Miss Ryan's Class is a Small Specialist Class for autistic children and pupils with social communication difficulties. The children in the SSC are in Years 3 to 6. They all have EHC plans and their place in the class is offered through Trafford SEND department not school. There are 10 children in the class, a teacher and two teaching assistants.

The aim of our class is to provide children with a safe, nurturing space that allows them to develop as a person and to fulfill their potential in all areas.

We have a large welcoming classroom with low distraction walls and displays. We have formal learning areas, play, reading and quiet areas. Children have access to wobble stools, standing desks and individual learning areas if needed. There is also an attached sensory room and a large outside play space with a trim trail.

We firmly believe that for our children to be successful we need to listen to them and to their parents to find out about their specific needs and then work to address these needs. We also work alongside and take advice from other professionals including Speech and Language, Educational Psychology and Specialist Sensory Occupational Therapy.

Often our children have particular sensory needs that we work hard to address whilst they are at school. We also try to be very aware of how our pupils may be feeling. We do a lot of work around emotions and helping our children to recognise their own feelings as well as the feelings of others. In this way we aim to help them understand and explain their emotions and to develop strategies to manage difficult feelings. We particularly want our children to manage their feelings of anxiety. On-going communication with parents and families is so important to this work. We know that many autistic children mask their feelings very well in school and that it is parents who can tell us how their children really feel and explain the impact of events in school.

In our class we cover all the subjects within the National Curriculum. Sometimes our children may not be working at age related expectations and the curriculum is therefore tailored to the individual child and their abilities.

As part of a mainstream Junior school we do want to include our children in activities with the wider school community. Children usually attend assemblies, eat dinner and may have some playtimes with the rest of the school. Some children may access some of the curriculum in the larger mainstream classes. Where appropriate children’s time in mainstream may increase as they progress through school. So by year 6 some pupils may be spending quite a lot of time in mainstream classes. Again this is tailored to the individual child and every child’s experience of inclusion will be different.