Many of our pupils experience significant and multiple barriers to learning, these include sensory needs, communication difficulties and behaviours that challenge the pupil to engage with learning. Learning must be and is personalised and meaningful with an emphasis on engaging them and promoting self-regulation. Learning activities are predominantly multi-sensory to enhance the pupil’s engagement and experience.

Pupils who follow a pre-formal curriculum focus on EHCP outcomes, SCERTS and PLP targets which are set by the class team and therapists. This creates a more personalised approach, focusing on early communication, social and emotional and cognitive skills that create the foundation of learning. It is based on an early year’s approach to teaching and learning, recognising the importance of play and the need for multi-sensory resources, enabling pupils to explore and make sense of the world around them. Our Curriculum is taught by experienced teachers and support staff who support all pupils to make progress at their own pace from their own starting points.

There is a significant focus on specialist provision such as swimming, rebound therapy, sensory integration, story massage, intensive interaction, and attention autism. The curriculum takes a holistic view of the pupils, by focussing on how best they learn and by acknowledging and celebrating the different abilities and achievements of those with complex needs. It is because these pupils are so unique that they require a very separate curriculum and we do not attempt to fit them into existing frameworks that were not developed with such complex learning needs in mind, i.e., we do not follow age related expectations devised for mainstream schools.

We record progress by using evidence for learning. The pupil’s progress is uploaded and then a learning journey is created to show the progression each pupil has made against their targets in each area- EHCP outcomes, SCERTS and PLP targets.

We have half termly topics which gives the pupils new experiences and learning opportunities. Our timetable allows cross-curricular learning with topic lessons that are linked to science, humanities, art, music, drama, IT and PSHE. We recognise annually celebrations and events which link to RE. The pupils learning experiences stretch to outside of the classroom by visiting places within the local community, giving them more social opportunities and exposure to community life.