Professional development

Professional development and support for staff in mainstream settings

Pupils at St Giles all have a physical disability, complex medical needs or complex speech and language difficulties in addition to their learning difficulties. However there are many children with the same physical, medical and speech difficulties that are able to access education in a mainstream setting. In the past these children may well have come to St Giles but now, in an inclusive society, they should be enabled to attend their local school with their siblings and friends. Staff at St Giles can support you to give you the confidence to meet these additional needs in your setting.

We provide this service free of charge as part of Croydon Special Schools’ outreach service. Support could include a visit to St Giles for a general tour or with a specific remit in mind, a visit to your school, a training session for staff or signposting to advice and support from other agencies.

You could:

• Come and look at furniture and equipment to support an individual child or to help you set up a new classroom or hygiene area.
• Come and look at different types of switches, keyboards and software and get advice about how to meet your child’s specific needs.
• Learn how to use Boardmaker, Symwriter or Clicker to create symbol resources for visual timetables and worksheets, to scaffold writing and to aid pupils’ communication and recording in all subjects.
• Come and learn some disability sports that all your children can take part in – Boccia, Polybat, Table Cricket, Target Beanbag, New Age Curling. Pupils with physical disabilities in your school could join the Croydon Panathlon team.
• Get support with writing risk assessments and policies for a new pupil, a specific activity or a school journey. One of our staff could visit to help you identify any risks and how they could be minimised.
• Get advice on managing intimate care and encouraging independence

Please phone or email the school office and a member of staff will get back to you to discuss your needs.

For further details please see attached document:

St. Giles Outreach Offer

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