One year on……

26th March 2021Loveday Fisk

This week, on March 23rd 2021, was the UK’S National Day of Reflection.  It marked one year since the beginning of national lockdown due to a global pandemic.  Many of you will have placed a lit candle at your doors to reflect on the millions of people who lost their lives to this awful virus.  Every member of school, staff and children, have all been impacted by the pandemic in one way or another.  As a whole, Hadrian have fought to support children and families throughout lockdown, remaining open for as long as it was safe to do so.  Individually, lots of our Hadrian family have sadly lost loved ones.

We marked the day in class with an outdoor exploration session in our Caterpillar garden, making a Tree of Remembrance. Choosing this area of school was poignant because it is an area in which we remember all of the amazing children we have sadly lost since opening our doors in 1999.  Every child is remembered with a named butterfly plaque. We thought it would be a beautiful place to spend some time on our National Day of Reflection.  We used yellow material to decorate our remembrance tree to mark the occasion.  Yellow being the colour associated with Marie Curie, the organisation who instigated the national day of reflection.

We continue to fight this battle alongside you all and feel confident we can begin to see light for us all.  We will continue to support our wonderful families to remain safe and well.  We are dedicating this week’s blog to all of those effected by Covid 19.  We’d like to take a minute to say thank you to parents for their continued support and trust.  Have a wonderful and safe weekend.

5th March 2021Loveday Fisk

We have been having lots of fun using our wonderful outdoors again this week.  Not only is this a measure to keep children safe during uncertain times, but our class LOVE it!  This week we have been out every single day.  We have explored our orchard, our trim trail, our secret garden and our internal quad.  Here are some photographs of this week’s outdoor adventures….

Yesterday we celebrated World Book Day in school. Classes have celebrated by telling stories all week to see which class has the highest story sharing number.  We await results today. We all had a huge amount of fun and games from coming into school to leaving on Thursday.  Children were either dressed in Pyjama’s ready for a story or as their favourite character.  We all filmed a class cat walk to share with school late in the day.  We enjoyed a zoom story time dance party with Dance Rox.  We had great fun moving like different story animals and doing the dinosaur rock!  We followed our dance session with a 3 bears porridge snack.  Lunch was also story themed.  Irene had prepared lots of yummy treats such as Olaf’s nose (yes, you guessed it……carrots).  We then enjoyed a hilarious school assembly.  You’ve all heard of the popular Saturday night show The Masked Singer……well at Hadrian, we adapted this to make our very own Masked Story teller.  We watched and listened carefully to 3 masked story tellers.  They were dresse3d as Mr Rollings, Mrs Stokle and Olaf from Frozen.  Children guessed which adults in school could be behind each mask. Children in school guess right.  It was Irene, our cook, Andy, Site Manager and Simon our TA.

We’d like to send a huge thanks to Rachael, our wonderful English coordinator for arranging such a wonderful day.  Staff and children were buzzing around school with the great atmosphere.  Huge thanks to Irene in the kitchen for the themed lunch.

We look forward to seeing lots of faces back at school next week when school lockdown is lifted.  Lots of friends who have been absent since Christmas will be able to return.  We are very excited to see you all.  We can almost feel normal times returning.  In the meantime we’re all maintaining great hygiene practice and staying in our class bubbles.   We hope you all have a lovely weekend.  Stay safe.

First week back

26th February 2021Loveday Fisk

How can it be Friday again already?  Our first week back after half term and it has flown by in a flash of fun.

This week we welcomed back our Jacob.  His first week back since Christmas lockdown.  We wondered if  he’d need some time back to settle back into his routine.  How wrong we were…….it was like he’d never been away.  He got back ingot the swing of school like an old pro.  His first morning back started with his reading session and he NAILED IT!!  We want to tell you we are so proud of you Jacob for taking everything in your stride.  We thought you deserved this weeks weekly achiever certificate  in assembly today.  Mrs Stokle read out the long list of things you’d been doing in class so well this week.  From crawling like an elephant in rebound therapy to making your own hedgehog inspired sculpture using polystyrene and pipe cleaners.  Have a look in the photo’s below….

 

We began the week on Monday by celebrating a special birthday in class.  Our Dan turned 9 years old last Sunday.  We had a wonderful party in class with the yummy snacks sent in by his family.  Huge thank you to Dan’s family for the kind party donations.  Especially the cakes for children to decorate themselves!!

Next Thursday (4th March) is World Book Day in school and we will be doing lots of exciting things throughout the week to celebrate in our class bubbles.  We have special snacks and a special lunch menu inspired by our favourite books!! We have sent letters home to request children to come to school dressed as their favourite characters or in your PJ’s as if you were ready for your bedtime story!  We will be seeing how many story shares we can tally up next week as a school.  We will let you know how we get on.    It’s always a fun day in school as everyone has fun in costume.  I wonder who Mr Rollings and Mrs Stokle will be this year?  Last year they were Mary Poppins and Bert!  Details of our zoom assembly will be sent home next week as we like to invite you parents along to join in the fun.

