SEN Inflatable Fun Day Exclusive Session
We thought we would make the first news post of the year about our SEN exclusive inflatable fun day session.
We understood a clear need for a SEN exclusive session after a chat with a SEN mum at our October one. She told us that her son had a good time, but it was a gamble for her because of anxiety about how he might be (or more accurately how other people would be if he became upset).
She explained that it’s often very isolating and SEN parents often just don’t go because of their worries. It was that instant we decided we’d try to host a SEN exclusive session.
We understand acutely how isolating things can feel sometimes. Our own son has a very low immune system due to chemotherapy for Leaukemia, so this is something we can relate to.
We decided immediately that we needed to make a SEN only session to embrace these children and have something that families could feel more comfortable in coming to, without fear of how people might react.
However, we can't just call it "SEN exclusive" and expect it to magically mean anything... We contacted Dartford NAS, Bexley Snap, Beams in Hextable and reached out to other groups designed to suppoer SEN families. We needed to understand how we could be better hosts and take a genuine interest, learn how to put on a good time, but a safe time too.
After integrating ourselves into these groups and speaking with key workers, it was clear that there is no one size fits all. There are numerous different syndromes and diagnoses that could all broadly be relevant; ADHD, Autism, Aspergers and many more. We soon realised that each of these children are individual and have come to love the quote "When you know one child with Autism, you know one child with autism". It's extremely relevant and needs to be understood. Our interpretation of it means that each child is unique and you cannot simply expect one thing to help or work.
It become apparant very quickly that we would need to adapt to suit their world, and this is what that session hopes to achieve.
There are so few things for children with Autism to do in Bexley, hardly anything is put on specifically and exclusively for them. We have had several Autistic children come to our sessions and while most of the time it has gone without any issue, we have been confused as to what to do.
A good example was a beautiful boy who was non-verbal. I was personally staffing our huge event slide and his grandmother and mother was delighted that he had found something he enjoyed. The slide is always a popular item at these events and we have to ensure that it is staffed and managed properly. We have a member of staff clearly visible and allowing children to go up it in order, without too many at the same time. A lot of judgment is needed because we can't really allow different sizes to mix, so we need to limit children going up the steps.
The little boy did not understand the concept of queues. He would come down the slide and immediatly "push in" and try to go up the steps again. At the time I had no idea that they boy was autistic. After him pushing in twice (despite very clear instruction to stop and wait his turn) I was careful to make sure he didn't do it again. A little girl who was very young and just at the age and size of being allowed on the slide was going up the step was scaling the steps carefully and cautiously. She wasn't very steady and she needed some time before anyone else could follow her up (for her safety as well as any other children). Sure enough the boy pushed passed the queue and tried scambling up the steps. I told him rather sternly to stop, yet he didn't even turn around, he kept going forward. For his own safety and the little girls, I had to stop him.
His mother and grand mother approached and explained that he was non-verbal and autistic. I felt a little embarassed, but at the same time I needed to safe-guard all children.It was near the end of the sessiona nd it had taken a long time for him to find his confidence. After his mother had soothed him, we decided that as the session was ending soon that they may like to stay on afterwards. We kept the slide up for half an hour with just him and his mother and grandmother there. He had it all to himself and was very pleased.
It was this example that we shared with a SEN group and we received some suprising support and ideas of how we can help. They suggested that as an autistic child becomes over stimulated that their ability to understand and comprehend verbal input diminishes. They suggested that visual queue cards would be better, perhaps instead of words, a colour with an action on it would be best to help them understand to "stop", equally a "good boy" or a "good girl" would be encouraging and they see a lot of good response from these.
However, the other part was that he became over-stimulated and it may have been difficult to calm him as well as embarrassing in front of people. They also suggested that some children respond well to visual timers like a sand-glass (this wouldn't be possible for turn based on a slide, but perhaps for other inflatables).
The over-all theme consistently was "stimulation". Too much input often over-loads. It's a bouncy castle day so they will be excited already, all extra stimulus needs to be avoided!
- We have decided to implement the following changes for the session:
- Capacity halved so there will be half the amount of children and more space, more free-roaming and less children per inflatable
- No music at these sessions to remove a unnecessary stimulas
- All whistles from marshalls removed and replaced with a set of A3 visual action cards
- Spare room made available as a quiet room to any guest that would like to use it
- sand egg times provided to marshalls if they need to limit play time on a specific inflatable
- An extra first-aider present
We strongly hope that this will be successful and have taken as much action as we can to make sure it will be. if we receive positive feedback then we will be able to host more of these sessions in the future. Hope to see you all there!
Bouncy Castle Hire Crayford
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