Within this group learners focus on developing essential life skills. Activities will be designed to support development of turn taking, sharing, tolerance of others, self-regulation and communication. We use a range of approaches to support our learners achieve their learning outcomes, for example attention autism – these sessions support learning being a shared experience for our learners, developing attention spans and engagement levels. As a group we aim to have fun with our focussed learning outcomes. Attention autism sessions supports our delivery of phonics, number and science learning. 

Students have the opportunities to develop personal development areas through TEACCH tasks. These can be both bespoke to the individual and generic, depending on the focus area, and these support our students with their independent learning skills. Our TEACCH tasks cover a wide range of learning opportunities including fine motor activities, sorting skills, early number skills and matching skills to name a few.

We are a very sensory based group and as such much of our learning involves sensory input. We enjoy a sensory story and making a mess wherever we can. Being able to experience stories in this way helps with our engagement levels, sense of anticipation and understanding of the story being shared with us.

Numeracy is mostly taught through experiences and games. This could involve number or shape hunts around the classroom, sorting coloured balls into coloured hoops, numeracy themed attention autism sessions or through independent TEACCH tasks. Learning number through play is also a key approach to learning for our adventurers.

We both enjoy and require movement opportunities to support regulation and this may involve using sensory circuits in our outside area, visiting the sensory garden or time in the sensory gym. We also enjoy spending time in our outside area exploring what is on offer.

Physical learning sessions in PE and swimming in our school hydro therapy pool is an important part of our curriculum. These sessions help our students to develop co-ordination and balancing skills and develop a healthy lifestyle through exercise. Swimming sessions also offer an opportunity to develop other life skills such as changing and drying before and after using the pool.   

Within this group, students will work towards a wide range of learning outcomes. Students will continue to develop their turn taking skills, sharing skills, tolerance levels, ability to self-regulate and manage their emotions appropriately to the situation. We use ‘zones of regulation’ to identify our thoughts and feelings and within this learn how to support ourselves and others when experiencing different emotions.

Students each have independent schedules of their days, allowing them to know what their day looks like, when an activity is complete and what is next. This helps to reduce anxiety and allow students to prepare for their day. Routine is key for our students, but allowing students to experience occasional changes to the schedule helps towards their holistic development and their ability to cope with change in later life.

Our literacy sessions are taught as a group initially, before transitioning back to our tables to complete linked tasks. Literacy in Willow class is delivered through a range of approaches. For example, if we are developing storytelling and creativity, we use Talk for Writing and the 5 sentence story approach. This helps with structuring our storytelling skills, encourages engagement and enthusiasm and keeps demand manageable. Often, the adult will scribe, allowing the students to share ideas and develop the story as a group, broadening vocabulary as we go.

We also use colourful semantics to support sentence structure when working on recall. For example, students may watch a short film and recall a scene by indicating ‘who’, ‘doing’, ‘what’ and ‘where’. Where appropriate, some of our students may be stretched and challenged by underwriting their sentences or overwriting yellow pen.

Phonics is taught using Read, Write Inc. Learners in Willow class use the virtual classroom to develop early reading skills. Students have access to the Read, Write Inc. texts to support their reading development. Students have the opportunity to read 1:1 to class staff and our intervention lead across the week.  

Numeracy is taught using a carousel approach. This consists of three stations themed to the focussed learning and a timer with calm music displayed on the interactive whiteboard. Students will transition around each of the stations over the course of the session. As the year progresses and students become familiar with the carousel set up, time at each station is 10 minutes, allowing sessions to be 30 minutes in total and keeping student engagement.

Our Discoverers are a very energetic group and benefit significantly from an active curriculum. We enjoy yoga, boxercise, team games, PE and swimming at the Meridian leisure centre. These sessions help with our physical development and well-being.