On line safety, good books & send sports

On-line Safety, Good Books & SEND Sports 20th May 2017 Dear All If you’re worried about your child and the world on the internet, please come to one of our sessions on Online Safety (details further down).

One of our presenters is Peter Cowley; we saw him present last week and he really did highlight the risks our children and young people are exposed to in their ever-changing online world. He raised awareness of how to set parental protections and exposed the danger that can be avoided.

Charities and Grants to support families We know money is tight – and it’s going to stay that way for a while. There is a range of organisations that offer grants or funding that can be used towards short breaks, equipment and other things. With thanks to Heather Matthew, Richmond CVS for these updates, and you can also find more on the Local Offer.

Roald Dahl's Marvellous Children's Charity awards grants of up to £500 to families facing financial hardship while caring for a child with a serious illness. Aiming to provide support to help families cope, grants can cover a wide range of costs from respite breaks and counselling to hospital travel expenses. http://www.roalddahl.com/charity/family-grants The Disability Grants website has a comprehensive self-search directory that is organised into themed sections such as grants for children, families, equipment and holiday grants. www.disability-grants.org The Turn2Us website features an online benefit entitlement calculator and grants for individuals search engine www.turn2us.org.uk Citizens Advice Richmond based at Regal House Twickenham offers advice across all topics including financial. They offer pre-booked appointments and drop in sessions including Tuesday evening between 5-7 for full time workers, students and carers. Their advice is also available by phone, e-mail and online https://www.citizensadvicerichmond.org/ Advice Kingston service was established in April 2017. Through partnership working, this new service provides a single front door for all information and advice provision locally, through all channels of access – phone/face to face/online. http://www.citizensadvicekingston.org.uk/ And the link to the list on the Local Offer… https://www.afclocaloffer.org.uk/pages/home/leisure-activities-and-short-breaks/otherfunding-and-grant-sources

Support for Families: Upcoming events for your diary…

We (SEND Family Voices) are holding a series of Informal Open Meetings for parents to meet other parents. Whether you are new to the world of SEND or an 'old hand', we aim to answer

your questions and facilitate open discussion on what is important to you.

Online safety: Keeping Children and Young People Safe (workshops) These workshops will cover the legal framework for keeping children and young people safe on-line. And… in real life, what works, what doesn’t?

During these workshops, we will have an opportunity to learn from Achieving for Children’s ICT and Online Safety Adviser – who will be able to give an insight into the law and how it is applied. (The presenter is Peter Cowley – he’s good!). We will then discuss our own practical experiences - good and bad – with the intention of finding some really good ideas!

The focus of these informal and practical workshops is safety & awareness of social media and the internet; and to provide support to young people and their families.

Both our meetings and our workshops will provide the chance to talk to other parents in a relaxed atmosphere and to learn from each other.

Please let us know if you plan to come along – it’s not essential, but it does help us with teas & coffees etc. E: sendfamilyvoices@outlook.com Event

Date and Time

Venue

Online Safety Keeping children & young people safe

Monday 12th June 10.30am to 12.30pm

Whitton Youth Zone, Britannia Lane, Whitton, TW2 7JX

Online Safety Keeping children & young people safe

Thursday 15th June 6.30pm to 8.30pm

The Salon, York House, Richmond Road, Twickenham, TW1 3AA

Open Meeting Golden Booklet

Thursday 15th June 10.30am to 12.30pm

Open Meeting Golden Booklet

Friday 16th June 10.30am to 12noon

Online Safety Keeping children & young people safe

Wednesday 21st June 10.30am to 12.30pm

Open Meeting Golden Booklet

Thursday 22nd June 7pm to 9pm

Open Meeting Golden Booklet

Thursday 29th June 7pm to 9pm

Express CIC, 452 Ewell Road, Surbiton, KT6 7EL MeToo&Co*, Crossways, St. Stephen’s, Twickenham, TW1 2PD Castlenau Community Centre, Barnes, SW13 9AQ

The Strada, Griffin Centre Kingston upon Thames KT1 1JT The Petersham Hotel, Nightingale Lane, Richmond, TW10 6UZ

* crèche available at meetings hosted by MeToo&Co. Please contact Tel: 07946 646033 or e-mail: info@metooandco.org.uk to book a crèche place.

