Individual Education Plans in England: What Home Educators Need to Know About EHCPs

If you have been reading about special education support and come across terms like "individualized education plan" or "IEP," you are likely encountering American terminology. In England, the legal document that serves a similar function is called an Education, Health and Care Plan — an EHCP. The two are not interchangeable, and the rules governing what happens to this plan when a child is home-educated are specific, consequential, and not well explained in most of the guidance parents find online.

Here is what the law actually says, and what it means practically for home-educating families.

What an EHCP Is and How It Differs from an IEP

In the United States, an Individualized Education Program (IEP) is a federally mandated document under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA), specifying the support services a child with a disability is entitled to receive in an educational setting.

In England, the equivalent mechanism is the Education, Health and Care Plan, introduced under the Children and Families Act 2014 to replace the older Statement of Special Educational Needs. An EHCP is a legally binding document that describes a child's special educational needs (Section B), the educational outcomes being worked toward (Section E), and — crucially — the specific provision the local authority is legally required to secure (Section F).

The critical distinction: an EHCP is not just an educational plan. It integrates health and care needs as well. The local authority, NHS, and social care services all have legal duties attached to what is written in it. That legal weight is what makes EHCPs both more powerful and more complex to navigate than a simple school plan.

What Happens to an EHCP When You Start Home Education

This is where many families get caught out. The EHCP does not disappear when you deregister your child from school. The local authority remains legally responsible for maintaining the plan and conducting annual reviews — even after your child moves into elective home education.

However, Section F of the EHCP — the part specifying what provision must be secured — changes materially. When a child is in school, the local authority arranges the Section F provision through that school placement. When you become the educating parent, the local authority's duty to secure Section F provision continues, but the delivery mechanism changes. You, as the home-educating parent, take on the responsibility for ensuring that provision is in place.

In practice, this means the local authority should update the EHCP to reflect the home education context. They may reduce or amend the provision they directly fund. Some families find that certain therapies or specialist support previously provided through school become much harder to access once the child is no longer in a school placement.

If the named school is a special school, the situation is different. You cannot deregister a child from a special school without the formal written consent of the local authority. The LA must be satisfied that you can adequately meet the child's needs before releasing them from the placement. This is a legal requirement, not a courtesy, and attempting to deregister without consent creates significant legal risk.

The Annual Review and Your Documentation Obligations

Even with an EHCP child in home education, annual reviews are mandatory. The local authority must conduct these reviews and must invite you to participate. The review examines whether the EHCP still accurately describes the child's needs and whether the provision remains appropriate.

This is where your home education documentation directly intersects with the EHCP. Your annual review submission should not simply be a general educational provision report. It needs to specifically address how your home education is meeting each element of Section B (special educational needs) and Section F (provision).

For example, if Section B describes sensory processing difficulties, your documentation should describe how your daily routine accommodates sensory needs — the physical environment, the schedule flexibility, the specific adjustments you have made. If Section F specifies speech and language therapy at a certain frequency, your records should show how that provision is being delivered and by whom.

Local authority EHE officers sometimes lack specialist SEND training. A report that uses the same structural language as the EHCP — referencing specific sections and demonstrating that you understand what the plan requires — is far more effective than a general report that lists subjects covered. It speaks directly to what the reviewing professional needs to assess.

Documentation Best Practices for EHCP Families

Because the EHCP creates specific legal obligations on both you and the local authority, your documentation needs to be more structured than for families without an EHCP.

Keep a copy of the current EHCP accessible and review it before writing any report for the local authority. Your report should map explicitly to the plan rather than operating as a parallel document.

Record the specific interventions and support strategies you are using for each identified need. If your child has dyslexia and the EHCP specifies multi-sensory literacy support, document which approach you are using (for example, an Orton-Gillingham-based programme), at what frequency, and what progress looks like.

If you are accessing any specialist support externally — private speech and language therapy, occupational therapy assessments, educational psychology reports — keep dated records of these inputs. They demonstrate that you are actively securing appropriate provision rather than simply asserting that you are.

When the annual review approaches, the Ombudsman data is relevant context: the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman found fault in 91% of education complaints investigated in 2024-25, frequently citing local authorities for making unreasonable demands without clarifying statutory parameters. Knowing your rights means knowing what the LA can and cannot require. They cannot demand home visits as a condition of confirming that provision is suitable. A well-structured written report that directly addresses the EHCP is a legitimate and legally sufficient response to an annual review.

When the EHCP Ends

EHCPs can be maintained until age 25 for young people in education or training. For home-educated young people approaching 16, the annual review becomes particularly important because it determines whether the EHCP continues, is amended, or ceases.

If your child is pursuing GCSEs or IGCSEs as a private candidate, or planning to apply to a further education college or sixth form, the EHCP review at Year 10/11 is a critical planning point. Some FE colleges accept home-educated students with EHCPs and have dedicated SEND support funding attached to those places. Understanding what is in the plan and how it translates to post-16 options is documentation work that pays off directly in terms of access to support.

The England Portfolio and Assessment Templates includes documentation frameworks specifically designed for home-educating families navigating local authority reports and EHCP annual reviews — structured to use DfE language and address the specific requirements an EHE officer or annual review panel will be looking for.

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