Walnut

Walnut class is an Enhanced Resource Provision for children with Special Educational Needs. We provide a safe, nurturing and supportive environment that places language at the heart of all learning activities and experiences to develop children’s communication and interaction skills, in addition to their curriculum progress.

The aim of Walnut class is to provide targeted specialist support and intervention which enables children to access the mainstream curriculum and make good progress, whilst developing their use of, and understanding for language and play skills. Alongside specialist teaching and intervention, external agencies may be involved in supporting children’s progress, such as Speech and Language Therapy Services (SALT), Educational Psychologists (EP), Occupational Therapists (OT), and members of Coventry’s Complex Communication Team (CCT).

Our fundamental goal is to ensure that children are happy, confident and increasingly independent learners with a strong sense of self. Our staff working with the children in Walnut class are passionate and highly skilled. We offer a range of exciting activities/lessons linked to children’s curriculum subjects and use flexible and multi-sensory approaches in order to support children’s engagement and participation. Children enjoy taking part in Forest school once per week and wherever appropriate, return to their mainstream classes to complete learning activities. We teach the importance of independence and this is encouraged through daily routines and roles of responsibility within the classroom.

To support children’s speech and language skills within Walnut class, we make  use of technology, communication symbols and sentence stems. Class teachers deliver interventions set by Speech and Language Therapy services each week and additional weekly Thrive learning supports children’s understanding of emotions and friendships. Further memory games/activities are completed on a regular basis to support children with retaining key learning and promote their academic progress.

We feel extremely lucky to have such an amazing resource for our Walnut children which will build the foundations for them to become life long learners.