Dear Parents/Carers
You will now receive newletters in: November, February and June. This will cover Term 1 – Autumn, Term 2 – Spring and Term 3 – Summer. Please click on the link below to upload our most recent newsletter.
Thank you.
Over the next few weeks, we will be hosting the following learning events from 10 am for parents and carers.
Wednesday 2nd November – Watch Your Language
Wednesday 9th November – Intensive Interaction
Wednesday 16th November – Using Visuals at Home
New staff to the school will also participate in the above courses as part of their induction programme.
Autism is a national priority. Currently development and creation of a new Scottish Strategy for Autism is taking place across Scotland to ensure that progress is made across Scotland in delivering quality services. In September 2010, the Scottish Government consulted on the way ahead. North Ayrshire Council Educational services have been developing their strategy in partnership with staff, parents etc across the Authority. Today they met with a focus group of parents to discuss the way forward. Christina Larsen, Ashley McConnell and Kirsty Stewart attended from Haysholm. I attended the opening of the Astra base at Ardrossan Academy this morning, I am delighted to be part of the positive changes that are taking place within the authority to ensure high quality delivery of Leaning for those who are on the Autism Spectrum.
We are delighted to announce that we are having a ‘Get Connected’ day provided by volunteers who work for the council. Irene Somerville and Fiona walker attended a meeting this week with myself and representatives from North Ayrshire building services to walk around our outdoor space to assess whether we could qualify for the day. The ‘Get Connected’ will take place on 11th May and volunteers will carry out a range of work activities including painting playground games, providing willow screening and an outdoor class. We are very excited about it.
Just a reminder that our Halloween activities will take place tomorrow afternoon. The children and young people will rotate around classes accessing a range of fun active learning activities, all Halloween themed, of course! Watch out for the photographs!
This afternoon, Mrs Mair met with a selected number of learners to ask their views about getting a new school. A powerpoint presentation was used to help them make sense and understand what that means for them. Mrs Mair then used a Talking Mat to ask them how they felt about a new school that would be bigger and include a swimming pool. Everyone was very excited about the prospect of a new pool and one of our lower primary pupils got excited about ‘more choices’.
Mrs Wilson and Ms Brisbane have been busy over the past couple of days participating in their rebound training. This is welcomed as we have a shortage due to maternity cover!! Rebound Therapy continues to be an integral part of our PE programme for most of our children and young people. It is a fantastic way of developing communication skills, core strength and stability and for having FUN!!!!
Well done to the Senior pupils who attended the recent Sportsability event. I received a phone call commenting on how well behaved they were during their attendance. A well deserved certificate!!!
We had a very busy day learning on our In-Service day. In the morning the classroom assistants:
They worked very hard in groups and individually. It is clear that they are very committed to improving outcomes for all of our children and young people.
In the afternoon Haysholm and James McFarlane staff teams joined together for an input from Mrs Olwynne Clark who has a range of experience in our sector. We covered the theory of Piaget, Vygotski and Bruner as well as working in groups to discuss learning activities in the class. Olwynne introduced the use of early schemas to help assess learning. It was a great day and has generated a lot of good discussion in class teams. We look forward to welcoming Olwynne to spend a day in classes observing and helping us evaluate our next steps to improve learning.
Thank you to all those who supported the Race night. The Parent Council organised this as part of the fund-raising drive for the new minibus. This was a huge success, enjoyed by all who attended and a grand total of £1741 was raised. Thank you again to the hard work of the Parent council members, Christina Larsen and Ashley McConnell who organised this.