Some of our favourite books…

When parents call us, we sometimes refer people to books we’ve found helpful. Below is a short list of some of our favourites. Please send us your recommendations!

For these first few, the clue is in the title! These are charming photographic books which help explain how some people see the work; useful for family members and primary school age.

All cats have Asperger Syndrome - Kathy Hoopmann & All dogs have ADHD - Kathy Hoopmann & Inside Aspergers Looking Out - Kathy Hoopmann “Inside Asperger's Looking Out follows in the best-selling footsteps of Kathy Hoopmann's All Cats Have Asperger Syndrome and All Dogs Have ADHD. Through engaging text and fullcolor photographs, this book shows neurotypicals how Aspies see and experience the world.” & All birds have Anxiety - Kathy Hoopmann “Life as a bird can be stressful! From worrying about airplanes, windows, and getting enough worms to eat, it is clear that birds can be anxious beings” For those interested in hearing impairments: Daisy and Ted’s Awesome Adventures - Alex Naidoo “An exciting story aimed at four to seven year olds that follows Daisy, a girl who is deaf and wears a hearing aid, on fun adventures with new friend Ted.” Dyslexia and ADHD: books for older children, where difficulties in the modern world are explained as super powers. Really good fun to read!

The Percy Jackson series – Rick Riordan “Look, I didn't want to be a half-blood. I never asked to be the son of a Greek God. I was just a normal kid, going to school, playing basketball, skateboarding. The usual. Until I accidentally vaporized my maths teacher. Now I spend my time battling monsters and generally trying to stay alive.”

When My Worries Get Too Big!: A Relaxation Book for Children Who Live with Anxiety - Kari Dunn Buron “Worry and anxiety are on an upswing. In fact, anxiety is the most frequent of all mental disorders in children. High levels of stress and big emotions related to social situations, sensory issues, or general frustration are common in children who live with anxiety.”

Shtum - Jem Lester “This exhilarating roller coaster ride portrays the love, guilt, exhaustion and rage felt by the parents of a boy with profound learning disabilities.”

Thinking in Pictures - Temple Grandin “Temple Grandin, Ph.D., is a gifted animal scientist who has designed one third of all the livestock-handling facilities in the United States. She also lectures widely on autism—because Temple Grandin is autistic, a woman who thinks, feels, and experiences the world in ways that are incomprehensible to the rest of us.”

A new service – what do you think?

Express are exploring the possibility of offering a low-cost counselling service to parents and carers of children with autism and additional needs.

“Parenting a child with additional needs also puts huge pressure on relationships with partners and families that can be difficult to resolve.

We are inviting expressions of interest in receiving counselling so that we can assess the need for such a service and how we might best organise it to the meet the needs of our parents/carers.

We appreciate that even acknowledging that counselling may be of help to you can be a big step but if you would be interested in this, and feel able to, please let us know by email to info@expressic.org.uk . It would also be helpful to know what time/day that you would be able to come to counselling.

All expressions of interest would be treated in the strictest confidence.

Many thanks, Annette & Tracey at Express CIC “ info@expresscic.org.uk

@SENDFamilyVoice

@SENDFamilyVoice 100+ tweets this week - there's so much going on in the SEND world – here are just a few highlights…

Supported loving: just 3% of people with learning disabilities have a partner https://www.learningdisabilitytoday.co.uk/supported-loving/?platform=hootsuite I am too young to accept I can't have more children: what living with an undiagnosed child with severe disabilities means https://www.undiagnosed.org.uk/news-events/news/answers/ Challenging behaviour & parenting: join this interesting advisory group https://www.cafamily.org.uk/news-and-media/join-a-parent-advisory-group-for-challengingbehaviour-project/ Want to join the fabulous Singing Hands as Office Manager? https://www.totaljobs.com/job/office-manager/singing-hands-limitedjob73858759?entryurl=%2fjobs%2foffice-manager%2fintwickenham%3fradius%3d10%2373858759&TemplateType=ResponsiveFeatured The hidden, personal costs of fighting your LA: a great blog https://itmustbemum.wordpress.com/2017/05/16/the-hidden-costs-of-fighting-with-the-la/ Love this visual schedule watch: so much better than laminated efforts http://octopus.watch/ Co-production is vital if we are to shift institutional thinking https://www.themj.co.uk/We-need-to-involve-people-in-difficult-decisions-aboutservices/207634 Blogger with ASD becomes new shadow minister for neurodiversity https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2016/may/31/labour-to-appoint-shadow-minister-forneurodiversity-monique-craine

What’s New on the Local Offer?

