NCFE CACHE Level 2 Teaching Assistant Certificate

This unit explores:

• The expected pattern of development for children and young people from birth to 19 years
• The factors that influence children and young people’s development and how these affect practice
• How to monitor children and young people’s development and interventions that should take place if this is not following the expected pattern
• The importance of early intervention to support the speech, language and communication needs of children and young people
• The potential effects of transitions on children and young people’s development

This unit explores:

• The main legislation, guidelines, policies and procedures for safeguarding children and young people
• The importance of working in partnership with other organisations to safeguard children and young people
• The importance of ensuring children and young people’s safety and protection in the work setting
• How to respond to evidence or concerns that a child or young person has been abused, harmed or bullied
• Understand how to work with children and young people to support their safety and well-being
• Understand the importance of e-safety for children and young people

This unit aims to prepare the learner for working in a school. It covers key aspects of schools as organisations including the structure of the education system, the roles and responsibilities of key members of the school team, and the purpose of school ethos, mission statement, aims and values. Learners will also understand the reasons for key legislation, policies and procedures followed in schools and how schools operate within a wider context.

Health and safety should always be taken into account when planning safe indoor and outdoor environments and activities. Individual educational and health needs should be known and taken into account for each pupil to ensure they are supported effectively. The environment students enter should be safe, with any hazards removed or disposed of before students enter.

This unit covers key principles including:

• Participation — asking children and young people what works, what doesn’t work and what could work better, and involving them in the design, delivery and evaluation of services on an ongoing basis
• Equality of access — ensuring that discriminatory barriers to access are removed and allowing for children and young people’s individual needs
• Anti-discriminatory practice — taking positive action to counter discrimination, identifying and challenging discrimination and being positive in own practice about differences and similarities between people
• Inclusion — a process of identifying, understanding and breaking down barriers to participation and belonging

This unit covers how to maintain and support relationships with children and young people, including communicating in a way that is appropriate to the individual using both conventional language and body language.

This unit introduces the ways in which behaviour management is approached in schools, including strategies for promoting positive behaviour, how to manage challenging behaviour, and how to assess the risks around it. It offers ways in which learners can approach behaviour support in order to benefit pupils and assess challenging behaviour and its impact.

All assessment criteria must be assessed in the workplace. This unit covers communication in the following forms:

• Verbal
• Non-verbal
• Informal
• Formal

This unit covers assessment for learning, including assessment opportunities and strategies such as:

• Using open-ended questions
• Observing learners
• Listening to how learners describe their work and their reasoning
• Checking learners’ understanding
• Engaging learners in reviewing progress
• Encouraging learners to keep in mind their learning goals and assess their own progress
• Encouraging learners to review and comment on their work before discussing with the teacher
• Praising learners when they focus on their personalised learning goals

This unit covers learning support strategies including:

• Creating a positive learning environment
• Managing behaviour
• Encouraging group cohesion and collaborative learning
• Prompting shy or reticent learners to ask questions and check understanding
• Translating or explaining words and phrases
• Reminding learners of teaching points made by the teacher
• Modelling correct use of language and vocabulary
• Ensuring learners understand the learning tasks
• Helping learners to use resources relevant to the learning activity
• Providing individual attention, reassurance and help with learning tasks as appropriate
• Modifying or adapting activities

Displays can take the form of useful reference material to support pupil learning, such as letters of the alphabet and number lines. Display material can also include information that is important for students to memorise, such as number tables, formulae, spellings and other important factual information.