may carry out observation or assessment work with the child. They will add information from this into the joint assessment, alongside information from others at the meeting, as well as asking questions during the meeting to get as full a picture of the child as possible.
The meetings generally take about two hours, but this can vary. Participants don't need to do anything to prepare for the meetings as all you need to bring is the knowledge that you already have of the child.
Person-Centred Planning – PATH and MAP and the Kent Educational Psychology service
What is Person Centred Planning?
Person centred planning aims to put children and young people at the centre of planning and decisions that affect them. When children are meaningfully involved, this can change their attitude, behaviour and learning and make them active partners who work with adults to bring about change.
A model of person centred planning aims to:
- Put children and young people at the centre of planning and decisions that affect them
- Bring people together – both to celebrate successes, and also to address difficulties with honesty and care
- Help children and young people learn how to express their views, how to choose and how to listen
- Show children and young people that they are listened to, respected, and valued and cared for – that they belong
- Help adults get to know the children and young people they work with, and give insight into the impact they are having on children and young people
- Make plans that build towards meaningful outcomes for children and young people and their families
What is a PATH and a MAP specifically?
PATH and MAP are person centred planning processes used by the Kent Educational Psychology service to work towards a brighter future for people.
The research based creative planning tools, PATH and MAP (Pearpoint, O’Brien Forest, 1993) are led by two trained facilitators who use process and graphic facilitation to create a shared vision of a positive future for individuals, families, teams and whole organisations.
PATH is a positive process which always looks forward, draws on people’s ability to visualise positive futures and to plan backwards from a future vision or dream. It allows focused listening, creative thinking, goal setting and alliance building.
MAP differs to PATH by allowing a person or team’s story to be told first, before drawing a line around to represent containment of the past and begin to think about the future. This process then listens to the dreams, acknowledges the nightmares, and lists the gifts and strengths already present that can be built upon in the action plan.
These tools can be used with teams or individuals of any age where future forward planning and thinking together around a given challenge or issue are needed, such as times of transition and review meetings.