This week we have also worked hard on our physical skills and movement in Jabadao.  This is a session which children are encouraged to explore an exciting environment with an adult. We have lots of apparatus which is chosen to support particular skills in each child.  We also use our knowledge of what motivates each child to choose our weekly set up.  Each week we begin with a child led session ensuring each child has 1 to 1 time with an  adult to support their learning. Adults are also responding to children are communicating using their core vocab.  Go, Stop, Fast, Slow……

Mid way through the session we switch to a call and respond game using the core vocab.  Adults find a space and model the core vocab to allow children the opportunity to make links between the vocabulary and the action.  This week our Jacob used his big voice and led us all in his movement calls.  He was amazing and had us all worn out!!

 

This week we also worked very hard in sensory art.  Being introduced to new resources is always exciting to see how children respond.  This week everyone worked hard concentrating to make shapes and thread beads.  Lots of lovely engagement, which is just what we like to see!

Have a wonderful weekend friends. Stay safe

 

Happy half term

12th February 2021Loveday Fisk

Well, it is the end of Spring 1 half term already.  We all got here safely and soundly.  What a half term it has been.  The country is in lockdown, we have snow on the ground.  The days are getting longer and we are all feeling very proud of how resilient our children have been through tough times.  A huge thanks to everyone in school for making our school a safe and happy place to be.  Thanks to SLT, to admin staff, to kitchen staff, our lovely caretaker and site manager, to teachers and teaching staff, to our cleaning team, our bus escorts, our fantastic supportive parents and of course our amazing children who are the reason our Hadrian world goes around. Special thanks to our lovely teacher Phil for leading our zoom assembly’s and singing sessions.  He has kept us all entertained this half term with his singing, guitar playing, and funny characters.   Here is a snippet of another busy couple of weeks at school.

This week we celebrated a special birthday in class.  When any of our adults celebrate a birthday we say it is a special one when it ends in a zero;0) Children and staff enjoyed a party in class, a fun exploration session and lots of music and singing.  In unusual times we couldn’t invite friends into class to celebrate so we made a video from every class in school wishing Loveday a happy birthday in their own ways.  Very creative work from everyone……Loveday shed a little tear.  Big thanks to Phil and Ellen’s class for safely serenading Loveday from outside.  They all sang happy birthday for Loveday to enjoy through the window.

Music is a favourite amongst all of our children!  Our Daniel and Leen enjoyed music therapy sessions this week with our Music Therapist, Bev.  They had fun initiating music, responding to fast and slow tempo and enjoying some wonderful intensive interaction using voices and instruments.

During half term we share Shrove Tuesday and in true Hadrian tradition we celebrated a week early by making and tasting our own in class.  Children explored using their hands, their mouths and tools such as whisks and spoons.  We cooked them in class so everyone could enjoy the delicious smell and we had a special pancake snack with chocolate spread and golden syrup.  Yummy.

Watch out in children’s bags this week for special cards coming home.  We celebrated LLEERRVVEE this week for Valentine’s Day this Sunday.  Children made cards with their own hands for people at home.  We also made special cards for our friends who are not able to join us in class during lockdown.  Watch out for postman Pat, Jacob and Yahya!  He might just have something for your from your class friends.  We miss you guys.

 

We ended the half term on a high note today.  The whole school enjoyed an outdoor assembly to enjoy a singing session together, safely distanced outdoors.  It was wonderful to see everyone having fun.  These are times we miss at Hadrian.  We all miss our whole school gatherings. Mr Rollings has competition with some of our older children leading singing!! Joe sang beautifully using the microphone in front of the whole school.   We kept warm with blankets and cuddles in our bubbles while we sang and danced in the snow.

 

This week we celebrated our Daniel in our weekly assembly.  Daniel’s progress this week has been phenomenal.  He is now using our core vocabulary boards to choose symbols which help him make choices.  Daniel showed us that he can consistently ask for more by pointing precisely with his finger at the more symbol.  It was wonderful to see him gaining skills which gives him his own voice.  Well done Dan!! High five to you!  Mr Rollings saved one of his special medals for Daniel as he was super impressed by this progress! Have a look at our Dan…

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1zNvQMpDV0dgqFhbW1F6lyjFt8NJ7qbBY/view?usp=sharing

Outdoor laughs and a birthday bash

29th January 2021Loveday Fisk

Happy Friday everyone.  This week has been a turning point in school, in regards to our fight against this global pandemic.  I am sure those of you who follow our Friends of Hadrian Facebook page know  we were given the go ahead to have staff in school vaccinated.  Wooooooo Hoooooooo! As you can imagine, this has been a long time coming.  Thanks to the hard work of our Senior Leadership Team, who have fought for us all since vaccinations became an option.  I am happy to report every member of staff in our class have now been given the first vaccine!  Onwards and upwards.

