Once pupils are admitted on the wards at Heartlands Hospital, we firstly introduce and welcome them to the James Brindley School.
At this instance, we profile and engage them in a welcome activity to purposefully assess whilst developing a teacher/pupil relation at the same time.
From this initial welcome meeting, we learn a lot about our pupil; their likes and dislikes, their home-school topics currently being taught across subjects, a general idea of what levels they are working at, any special educational needs they may have, and their specific strengths, weaknesses and gaps for learning based on the welcome assessment completed. This information is then used to plan and prepare fun, engaging and challenging lessons based on their individual learning needs and style.
At Heartlands Hospital, lessons are offered from a range of curriculum areas such as English, Maths, ICT/Computer Science, Art, Science, and more, with pupil requirements and needs at its core. If pupils are admitted during an exam period and are well enough to still sit the exam on that day, then James Brindley staff will ensure arrangements have been made for invigilators and exam papers to be delivered so that there is no disruption to the child’s progress and achievements. In this setting, our staff have a unique ability to think on their feet and teach even when medical interventions are taking place.
When pupils are here for a few days or more, James Brindley School will liaise with home schools to ensure pupils are being educated in line with their own school curriculum. For our regular re-admits, James Brindley staff liaise with home-school from Day 1, developing an effective working relationship with key staff in order for our pupils to make significant progress whilst admitted here on the ward. In most cases, for our regular re-attenders, work will be provided by the child’s home-school and our staff will deliver lessons to ensure these tasks are being completed to the best of their ability. The home-school is then kept informed and updated on the child’s progress during their stay.
We have an extensive range of resources available for all school age children including full sets of stationery, text books and reading books for all levels, programming devices, interactive educational games/activities, mannequins, arts and crafts kits, special needs resources, and much more. Our pupils also have access to the internet via James Brindley School laptops and pupil iPads where required, to complete their school learning tasks. This also enables pupils to log in to their home-school VLE to access and complete lessons and homework they are missing on that day whilst in hospital. Our service enables pupils to not fall behind in their education due to their medical condition.