OUR THERAPEUTIC APPROACH

        Emily Barlow is our therapy & trauma specialist

• Art

  ART THERAPY

  April offers art therapy across our schools. She provides child-centred, creative therapy using art as a tool for connection and understanding of the pupils' inner world, their feelings and experiences. Art therapy is used to improve self awareness, self esteem, promote insights and develop emotional regulation.

• Canine

  Canine Therapy

  We have three therapy dogs: Mabel, Maurice and Paddy. Mabel is a young puppy and is the newest addition to our therapy team. Our therapy dogs spend quality time with our pupils. Pupils read to the dogs, cuddle them, tell them how they are feeling and take turns in looking after them. Maurice especially likes cuddles and listening to pupils read!

• drama

  DRAMATHERAPY

  Louisa is a drama therapist and is the lead therapist at our Vauxhall site. Dramatherapy uses creativity and the imagination to support feelings. It can help pupils to understand different emotions and to build confidence. In these sessions pupils can share their thoughts and experiences in a safe way using role-play, storytelling, sand-play, lots of different objects, art materials, poetry and creative writing.

• EDUCATIONAL PSYCHOLOGY

  EDUCATIONAL PSYCHOLOGY (EP)

  Aysun is our educational psychologist. She provides assessments to further support our pupils in accessing the learning environment. Aysun works alongside both therapists and teachers in order to assess our pupils' needs and to develop strategies to help them. She will also meet with families to discuss what they see at home and to offer additional support where needed. 

• Family Support

  Family Support

  Our lead therapists (Louisa at Vauxhall; Celine at Walworth; Ben at Kennington; Charlotte at Great Baddow) provide our families with therapeutic support, tailored to meet the needs of the individual family - whether flexible and ad-hoc or weekly, online or face-to-face, individually or with their child. We work in an integrated way, using a variety of therapeutic tools that support families for meaningful and transformative change.

• Integrative

  INTEGRATIVE THERAPY

  Integrative therapy is flexible, child-led and adapted to meet pupils' complex needs. Pupils can choose different ways to share their thoughts and feelings. These may include play, drama, music or art. Our therapists work with pupils in the classroom as well as offering therapy sessions in the therapy room. 

• Music

  Music Therapy

  Ben is our music therapist and lead therapist at our Kennington site. Ben uses music and song writing to help pupils share their feelings and experiences. Aims of therapy include relieving stress,                problem solving, understanding emotions, increasing levels of self-confidence and improving relationships. In music therapy pupils can play a range of instruments, make recordings and share music by their favourite artists.

• OCCUPATIONAL

  OCCUPATIONAL THERAPY (OT)

  Lenez and Martha are our occupational therapists. Occupational therapy can help pupils with various needs including the need tomove around or difficulty sitting still. This, in turn, can help to build confidence, self-esteem and improve access to learning. Lenez and Martha create plans to support the development of key skills needed for pupils to learn and complete everyday tasks. They work with pupils both in the classroom and in specialist therapy spaces.

• PLAY

  PLAY THERAPY

  Celine is our play therapist. She is also our lead therapist at Walworth. Play therapy uses different ways of playing to help pupils develop confidence in talking to others.

  Play therapy sessions may include using sand, arts and crafts and a range of toys. Play therapy is a place where you can think about how you are feeling and share different experiences in a safe way.

• SPEECH AND LANGUAGE

  SPEECH & LANGUAGE THERAPY (SaLT)

  Bethan is our speech and language therapist. She assesses pupils to help us understand whether there are additional speech and language needs that can be better supported in school. If additional needs are identified a pupil may then be offered group therapy, one-to-one speech and language therapy and/or indirect therapeutic support, both in the classroom or in a therapy room.