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SENCO: interview questions and tasks

Download and adapt our interview questions to help recruit your next SENCO. Read advice on what to look for in candidates' answers, and find example interview tasks to help you assess if candidates have the right skills for the role.

Last reviewed on 8 August 2025
School types: All•School phases: All•Ref: 1388
Contents
  1. Make a custom interview pack based on the job description
  2. Use our list of interview questions
  3. Download and adapt our example tasks
  4. Ask KeyGPT for personalised questions and tasks 

Make a custom interview pack based on the job description

SENCO roles often vary from school to school, depending on factors like:

  • Your school's size and phase
  • The specific pupil needs
  • If the SENCO has extra responsibilities, such as inclusion or safeguarding

Use our interactive tool to create an interview pack for your specific SENCO role. 

You can choose questions and tasks matched to the job description, and your pack will include guidance on:

  • What to look for in good answers
  • How to adapt and evaluate interview tasks

Use our list of interview questions

Download our pre-made interview sheet suitable for any SENCO post.

Adapt it to match the specific role and your school's context, and record the candidate's responses and score evidence during the interview.

Remember to make sure at least 1 person on the interview panel has attended safer recruitment training.

KeyDoc: interview record sheet for a SENCO DOCX, 120.8 KB
Download

Download and adapt our example tasks

Download the document below and choose from 1 or more of the following tasks, depending on the role you're hiring for: 

  • In-tray exercise 
  • Data analysis
  • Deliver a presentation
  • Observe a lesson
  • Pupil scenario

The download has:

  • A summary of each task, including the key skills it tests 
  • Key points to look for in candidates' responses 
  • What you need to prepare
  • An overview of each task to give to the candidates
  • A presentation scoring sheet 
KeyDoc: SENCO interview tasks DOCX, 144.5 KB
Download

Ask KeyGPT for personalised questions and tasks 

Ask KeyGPT, our AI-powered assistant, to generate more examples of interview questions and tasks suitable for your context, based on what it knows about your school and what you tell it about the role. Just adapt the prompts in our interview questions wizard and see what it suggests.

Sources

  • Ann Marie Christian is a safeguarding practitioner with over 30 years of experience. She supports schools with safeguarding knowledge and compliance, and provides training and consultancy for designated safeguarding leads and governors.
  • Lorraine Petersen is an education consultant. Previously the chief executive officer of nasen and a primary school headteacher, she is also a chair of governors
  • Jenny Moss was the headteacher of a special school judged ‘outstanding’ by Ofsted. She has worked in school leadership for almost 20 years
  • Trevor Bailey has extensive experience in school leadership and management, and was a secondary headteacher for 14 years

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