These blog posts are all about our many senses and are full of ideas and activities to help us to explore them and understand them better with the children we are engaging with.
I thought it might be helpful to provide a ‘kit list’ of items that can be helpful in supporting children and young people with a range of additional needs. If you are looking for something specific, and can’t find it, email me at markjarnold@gmail.com and I’ll see what I can do!Mark’s Additional Needs Kit List: Start … Continue reading Seven Ideas For Your Additional Needs Kit List
With better understanding about our many senses and sensory processing difficulties, and with the right strategies in place, every leader can learn to make all that they do inclusive for every child and young person. Learning that behaviour is a form of communication is a great place to start.
Halloween literally means the evening before All Hallows Day or All Saint’s Day, a day festival celebrated on the 1st November each year. The name Halloween is a shortened version of All Hallows’ Evening which is celebrated on 31st October. The origin and meaning of the festival of Halloween is derived from ancient Celtic harvest … Continue reading Alternative Halloween For Children With Additional Needs
As he walks through the front door, his parent asks him “Did you have a good day at school today, Jack?” and in doing so metaphorically pulls the ‘ring pull’ on the coke can that has been shaken all day… Boom! Jack erupts, and his parent wonders why this always happens at home and not at school…
Sometimes it can be hard to support our children to learn and develop, especially if their additional needs make learning extra hard. So, what can we do to help them to engage, stay focussed, and enjoy learning and developing?One way can be to use what they already enjoy doing to help them to learn. This … Continue reading Six Ways To Use Football To Aid Additional Needs Learning
Spring is here, the Easter school holidays are coming up fast, longer, warmer days are approaching, so here’s five fun sensory ideas to try with your children to help them get out and explore and think about Spring! See Spring is the time when all the wildlife wakes up after the winter. If you have … Continue reading Five Ideas For Sensory Spring Fun!
We are all sensory creatures, exploring, understanding, and engaging with the world through all our many senses. This is just as true for someone who may have additional (special) needs as it is for anyone else.Sometimes we can be under-responsive (or hypo-sensitive) to sensory inputs, sometimes we can be over-responsive (or hyper-sensitive) to sensory inputs. … Continue reading How Happy Haircuts Happen!
Little by little the days are getting long, lighter, maybe even warmer… Green shoots are pushing up through the earth and there are the first flowers of the year, snowdrops and crocuses dazzling us with their beauty. Spring is coming! Crocuses and daisies on a grass field If, like me, you find winter especially hard, … Continue reading Spring Is Coming: 10 Ideas To Get Out And Enjoy It!
(A guest post from my good friend Lydia Gibson...)I’m sure many, like me, can really relate to the character Luisa in Encanto. Her song has been going round and round in my head for days now (mostly because my 9-year-old is obsessed with the film at the moment!) I have been really struck by the … Continue reading Encanto: What Does Luisa’s Song Teach Us About Mental Health?
If you’ve been following Strictly Come Dancing this year, you can't help but to have been thrilled by the progress of Rose Ayling-Ellis a Deaf actress who plays ‘Frankie’ on Eastenders, and her professional dance partner Giovanni Pernice. Well last night was the Strictly Come Dancing final! [Spoiler alert: the result is mentioned and featured … Continue reading Rose And Giovanni: Inclusion Champions!
Teaching Resources, Sensory Stories and SEND Information
The Additional Needs Blogfather 