What pieces of the ‘jigsaw’ do you and your colleagues have already?

Danny is the youngest child of fi ve in the Sanders family. Danny attends the nursery class where you work and his three brothers are in the primary school. Danny is frequently dressed in clothes that are torn, dirty and smelly. His shoes and socks appear to be too small for him and affect how he walks. You have spoken with teachers of the other Sanders boys, who say that these children are usually in clean clothes and quite expensive trainers. When you mentioned Danny’s shoes to his mother, Mrs Sanders told you fi rmly that she does not have money to burn and Danny should be grateful that he has any clothes that his brothers have not already ruined. You continue to be concerned about Danny. Something he says to you makes you suspicious that he is shut in an enclosed space. But, when asked, Mrs Sanders says that Danny was shut in the cellar by one of his brothers as a joke and then the boy forgot. A singed area of hair and what looks like a burn on Danny’s scalp are explained as, ‘I got the hairdryer a bit close to him last night. Kid wouldn’t sit still!’ One afternoon you overhear Mrs Sanders talking to another mother, who is expecting her second child and says she is hoping for a girl this time. Mrs Sanders says that Danny should have been a girl. ‘I wanted a daughter. Do you think I wanted all these boys! But Danny fi xed that for me. It ruined my insides having him and he was such a sickly little runt. They had to change all his blood when he was born, so it’s not like he’s really mine, anyway.’