(taken from: https://www.egfl.org.uk/sites/default/files/Services_for_children/SEND/Case-Studies_ALL.pdf)
School website www.phoenix.towerhamlets.sch.uk
Age range 3 to 19 years
Principles Illustrated:
- ➡️ Understanding the strengths, interests and challenges of the autistic students
- ➡️ Enabling the voice of the autistic students to contribute to and influence decisions
- ➡️ Collaboration with parents and carers of autistic students
- ➡️ Workforce development to support autistic students
- ➡️ Leadership and management that promotes and embeds good autism practice
- ➡️ An ethos and environment that fosters social inclusion for ASD students
- ➡️ Targeted support and measuring progress of ASD students
- ➡️ Adapting the curriculum, teaching and learning to promote wellbeing and success
Context
The school population represents several different cultures and ethnicities, with the majority of pupils being Bengali (70%) or Somali (20%).
Understanding the individual with autism:
- ➡️ Understanding the strengths, interests and challenges of the autistic child and young person
- ➡️ Enabling the voice of the autistic child and young person to contribute to and influence decisions
➡️ Pupil voice is promoted across the school.
Each pupil has a PowerPoint presentation they have produced for their annual review. It may be a series of pictures (e.g. showing what they are good at, what people say about them and what they want to learn).
- ➡️ Positive and effective relationships
Collaboration with parents and carers of autistic children and young people
The staff run an autism support group for parents. They have piloted mini workshops (weekly). Topics include sleeping and eating, a sensory workshop, and an anxiety workshop by Child and Adolescent Mental Health Service staff.
Workforce development to support autistic children and young people
The school provides a very comprehensive induction to autism for professionals and parents / carers. The training includes:
• Introduction to autism
• Understanding and managing behaviour that challenges
• Sharing the diagnosis
• Top tips for working with a child with autism.
• Enabling environments
Leadership and management promotes and embeds good autism practice
An ethos and environment that fosters social inclusion for children and young people on the autism spectrum
The children engage with alerting, organising and calming strategies and activities in all classes for half an hour as soon as they enter school. In some classes, they focus on only two aspects, depending on the needs of the children.
Speech and Language Support
Each class has a Speech and Language Teaching Assistant.
Targeted support and measuring progress of children and young people on the autism spectrum
Learning objectives are printed on students’ work using symbols and words.
The school measures the impact of their interventions through a series of questionnaires, as part of an ongoing bigger research project.
Adapting the curriculum, teaching and learning to promote wellbeing and success for autistic students
Activity sheets are adapted to suit the needs of the children using symbols and words. Alongside these, the children use mini task boards to record what they have done during the lesson. There is a focus on work-based learning.
Transferable practice – actions you could try in your setting
• Share pupil passports/profiles with staff and others who have direct contact with the children and students, including drivers and escorts
• Consider using sensory strategies at the beginning of the school day to see what impact these have on students’ regulation and their ability to engage in learning.
• Use a sensory checklist and shared sensory strategies
• Use Sensory and Motor Strategies
