Fiveways good news story july17 (fiveways-good-news-story-july-2017.pdf)

Every year the Move organisation invites schools to celebrate their childrens’ achievements by holding a ‘Move Day’. However we generally find that a day is not enough, so spread our activities and celebrations over a week!

During our Move Week in July 2017 we aimed to offer all the pupils on the programme the opportunity to extend and develop the activities that they generally enjoy within their own classroom. This enabled them to work along side other children and staff, sharing tasks and experiences and celebrating their achievements within a wider group.

We also encourage our ‘Super Movers’ to take part, those who are more physically able but still benefit from developing their physical skills and challenging themselves to complete different tasks.

Activities throughout the week included:

 Super Movers sessions: We normally run a group where our pupils can practice balancing, jumping, stepping stones, hurdles and steps, as well a crawling and rolling activities. This group was extended so that more children could come along and join in.

 The younger pupils enjoyed a Halliwick swimming group, which was also an opportunity for staff unfamiliar with the swimming programme, to learn more about it.

 Our physios offered support to staff during swimming sessions, allowing an exchange of ideas with staff working with PMLD pupils.

 We had extra bike and trike sessions on the playground.

 A hike through the Woodland walk to our specially created Move week spa (located in the woodland log cabin).

 Extra opportunities for pupils to use our wheel chair swing and slide.

 A ‘sitting group’ when wheelchair users were able to leave their chairs and practice sitting skills on benches and seats, at the same time enjoying a range of communication games and activities.

 We held an interclass bowling competition.

 A balance challenge, different activities set out in the school hall, daring pupils to challenge their balance and co-ordination and walk the plank…

 A wheelchair dancing session – noisy and slightly chaotic, but great fun!

All these opportunities to ‘Move’ were in addition to pupils’ individual Move goals, regular opportunities to ride Thunder (our riding simulator), PE, Rebound, RDA riding sessions and swimming groups.

Move had suggested a theme for Move day could be ‘Holidays’ so we ran with this idea, introducing fairground music during some sessions, an underwater theme in our sensory swimming pool and opportunities to relax and enjoy water, foam, jelly balls and other sensory materials during relaxation. Each pupil was given a seaside creature as a symbol which they fixed to an underwater interactive screen as they achieved their Move goals. We celebrated during assemblies, enjoying icecreams served by the 6th formers from their icecream cart, and resting feet in paddling pools of water and sand.

By Thursday we were ready to congratulate ourselves for all our hard work and to recognise and celebrate these great achievements. Certificates were handed out across and throughout the school, and we were pleased to welcome to this assembly, one of our Governors, Adrian Partridge, who has a special interest in Move, and gave out many of the certificates .

Selworthy Good news story (selworthy-school-good-news-story-1.pdf)

A work experience review within the Selworthy School sixth form curriculum was held and through in-depth discussions with the staff and learners, interests and abilities were established.  From these discussions, it became evident that we needed to establish more community links to broaden work experience opportunities.  One of our learners was predominantly motivated by vehicles and their maintenance.  Therefore, one of these links was established with the Toyota Garage in Taunton.

http://scc.toyota.co.uk/

We believe that high quality, meaningful and purposeful work experience is an essential component of the sixth form curriculum.  We also promote community cohesion.  Our learner (LR) attends the Garage on a weekly basis in term-time.  He is accompanied by a Teaching Assistant, who offers minimum support.

LR works with a mechanic, assisting in every opportunity for vehicle maintenance and other jobs within a working garage.  He has demonstrated a range of skills during this extended work experience, and his self-esteem and confidence in his own ability and self-worth have soared. 

LR stated that he likes the “hands on” work and  “Matt the mechanic is great.  Wendy [TA] doesn’t help any more.  I can do it.  I can change tyres and check pressures.  I can change oil and help with MOTs”.

We spoke to Matthew Ulrico (Mechanic at Somerset County Cars Ltd) and he provided us with the following statement. “(LR) came to us as a shy, quiet, withdrawn young man.  Over the last two years...he has grown in confidence and has learnt a great deal about working in the automotive environment.  He was designated a role amongst a team of 6 technicians in a busy workshop.  With support and encouragement he has learnt many ‘tricks of the trade’ and has grown into a confident and reliable member of the workshop team.  His knowledge and enthusiasm of working on cars has helped him learn more and more about the job role. He has built up a very good working relationship with all of his colleagues. It has been a pleasure to have taught and worked alongside LR and see the progress he has made over the last two years”

The TA who accompanies LR said, “It has been wonderful to watch (LR) gain in confidence and ability with the incredible support, patience and understanding he has been given within a fully inclusive enrironment”.

Additional info:

We strongly believe that the vast majority of our learners are capable of completing successful work experience with the right guidance and support.  We are hoping that the more opportunities we can create within the community, the profile of our school and our learners will be raised and the work experience offer is enriched.  We are also looking at working in collaboration with Somerset County Council to develop supported internship opportunities in the local area for the majority of learners that are capable of meaningful employment and promote inclusion within our society.

This has also resulted in a potential additional source of funding through the ‘Toyota Fund for a Better Tomorrow’.

https://www.toyota.co.uk/world-of-toyota/environment/community.json

The Sensory Garden Project

Selworthy School opened their doors to parents, staff and the local community to help create a sensory garden for their learners. A number of volunteers and their families turned up to work alongside the community payback scheme to help clear an area of the school. The volunteers worked tirelessly to remove flower beds and fences and cut back overgrown brambles. The next phase of the project will see volunteers work with Kings’ College and the community payback scheme to continue to clear the area ready for paths, artificial grass and sensory items to be installed.

 Fundraising coordinator Cameron Merry said; “This is a really exciting project for us. By attempting to complete the work ourselves we are saving over £30,000. We are extremely grateful for all the volunteers who are giving up their weekends to help and to the community payback scheme and King College for their help and support over the coming months. At the end of this we will have a sensory garden and outdoor classroom area that will benefit all of our learners.”

Official Launch of sen.se

A film showcasing the launch of sen.se, providing more information about the collaboration and celebrating with some of the students across the schools.