In other news, we have enjoyed outdoor learning every day this week.  On colder days we try to wrap up and go for a walk to keep us all warm and safe. Our route around the school grounds includes walking up and down hills, exploring uneven ground and obstacles such as chopped wood to challenge our physical skills.    Our favourite route, chosen by our children’s interests, takes us through the wildlife garden where we like to explore the mud kitchen and the pagoda, followed by the woods.   We usually end up in the Early Years playground at the front of school, exploring musical instruments. On wetter days we all don our waterproofs and splash in puddles.  Every lunch time we have enjoyed an outdoor singing session, marching to favourite songs to keep children active and engaged.  Today we enjoyed exploring the internal quad play area.

Every Friday, one of our timetabled sessions is called Music and movement.  This is a favourite amongst children in class.  The session was initially planned given how much children respond to music.  Each child has a specific learning intention for this session, based around communication.  Some children will be working on responses and eye contact while others are using core vocabulary to choose “more”.  We always begin the session by reading out loud which targets we are working on, to allow adults to be focused on the specific learning intention for the child they are supporting.  Another example of how effective learning can be using a creative curriculum based around child led learning.

This morning we enjoyed our second Half Term Achiever assembly, for children who have worked exceptionally hard this half term.  This is a favourite amongst staff around school.  It’s so lovely, especially in these strange times, to see the amazing work going on in different learning bubbles.  It’s a pleasure to see these bursts of progress in each video story.  Well done to this week’s half term achievers.  The assembly allowed you all to shine bright this morning.

This Sunday is a special day for our Aaron in class.  Our little dude hits double figures……10 years old! Wow.  We hope you have a great day.  We enjoyed celebrating with you in a special class party today. We had a party, Aaron enjoyed a specal birthday sing along with Amy and her ukelele.  We also enjoyed lots of classes joining in with a happy birthday during our zoom singing session.

Have a lovely weekend guys.  Stay safe.

Play space, outdoors and super achievement

22nd January 2021Loveday Fisk

Welcome back to Loveday’s class blog.  Another week in strange times.  However through these Hadrian doors… our school world, inside the safety of our class bubbles, are a wonderful place to be.  Our priority in school is to keep life safe, happy and as normal as possible.  This means business as usual for the children who are back in the building.  Children are working hard and playing hard.  We appreciate all of you parents staying in touch with school throughout these tricky times.  A team approach between home and school remains key.  So, this week in our class has looked like this….

Snow days

We continue to spend time daily learning outdoors.  Our children LOVE learning using our wealth of outdoor areas.  This week has been no exception with the arrival of more snow!!.  We have enjoyed daily sessions wrapping up and exploring outdoors and we are definitely showing preferences in activities and areas.  Here are some photos of our week outdoors…

Play space

This week we have been working on targets in our play space too. We wanted to share with you some of the learning intentions during our time here, to show how important play is in the context of learning.  This is the area next door to our classroom which is specifically set up into different areas to support play and learning using a child led approach. We have a messy play area, a small world and role play area, a construction area, a sensory integration/movement area and a problem solving area.  Children are encouraged to explore freely, supported by adults who scaffold their learning and play.  While we are in this area we are learning to play as well as any of the following……….

Developing gross and fine motor skills,

Developing curiosity and interest in a wider range of experiences,

Using and hearing key vocabulary,

Being challenged to extend our skills with new experiences,

Watch and show interest in the results of our actions,

Sharing attention with someone on the same experience,

Developing our problem solving skills,

Moving around to explore the space,

Developing trusting relationships with adults and friends,

Developing our sense of feeling safe and special through our play interactions,

Making choices and developing preferences,

Representing experiences through play.

Here are some examples of what that looks like for us …..

 

Our Fatima has been working hard in rebound this week.  She follows a rebound profile and has a range of stretches before she even begins her work.  She has been a superstar, doing all of this work with a beautiful smile on her face. She is crawling independently over obstacles and is loving her time working on her physical skills.

This morning we celebrated our Aaron in his favourite time of the week…..assembly.  Aaron was chosen to be our class Half term achiever for a list of reasons.  Aaron’s first time back in school post-lockdown was also for him post operation.  Aaron has had major surgery on his hips, ankles and toes.  He returned to us in October after 7 months off school with casts on both legs.  In a short space of time Aaron has gone from being confined to a chair to walking independently around school with the support of his walking frame.  Here is Aaron’s story……

https://drive.google.com/file/d/19QawnpUKBYT99dai6fHafpPedfUKReFA/view?usp=sharing

We hope you have great weekend.  Stay safe!

Winter Fun

15th January 2021Loveday Fisk

This week we tried a new session in class.  We continued the theme of exploration using scarves, material and pom poms.  Using a range of music tempo’s we enjoyed some intensive interaction with children and followed their interests. Using our observations of each child we also worked on individual communication targets and core vocabulary.

The great thing about this session is we had so much fun.

We had lots of outdoor fun again this week.  We wanted to explore colour using the snow as a blank canvas.  Armed with coloured spray, we made snowmen and all took turns to spray him different colours.  Children explored in their own way.  Some children sprayed, some poured and some enjoyed rolling in the snow.  Basheer decided to lay down and experience tasting the snow flakes as they fell!! A great time was had by all!!

 

Friday afternoon finished our winter exploration off perfectly in the school Yurt.  Children enjoyed choosing music, having cuddles from staff by the idyllic setting of the fire.  Looking out on to the cold snowy outdoors was perfect.  We shared snacks in there too.

Have a lovely weekend everyone.  Stay safe and take care.

 

 

Welcome back. Happy New Year!

8th January 2021Loveday Fisk

Happy New Year to you all.  We are super excited to see in a new year.  I know we’ve all been waiting eagerly to say hello to 2021!  Welcome back to our 2021 blog.  We hope this brings a little ray of light to all who follow in such strange times.  We have lots of fun activities planned this half term and this blog is dedicated to shining a light on all of the wonderful things we are doing and achieving.  We can’t begin our 2021 blog fun without first mentioning the obvious, national lockdown and C19 news.  We want to reassure you that we are doing everything in our power to keep children and staff safeguarded in school.  It is a worrying time for all of us currently but we are confident we are all following strict guidelines and procedures to keep our precious children safe.  Our senior leadership team are working hard to keep you all informed of our path forward as things change.  Any worries or queries, please do not hesitate to contact us.

Happy birthday to our Lacey for her holiday birthday.  Lacey turned 9 on December 28 – you share your birthday with someone else at Hadrian………Mr Rollings!  WOW Lacey…..  We hope you have a lovely day celebrating with your family Lacey.

Congratulations to our Leen for being chosen to be class weekly achiever.  Her work in Music Therapy has been amazing.  She thrives in her sessions with Bev, showing anticipation and using her voice.  Well done Leen.

This week we have all enjoyed working on our targets in a range of different sessions.  This half term we began to use shredded paper in our sensory art exploration session. We explored both dry and wet paper this week.   Lots of opportunities to explore using our hands, ask for more, show preferences and show great engagement.  This is a weekly session which we will build upon using children’s preferences and engagement levels.  Here are some photos of our work……

We are still spending lots of time outdoors as our children love it!  We experienced snow this week.  We all had great fun.  Here are some pictures of our outdoor fun………

Merry Christmas!

18th December 2020Loveday Fisk

We wanted to wish you all a very Merry Christmas from children and staff in Loveday’s class.  We hope you all have a wonderful Christmas and a healthy and happy 2021.  Here is a link to our Christmas show for you all to enjoy……..

WARNING: please watch with a box of tissues at the ready!

Enjoy.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1l9nyo457h9Go6tqvl1YGrVtebolQIgcj/view?usp=sharing

A sneak peak at our Rebound Therapy programmes….

11th December 2020Loveday Fisk

This week we wanted to share with you our rebound therapy work.  It is a festive time of year, filled with Christmas fun.  But even during these festive times, we maintain physical outcomes as a priority in class. It is so important to all of our children to continue to work hard to make sure we are well over the festive period as well as any other time of the year.  What better way to achieve this than using our bespoke Rebound Therapy Centre.  In our weekly sessions we work on children’s individual rebound therapy programmes. We learn about balance, posture, position, strength, stamina and movement.  We start the session with a lovely stretch and massage to get our bodies ready to work.  We then use equipment on the trampolines to encourage exploration and play, enabling children to work without even knowing they are working!!! Our Rebound Therapy centre is essential for our children to access a broad physical education curriculum, meeting the needs of every child who accesses it.

Have a look at our session’s in action….

This week in class, our little Loveday elves also began making gifts for home in our Christmas toy shop!  See if you can guess what we began making.

Here’s a clue….you can hang it on you Christmas tree!!!

 

 

Well done to our wonderful Fatima.  She was awarded a certificate in our zoom assembly this morning.  She was presented with this certificate and her chosen treat was a bag of Maltesers which she enjoyed as she watched the rest of our achievers assembly!

 

 

A little elf told me this week that Loveday’s class were in the process of making a Christmas show!! Watch this space for details to follow.

It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas……

Have a lovely weekend everyone.

Stay safe!