A useful SEND handover tells the next teacher what helps this pupil learn, participate and feel safe, what gets in the way, and what to try first. Keep it short enough to use, specific enough to act on, and grounded in the pupil's and family's current views. Link to the live plan and records rather than copying a small archive into a new document.
This guide is for schools in England. It supports professional transition planning, but it is not legal advice and does not replace formal educational, safeguarding or health record-transfer procedures.
Why a practical handover matters now
The final full week of term is a good moment to preserve knowledge that otherwise lives in one adult's memory. The current SEND Code of Practice says SEN support should include planning and preparation for transitions. Where a pupil moves setting, information should be shared and schools should agree with parents and pupils what will be shared.
A class-to-class handover is useful even when the child is staying in the same school. Its purpose is not to summarise everything ever recorded. It is to make the receiving teacher's first decisions better. A document nobody can scan before registration is technically a handover, in the same sense that a filing cabinet is technically a conversation.
The SEND pupil handover template
Use the headings below for a one-page pupil passport or transition summary. Put the date, author, pupil contribution and next review date at the top so the receiving teacher can judge how current it is.
| Heading | What to record | Useful example |
|---|---|---|
| What matters to me | Strengths, interests, aspirations, relationships and the pupil's words | “I join in more easily when I know who I will work with.” |
| How I communicate | Preferred communication, processing time and how the pupil shows uncertainty | Give the instruction, show the written step, then allow ten seconds |
| What helps | Three to five observable strategies, adjustments or environmental supports | Preview room changes before the lesson and identify the named adult |
| What to avoid | Known barriers and approaches that have not helped, without blaming the pupil | Do not require a public verbal answer before checking understanding privately |
| Current priorities | One or two live outcomes, provision and how progress will be reviewed | Use the visual planning routine in English and review independent starts after two weeks |
| Patterns to notice | Relevant attendance, behaviour, attainment, sensory or participation context | Missed Friday sessions reduce access to the planned weekly provision |
| People and actions | Key contacts, agreed family communication, owner, first action and review date | Class teacher to check the seating plan with the pupil by 4 September |
Write strategies that another teacher can actually use
Replace broad labels with instructions that can be seen and repeated. “Needs routine” leaves the next teacher to invent one. “Display the three lesson steps, warn about changes before the transition and check which step comes next” describes adult practice.
Test each strategy against four questions:
- When should the adult use it?
- What exactly should the adult do?
- How will the pupil be involved?
- What would show that the approach needs reviewing?
Keep the language strengths-based and current. Describe access needs and effective support, not a list of perceived deficits. If the strategy depends on a particular room, adult or timetable, say so. The receiving teacher needs to know whether the evidence is likely to travel with the pupil or remain attached to last year's circumstances.
Build pupil and family voice into the document
Do not add a decorative “pupil voice” box after adults have finished the handover. Ask the pupil what they want the next teacher to understand, what made learning easier this year, what they are worried about, and how they would like help offered. Record their own words where that is useful and accessible.
Ask parents or carers what has changed, what should remain consistent and whether the summary reflects their understanding. For children entering Reception, the Department for Education's April 2026 transition guidance highlights interests, strengths, communication, friendships, additional needs and existing support. Those are useful principles beyond early years, although that guidance is specifically about transition into Reception.
The connected-data view: test the handover against evidence
Consider a fictional composite pupil whose plan says that a calm start and a short visual preview support participation. Recent behaviour records show several difficult Monday mornings. Read alone, that might produce a vague warning about behaviour.
Attendance shows late arrivals on the same mornings, and communication notes record a temporary transport change. The professional question becomes: what arrival routine and first contact would help the pupil re-enter learning when the usual start is disrupted? The handover can give the next teacher a first action, such as meeting the pupil at an agreed point and previewing the first two lesson steps.
The records do not prove why the pupil was distressed or that the proposed routine will work. They change the question and make a reviewable response possible. The teacher should check the interpretation with the pupil and family, then review it in the new context.
What the data cannot prove
A handover cannot diagnose a need, establish motive, prove that one strategy caused progress or predict how a pupil will respond to a new teacher. Old records can also preserve old assumptions. Date the evidence, distinguish observation from interpretation and say when a claim still needs checking.
Attendance or behaviour patterns are prompts for enquiry, not character descriptions. Provision records show what was planned or recorded, not automatically what the pupil experienced or benefited from. The next teacher should know what would change the current judgement.
Keep teaching handover separate from formal record transfer
A one-page handover does not replace the educational record, common transfer file, SEND plan, healthcare plan or safeguarding record. The Department for Education's data-protection guidance for schools was updated on 9 July 2026. It says that when a pupil moves school, records should be transferred securely, within 15 days of confirmation that the pupil is registered at the new school, and in a way that can be traced.
Safeguarding information follows a separate route led by the DSL. Keeping Children Safe in Education 2025 remains in force until 31 August 2026. It requires child-protection files to be transferred securely and separately from the main pupil file, with receipt confirmed. KCSIE 2026 was published on 7 July for use from 1 September 2026; schools should prepare for it without treating future guidance as today's duty.
Apply the school's role-based access, retention, health and safeguarding procedures. A class teacher needs usable support information, not unrestricted access to every sensitive record.
How Student Radar can support the handover
In Student Radar, Pupil Passports can be created, reviewed and checked for freshness. The receiving teacher can then use the pupil profile to inspect current SEND context alongside attendance, behaviour and communication records, subject to their role and access.
The Heatmap can surface a pattern and open the underlying pupil context, while the SEND Register and Provision Map keep the live plan and provision evidence available. That supports a shorter handover: the summary explains what matters now, and the authorised record holds the detail.
The final handover check
- Ask the pupil whether the summary feels accurate and useful.
- Confirm that family views and recent changes are represented.
- Keep only the strategies the next teacher can act on.
- Check attendance, behaviour, provision and communication for context.
- Name the first action, owner and review date.
- Link to live records instead of copying sensitive detail.
- Confirm that safeguarding and formal transfers follow their own procedures.
- Arrange a brief receiving-teacher conversation for complex transitions.
Review the handover after the first two weeks or sooner if the pupil's experience shows that it is wrong. A useful passport is a working agreement, not a museum label.
To see how connected pupil context can support transition planning, request a focused SEND walkthrough.
Sources and further reading
- SEND Code of Practice: 0 to 25 years, Department for Education and Department of Health, January 2015; publication page updated 12 September 2024.
- Supporting a smooth transition into reception, Department for Education, 16 April 2026.
- Data protection in schools: sharing personal data, Department for Education, 3 February 2023; updated 9 July 2026.
- Data protection in schools: record keeping and management, Department for Education, 3 February 2023; updated 9 July 2026.
- Keeping children safe in education, Department for Education, current 2025 guidance and 2026 guidance for use from 1 September 2026; publication page updated 7 July 2026.