Wells Park School

School trips are regular events. Visits are always well planned to support the learning and for rewards at the end of the school year.  In recent years, among other educational visits, children have visited the Houses of Parliament to encourage thinking about making connections between Parliament and their local area, major London museums, local parks and shops. Pupils have also visited local restaurants, major theme parks and zoos, swimming pools and Hainault Forest, as part of the residential time in the school.

We enjoy inviting a range of visitors to our school. These may be people working in our local community such as firemen, or professional musicians and singers. Children also enjoy history themed days, animal handling experiences and drama/music workshops to support learning. 

Our curriculum aims to have a pupil centred approach in which every pupil is encouraged to enjoy learning, make progress and achieve. We recognise that pupils at Wells Park School have specific, diverse and individual needs and our curriculum aims to reflect and meet those needs.

Life Skills are a key part of the curriculum for all Wells Park pupils. Careful and individualised curriculum planning gives all pupils the opportunity to experience and learn to prepare for real life situations. Practical life skills are an essential part of learning to be independent, feeling confident in the community and help to develop self-esteem. Skills taught within the safe school environment, and most importantly on trips out of the school, teach our children how to achieve tasks that others normally consider as easy.

How are Life Skills taught at Wells Park?

Whilst the development of life skills is embedded into the daily education and care for all pupils, we may dedicate time within the weekly timetable to concentrate on these vital skills for specific pupils. The child’s needs are carefully assessed and targeted, and next steps are prioritised. Key areas may include:

Emotional Literacy Skills

Individual lessons which develop a child’s ability to understand and express his own feelings. This includes learning to recognise feelings and considering how to manage them, such as the ability to stay calm when angered or to reassure oneself when in doubt.

Road Safety and Transport 

This includes crossing the road, using public transport, riding a bike.

Home Skills

This includes shopping, cooking, bed making etc.     

Environmental Awareness

Such as gardening, recycling, composting, seasonal crafts and developing a pride in our surroundings.

Leisure

This includes swimming or sports. 

At Wells Park, our curriculum aims to have a 24 hour pupil centred approach in which every pupil is encouraged to enjoy learning, make progress and achieve. Our data proves that children are making excellent overall progress with their behavioural skills. However, we have noticed that children appear to be making slower progress with their ‘Interacting and Working with Others’ area of development. To target this, we have decided to transfer our learning environment from the classroom, to the residential house setting on Friday mornings.

Through a Social Skills Programme and individual targets for all children we aim to improve this particular skill area. Staff will model positive social interactions and promote a positive attitude to learning away from the classroom. We aim to encourage children to transfer their improved learning behaviours learned in class, to the ‘home’ setting. On Fridays, learning takes place on each of the residential houses as children are supported by both the care and teaching team. We believe that children are intrinsically motivated and eager to learn when their interests are encouraged and supported in school and at home.

Wells Park recognises that pupils have specific, diverse and individual needs and our Friday curriculum aims to reflect and meet those needs. Each residential house aims to spark the interest of its children and tailors its learning programme according to need. All children are supported with homework and staff are able to deliver individual intervention programmes which support reading, writing and maths skills. We are also able to deliver the support recommendations suggested by other visiting professionals, such as speech and language and occupational therapists.

We aim to ensure pupils have access to supportive actvities to promote their self-esteem and that they have opportunities to talk through and reflect on different situations. Our Rainbows work is just one way in which we are able to do this.

Wells Park offers an outdoor approach to learning through its ‘Woody Wells’ programme. The philosophy encourages and inspires pupils through positive outdoor experiences. Children engage in motivating and achievable tasks in a woodland environment. Learning outdoors helps children to place their learning in context and is a motivating way for children to enhance learning opportunities. It is also a way for pupils to work on their social and independent sklls.

July 23rd began like any other on a farm in Suffolk, the animals woke up, Giles (the farmer) brought them food and checked they were happy and the animals prepared for a nice day in the sun. The day was slightly different to any other for Sunshine the pig as she woke up after a long sleep but was still tired. The reason she was tired was because she was pregnant with 10 little piglets. She couldn’t wait to see them and luckily she met her babies later that day, all happy and they began to suckle (milk from her).