Garrett Hall Primary School

The Ark - Our Resourced Provision

Garrett Hall Primary School’s resourced provision base, known to all as The Ark, is a resourced provision for children with SEMH needs including ASC.

The children who attend have an array of needs and The Ark strives to aid every child’s progress in academic and social skills. This is achieved by putting plans in place that are tailored to individual needs.

The Ark is located alongside the mainstream classrooms within the school. All at Garrett Hall ensure the children who learn in the Resourced Provision are part of the school community and we ensure they feel included and play an active part in school life.

The Resourced Provision currently has five places for students who have SEMH needs. In accordance with the SEND Code of Practice: 0-25 (2015), local authorities must provide a local offer for students with an additional needs.

The placement of pupils in the Ark is the decision led by Wigan SEND team and all requests need to be made through them.

The resourced provision at Garrett Hall is committed to safeguarding children and providing a safe secure, emotionally friendly and healthy environment for them across the whole school.

All pupils are entitled to a broad and balanced curriculum which takes into account their Special Educational Needs. The provision provides a highly structured environment in order ensure that pupils make progress in all aspects of their school life.

Children in the resourced provision are also allocated a mainstream class appropriate to their age and the children will access this as and when appropriate with support from RP staff.

The purpose of the provision at Garrett Hall Primary is to enable the students to have access to a balanced curriculum and remain part of a mainstream class with their peers.

The provision aims:

To strive for good academic attainment especially in English, maths and science, from their starting point
To support pupils with their personal, social and academic needs, allowing them to overcome barriers to attainment
To motivate pupils to learn, develops their self-confidence and improve their attendance
To assess pupils effectively, helping them reintegrate into mainstream education.
To work closely with the L.A and outside agencies.
For all pupils to achieve their best
Provide support and a curriculum to their appropriate cognitive levels of development
To meet any EHCP objectives for the pupils.

To ensure that the pupils are able to work alongside their peers and other staff in the school, the provision has the following organisational aims:

Provide a highly structured teaching environment
Observe and assess pupils in order to provide opportunities for appropriate teaching and learning
Opportunities to work in small groups and independently
Support the pupils in mainstream lessons
Provide pupil profiles/positive handling plans, complete with up to date strategies and new information as it arises for the mainstream staff
Work in partnership with parents, using SEESAW to share successes and as a communication tool.
Work in partnership with external support, professionals and therapists.
Organise staff training and continued support

The Teaching Environment

The RP environment consists of a classroom for group activities, individualised work, interventions and play based activities.

There is a sensory area and there is also a dedicated outside space for children who access the provision.

The provision offers structured teaching with:

Clear routines and structure
Clear expectations and boundaries
Consistent behaviour management

Based on structured teaching principles the provision has:

Individualised timetables
Visual timetables for students
Distraction free workstations
Modified tasks
Focused communication sessions
Clear routines
Sensory area/time to allow students who are finding the environment and the work at certain periods of the day an opportunity to independently recover and be ready for learning.
access to calming activities and times with a member of staff who will support the child in developing self-regulation techniques.

On top of this there are opportunities for social play to develop social skills, small group work to help develop attention and listening skills, circle time to develop social behaviours (turn taking, sharing, paying attention to others etc.) Where necessary children from the mainstream classes may join in with these sessions as appropriate.

Curriculum

Pupils have full access to the national curriculum at the appropriate level according to individual need.

Modifications may include:

Opportunities to take part in small group, individual or 1-1 activities within the provision
Individual support for mainstream lessons
Broken down tasks to enable maximum ability to concentrate on the task and complete work to the best of ability
Sensitivity to pupils’ sensory difficulties relating to their needs
Work and reward system to provide motivation

Assessment

Students will be continuously assessed using B Squared and The Boxall Profile. This information will be shared termly with parents to ensure that they are aware of the progress being made.

Transition

Once the placement is confirmed with the Wigan SEND team a full transition process is followed to enable students to quickly feel a part of the school and the RP.

Students will be visited in their primary schools by staff from the RP who will speak to the key staff to aid transition.

Pupils and their parents will be invited to visit the RP and transition resources can be provided for the children to support with the transition process.

RP staff may also attend any review meetings for incoming pupils.

Working with parents

The RP recognises the important contribution parents make to their child’s learning. We work in partnership with the parents and will communicate on a regular basis either in person, via phone conversations or through a home school book/SEESAW. Parents are encouraged to use the communication tools to communicate any pertinent information about their child. By sharing this information with the school, we are more able to adapt the day to ensure that a child is calm and available for learning. There are termly opportunities for parents to come in to the school to discuss the progress of the students. Pupils with an EHCP will also have an annual review meeting with key staff and external agents to review and set targets as identified in their EHCP.

Working with other professionals

The provision will work in collaboration with other professionals as stipulated in the pupils EHCP. Outside agencies may include: