Resource Provision for the Deaf
Welcome to St Jude’s Catholic Primary School Resourced Provision for Deaf Children
We have had an exciting start to the new school year with the opening of our new Resource Provision for Deaf children here at St Jude’s. The children are part of their own mainstream class where they are supported by a Communication Support Worker, who uses sign to help them communicate. We take a Total Communication approach to support the children as they grow. Each child has regular support from our Teacher of the Deaf, according to their needs.
Throughout the day, the children come to the Resource Provision, which is a quiet acoustically appropriate environment for the children to work in. This supports the children in pre and post teaching to help develop their language in different areas across the curriculum, as well as their communication skills with signing and attention. This might be either on their own or in a small group.
Listening Games
Each child has their own Personal Learning Plan (PLP) with targets to support their individual needs, which incorporates the targets set on their individual Educational Health Care Plans (EHCPs). These targets are set in discussion with the class teacher, Speech therapists and Audiology Departments, with input from both parents and the children. By working together, we can help the children achieve the best possible outcomes.
We have a Speech Therapist visit the Resource Provision regularly to work with the children, assess their current needs and give advice on how staff in the Resource Provision can help the children achieve new short-term goals. A Deaf Instructor will soon start to visit us to support the Deaf children with signing BSL and developing their own understanding of deafness.
All Staff have training in Deaf awareness and our Teacher of the Deaf works closely with class teachers supporting the children’s needs, matching resources and providing teaching and learning to support.
Every day starts with listening checks and sound games to develop the children’s listening skills as part of an audiology curriculum, as well as teaching the children how to be independent with their own Hearing technology. They then go to their own classrooms to begin the school day with their classmates. We want the children to be fully integrated into school life.
We want the children to be happy, confident and independent. Once a week all the children in the Resource Provision come together to develop friendships and a deaf peer group. This can include activities and games around PSHE, as well as enrichment with activities such as cooking and gardening. We work hard to develop the children’s self-esteem and resilience and encourage them to develop a strong sense of their own identity. We are looking forward to having the opportunity to meet up with deaf children from other local Resource Provisions for activities and events across the year.
The children have been excited to learn some BSL with our “Sign of the week” and already we see children trying to put these together to make short signed sentences, as well as signing some prayers and songs. It has been wonderful to see the children's enthusiasm to learn this new skill and we hear them talking about it, asking questions and eager to learn more.
