I just want to take this chance to give another little update on all the great work that has been happening to develop our school.

Since my last update in October, we have continued to work together to develop different aspects of the school.  All of our Advanced Pupil Support Workers are part of working groups looking at different activities and sharing ideas and resources to promote high levels of engagement for all pupils.  These include PE, effective use of the promethean panel, cooking, singing and messy play groups.

We are continuing to develop hydrotherapy and are starting to widen out the use of rebound therapy to more pupils across the ELC and school.

We have also been continuing to develop activities and resources to promote children’s rights and are planning to apply to sustain our Gold Award status later next year.  Some pupils attend a regular Learning for Sustainability group where they have fun and look after the environment at the same time!  We have had lots of donations for the West Lothian food bank and toy appeal this year so thank you to everyone who donated.  We have also celebrated a number of national days including World Food Day, Children in Need, World Children’s Day and International Day of People with Disabilities (see blog posts for more info).

We had our first curriculum evening in November.  Although we didn’t have lots of parents who managed to make it along this time, those who did gave great feedback and really enjoyed the opportunity to speak to staff about different areas of our curriculum.  We plan to continue developing our life-skills framework next term focussing on strategies to develop functional communication and cognitive (including earl numeracy) skills for our pupils.

Our Christmas show was very well attended and I think those who made it along will agree that the pupils and staff were fantastic!  Everyone had a great time.  The feedback so far seems to be that people liked the new lay out and format although possibly cakes and drinks at the start next time!!

Next term we plan to develop further opportunities for PE, and are planning to introduce an activity afternoon where pupils will split into different cross class groups focussing on developing physical skills.  We are also continuing to develop consistent use of all the  facilities and technology that we have in our new building.

I would like to wish you all a fantastic Christmas and happy New Year and look forward to seeing you at our parents’ evening in January 2024 (Wednesday 17^th Jan 3-6 and Thursday 18^th Jan 6-8).

Debbie