There are many different learning supports available at the Abbey Vocational School.
Below is an outline of some of the different programmes on offer.
Friends for youth summary
The programme helps students to develop resilience by teaching them effective strategies to cope with, solve and manage all kinds of stress including worry, change and anxiety. Students also get a chance to meet students from other classes and many friendships have developed in the past from these sessions. Skills learned throughout the programme will help students both now and in later life. The programme generally runs over a five week period - one period per week. The class will be a small group and the students will be withdrawn from non exam subjects on a weekly basis.
Organisational support
Students who are offered organisational support at AVS gain greater confidence with the “Getting it together” programme that was designed by the NCSE. This programme is tailored to support students at all levels in getting organised with their day to day life in secondary school. Organisation can be particularly challenging for students entering secondary school and dealing with more subjects/books, use of lockers, moving classrooms, more teachers, homework assignments and timetable schedules. The students involved will receive guidance and gain knowledge and skills to improve their organisation, which will in turn have a positive impact on their engagement with school and education.
ALERT Programme
The Alert Programme is an evidence based intervention, developed by occupational therapists for use by teachers and parents to teach students the skill of self-regulation. The programme uses an engine analogy to teach self-regulation (changing how alert we feel) and help students learn what to do if they are in a non-optimal state of alertness.
‘Self-regulation’ is the ability to change one’s level of alertness so that it is suitable for the situation or task. Student’s commonly exhibit behaviours consistent with low and high energy levels in the classroom. The goal of the programme is to teach students how to get to the ‘just right’ level of alertness which is most favourable to learning.
Students are taught how they can use their sensory systems to change how alert they feel. They have the opportunity to experience strategies linked to each of the Take 5 senses (mouth, move, touch, look and listen) which when used appropriately, can change their level of alertness to suit the situation or task.
Literacy and Numeracy
As part of the transition process and our own in-house testing including CAT4, NGRT and PTMaths a small number of students are identified as needing an intervention to support them with their literacy and or numeracy skills. This intervention will include a variety of evidence based programmes such as LEXIA, SNIP, CSI, TRUGS, Vocabulary Enrichment and Numeracy Ninja. The progress of the students and the progress made will be monitored regularly to gauge impact and whether the student continues to need support.