Those of us receiving these newsletters for some time hopefully know what the Local Offer is?

For those that are newer, or are just not sure…

The Local Offer is the central government name for the services (offers) available locally to families (parents, carers and children, young people) with special educational needs and/or disabilities.

(We can see their point in shortening the name to Local Offer… the long description is cumbersome, but is a short description any better?)

In its simplest form, the Local Offer is a kind of directory of local, available services.

In terms of central government’s aspirations, the Local Offer is a living directory; it’s always being updated and the gaps in services are visible – and so allow for new services to be identified. (often by a ‘no returns’ on searches).

Please give the Local Offer a try. Our Local Offer website was voted as ‘best in London’ by a peer review network. And… we know it’s not perfect, and that’s OK – please let Karen Lowry (AfC’s Local Offer content manager) know what works and what doesn’t.

Oh… and right now, two-and-a-half years on, there are all sorts of technical works behind the scenes. More news to follow. Please send feedback to Karen – it really helps…

W: www.afclocaloffer.org.uk E: sendlocaloffer@achievingforchildren.org.uk

A summary of the Evidence on Inclusive Education “Across the globe, students with disabilities are increasingly educated alongside their nondisabled peers in a practice known as inclusion. Inclusion is prominently featured in a number of international declarations, national laws, and education policies.

These policies, coupled with the efforts of advocates for the rights of people with disabilities, have led to a substantial increase in the number of students with disabilities who receive schooling alongside their non-disabled peers. In this report, we sought to identify research that demonstrates the benefits of inclusive education not only for students with disabilities, but especially for students without disabilities, since evidence of benefits for the former is already widely known.

This report is the result of a systematic review of 280 studies from 25 countries.“ http://alana.org.br/wpcontent/uploads/2016/12/A_Summary_of_the_evidence_on_inclusive_education.pdf

SEND Primary Age Sports Day

Kingsmeadow Stadium - Thursday 15th June 2017 – 9.30am to 12noon Following on from last year’s incredibly successful first ever primary age borough-wide SEN Sports Day, for those children who find it difficult to access their school’s mainstream sports day, The Lime Tree school in Kingston are doing it again!

If you would like your child’s school to join in next year [2018], read on…

“Letters have gone to local schools, and this year we have 10 schools attending totalling 120 children with varying special needs. Weir Archers will also be coming along supporting the event. (founded by David Weir, the Paralympian) We couldn’t have wished for a better day for the children last year [2016]. The children whole heartedly embraced the Paralympic Values, demonstrating determination in every event, taking courage to give a sport they have never done before a go. They were inspired by other children of equal standing and by the Weir Archers Academy, who came along to encourage the children. They also brought their competition and training wheelchairs along for the children to try out and did an exhibition race for them.

The children left with wide smiles and excited about participating in sports day; asking ‘when can we do it again?’ their adult assistants praising the event, having never experienced anything like it with the children before.”

Contact Lucy at: lphilp1@limetree.rbksch.org

This year, parents from the SEND Family Voices team will be coming along on the day - just to cheer and support this event. The plan is that Annette & Tracey (Express CIC & SFV), plus Rachel, Sam, Penny, and Caroline will all be around at some point (we are all parents and of course life is unpredictable! So, no promises). Please come along to watch and we’ll be delighted to meet you too!

…and thank you to Blue Gnome Finally, we had a bit of spamming to our own computer this week – and we’d like to thank Gavin at Blue Gnome Computers in Twickenham for his fast, sensible safety and repair work.

The SFV data is safe and protected. We can recommend Blue Gnome for their pragmatic helpful advice.

W: http://www.bluegnomecomputers.com As ever, if you have any queries at all, please ask and we'll always do our best to find an answer.

With best wishes, Caroline North (for Kingston) and Romany (for Richmond) Phone: 07469 746 145 www.sendfamilyvoices.org