St. Michael's CE School
Working Together For The Good Of All
“St. Michael’s Church of England School, established upon Christian foundations and living out the Christian faith, is committed to providing every child with an excellent education.”
COMMUNCATION AND INTERACTION
communication and interaction needs
Speech and Language
We are supported by the Speech and Language Therapy Service and children with speech, language or communication needs will have individual programmes of support, devised, overseen and assessed by a school assigned Speech and Language Therapist (SALT). These programmes are delivered by a trained and experienced member of our support staff team.
Speech and Language Therapist
The Speech and Language Therapist in our school is:
Jo Harrington-Hill
Jo regularly comes into school and can be contacted through our Inclusion Department. As speech and language therapists she always like to talk!
When Jo comes into school she will do a variety of consultations, training, observations and provide resources for us to use. This will include:
Observing children in their classroom to gain an idea of their communication skills.
Take children out for 1:1 sessions with a Teaching Assistant to assess and review their progress
Offer advice and provide resources for the school to use
Run / support communication groups, either for children on the speech and language therapy caseload or those who need an additional communication boost.
Speak to parents, teacher and the Inclusion team who are with the children every day to get a vital insight into their communication.
Autistic Spectrum Disorder (ASD)
The Early Years Centre and the Wandsworth Autism Advisory Service (WAAS) supports schools, settings and families in Wandsworth to achieve the best possible outcomes for children and young people with autism. These services support education settings to enable all children with Autism/ social communication disorders to achieve their full potential.
Wandsworth Autism Advisory Service
The Wandsworth Autism Advisory Service or WAAS for short is a single multi professional team that supports schools, settings and families in Wandsworth to achieve the best possible outcomes for children and young people with autism. The service supports education settings to enable all children with Autism/ social communication disorders to achieve their full potential.
The team works to support education settings to be Autism inclusive. Children’s progress is linked with the learning environment they are immersed in. The Wandsworth Autism Advisory Service will advocate for such an environment and will provide all necessary supports to education settings to achieve this.
Their offer is made up of a universal offer which is available to all Wandsworth residents with a Child or Young Person with a diagnosis of autism, Wandsworth schools, early years settings, services and professionals. After accessing the universal offer; the service also offers a more specialist and targeted offer which is accessed via a referral to the service.
Their team adopts a multi-agency approach. The service ethos is based on difference rather than disability. They are positive about autism and embrace neuro diversity. Their aim is to empower young people with autism and their families, enable schools, professionals and service with the skills and tools to facilitate a positive environment that embeds good autism practice.
The WAAS work collaboratively with agencies across SEND, schools, social care, early help, portage as well as voluntary organisations across the borough and nationally.
Parental support is available on this link: WAAS Parent Support
Learning Through Music
We are very fortunate at St. Michael’s to have staff who run Learning Through Music programmes for selected children. These programmes involve small groups of children in fun, interactive weekly sessions, which are designed to develop learning skills such as listening, turn-taking and self-esteem, as well as enhancing their musical and creative ability. Children really enjoy these sessions and it is wonderful to see the positive outcomes as their confidence develops.