What is personalised learning and support?

Personalised learning and support is a process that supports a wide range of students with additional learning and support needs.

Personalised learning and support is underpinned by evidence of four key elements or areas of activity:

• The assessed individual education needs of the student
• The provision of adjustments or support to meet the students' assessed needs
• Monitoring and review of the impact of the adjustment or support being provided for the student
• Consultation and collaboration – of teachers with parents, support staff and other professionals where required.

Assessed individual student needs

Rigorous and holistic assessment of a student’s learning and support needs is informed by analysis of data. Examples of data for assessing a student for learning may include:

• curriculum and extra-curricular activity assessments
• knowledge of the student from their parents and carers
• assessment of data specific to the individual student, such as reading and numeracy, language, communication, social/emotional, behaviour, health care, attendance, and their personal and cultural context
• profiles or assessments that identify a student’s learning and support needs
• documentation from medical practitioners, other medical specialists, other health or allied health professionals and therapists, such as a paediatrician, school counsellor or psychologist, speech pathologist, occupational therapist, audiologist.
• teacher professional learning to meet a student’s individual needs.

Provision of adjustments

Providing personalised adjustments based on the assessed needs of the student and in consultation with their parents and carers is supported by evidence of their implementation. Examples of evidence of adjustments may include:

• Adjustments to teaching and learning for individual students recorded in teachers’ planning and programming
• Records of educational and social-emotional supports provided for the student
• Individualised or personalised plans that address specific learning and support needs of the student and records of their implementation, such as plans for individual student learning, communication, behaviour, health care and transition
• Adjustments to learning materials such as the provision of learning materials in alternate formats (such as digital formats), adjusted worksheets or reworded tasks
• Environmental adjustments beyond those already in place in the school such as personalised learning spaces and use of sound field amplification systems
• Records of professional learning for teachers and school staff that support them in meeting identified student needs.

Monitoring the impact of adjustments

Adjustments for a student are regularly monitored, periodically revised and adapted or changed where needed, to continue to meet the assessed needs of the student. Examples of data that inform monitoring and review of the impact of assessments may include:

• Student progress data, including both formative and summative assessment
• Progress or file notes kept by teachers, specialist staff, other professionals
• Collection and review of specific data relevant to planned personalised adjustments or interventions, such as behaviour, health care, communication, attendance and learning achievement
• Regular review and updating of health care plans in consultation with medical specialists
• Records of meetings to review adjustments, with individual students, parents and carers, teachers, support staff and specialist staff.
• Records of adjustments to assessment processes, activities and responses such as scaffolded instructions, simplified language and written point form instead of essays. (See NESA's information on adjustments).

Consultation and collaboration

Teachers and school staff work collaboratively to identify and respond to the additional learning and support needs of students. This includes consultation and collaborative planning between school staff and students and their parents and carers, as well as collaborative planning between teachers, support staff and specialist staff within and outside education where needed to address individual student needs. Examples of ways in which this collaboration is recorded may include:

• records of meetings held at school to plan for and review adjustments involving teachers, students, their parents and carers, other specialist staff and professionals, such as learning and support team meeting records
• records of discussions and decisions about the provision of adjustments for the student
• documented student plans signed by the student and their parents and carers
• records of parent-teacher interviews
• parent-teacher communication books.