Autumn Newsletter 2017
Dear Parents and Carers
It was lovely to see all the pupils back after the summer holidays and hear all about what they had been doing during the break. All the pupils have settled in quickly and are eager to get started with the new academic year. Our overall topic this term is ‘The Whizpopping World of Roald Dahl’. Within this topic, our class will be focussing on the story of the BFG and we will explore this in a variety of lessons and contexts.
There will be a slight change to our Thursday hiking days this year. We will be accessing the sensory rooms at the Alan Shearer Centre on Thursday morning as usual, and then in the afternoon we will be working on our life skills by accessing different cafés in the community. This will serve as a good opportunity for the class to work on their communication and numeracy in a different context. For our visits out on a Thursday we recommend that pupils wear suitable clothing and have some sunscreen in the hope that we will get lucky with some late September sun! We will also be developing other life skills, such as independence in food preparation, in our weekly food technology lesson.
As with last year, art will be planned and led by Rachel Peaty, our class Higher Level Special Support Assistant, who will also be delivery science lessons.
Pupils will continue visit local supermarkets to buy ingredients for our cookery lessons. As with café visits, these sessions allow us to get out and be part of our local community, whilst transferring the communication and numeracy skills that we are leaning in school into functional settings.
Pupils will continue their individual swimming programme on Mondays. An additional session to our timetable this year is PE, which will take place each Friday morning. It would be great if pupils could bring some comfortable clothes and shoes for these sessions.
We are very excited about term ahead and look forward to seeing the students’ progress throughout the curriculum.
This year we will be taking part in Forest School sessions on Tuesday. The Forest School association describes it as “an inspirational process that offers ALL learners regular opportunities to achieve and develop confidence and self-esteem through hands-on learning experiences in a natural environment”. Forest School will be running regardless of the weather to allow the children to explore the natural environment throughout the different seasons and weather conditions. We will be able to provide waterproofs for children to wear, however if they have any wellies at home you can send in this will be beneficial. Please also ensure children have appropriate warm clothing and a change of clothes in school as we may be getting dirty!
If you have any further questions you would like to discuss please don’t hesitate to give me a call.
Jen and Team.