Mary Hare School has chosen a Spaciotempo temporary building to house its new customised swimming pool. Delivered on a tight budget raised through fundraising, the pool is a safe and brightly lit environment for students with hearing impairment.

Located in Newbury, Berkshire, Mary Hare School is a registered charity and is the largest non-maintained special needs school in the UK. The school educates 240 profoundly and severely deaf children, representing the single biggest community of children with a hearing loss in the UK.

Swimming is a major part of the school’s PE curriculum, and the existing pool required an upgrade to provide a better facility for teaching this vital, life-saving skill.

According to a new study commissioned by Ricoh Europe, 88% say that new skills learnt through the use of technologies such as digital fabrication and 3D printing are vital to educational success and preparing students for the graduate job market.

David Mills, CEO of Ricoh Europe, says:

“Digital fabrication and 3D printing provide the ability to illustrate complex concepts across a variety of subjects. As the way people and machines work together continues to evolve, integrating technical abilities into the learning process helps ensure the skills required of the future workforce become second nature for today’s students.”

A former student at a Newcastle school has returned to her roots to help break down communication barriers thanks to a free training initiative, Go>Grow.
 
Debbie Jervis, who is a profoundly Deaf native BSL user, has returned to Northern Counties School where she was once a student, to deliver British Sign Language training to staff. 
 
Northern Counties School in Jesmond, supports Deaf children as part of the Percy Hedley Foundation. They also support children and adults with complex disabilities, including cerebral palsy and speech and language disorders.
 

Oak View Academy, in Cheshire, has been commended by a national charity for ensuring all pupils are fully supported as they learn to read.

Beanstalk, an organisation which recruits, trains and assists volunteers to give one-on-one support to children who need extra help with their reading, have been working alongside the Winsford school for six years.

Now they have presented a special partnership plaque to recognise the hard work the primary does to promote children’s literacy.

In the latest Government School Performance Tables, the school was named as the most improved primary in Cheshire West and Chester, for progress in reading.

Year 10 and 11 students at the special learning needs Shapwick School near Bridgwater in Somerset are delighting staff by excelling in the new Level 2 Certificate in Health, Wellbeing and Physical Activity provided by Active IQ.

Orbis Education and Care has opened a new day skills facility in Swansea, providing young people and adults with autism with a way to gain hands-on experience in the world of work.

Located in Morriston’s High Street, The Orb is a shop, a café, an office and a laundry. The individuals who volunteer at The Orb have complex needs associated with autism and a learning disability.

Lucy Pottinger, Director of Education at Orbis Education and Care, said of the facility:

Having a child with special needs enables parents to understand and appreciate the important things in life, says actress and writer Sally Phillips. The well-known British comic was speaking at FestABLE, a festival celebrating specialist learning staged at National Star College in Cheltenham. 

It is the first time a festival dedicated to specialist learning has been staged in the UK.

“We are sitting on a treasure chest in the SEN (Special Educational Needs) world. Not only do we have freedom from some of the standards that the world operates with which are completely bogus but there’s a lot of living in the moment,” said Sally, who has a son with Down’s Syndrome. 

Award-winning developer Crest Nicholson is proud to announce the donation of three Variety Sunshine Coaches to St Francis Special School and Mary Rose Academy in Portsmouth.
 
Crest Nicholson’s South Division presented the coaches to the schools, following a children’s fun day of activities and games earlier this month at Silvermere Golf Club in Cobham, Surrey.
 
Each Sunshine Coach will provide pupils with a vehicle to help them to visit their local parks, theatre and wider community during term time, whilst also supporting able-bodied children to take part in exciting sporting activities each day.
 

Sudocrem set up the award-winning Play More campaign because playing outside and discovering the world of nature is part of growing up - or is it? Do children still push aside logs to see what’s crawling underneath? Are daisy chains part of playground life or a relic from the past? 

Children are spending more time indoors than outside and they are missing out on exploring the natural world. In fact, research found that 1 in 9 British children have not visited a beach, park or forest in twelve months, and on average a British child only spends 4 hours a week playing in the great outdoors.

Chroma, the UK’s only national provider of arts therapy services, has seen an increase in demand from mainstream schools to provide art therapy sessions for pupils requiring more supported learning or with special education needs. 

Over the past year Chroma has seen a shift in attitude from mainstream schools to the use of arts therapy as an effective means of supporting SEN pupils. 
The use of arts therapy is proven to better engage with pupils, achieve higher levels of development and provide additional support not previously seen outside of independent special needs schools.