Percy Shurmer Deaf Learning Base caters for children who have an Educational Health Care Plan (EHCP) due to significant hearing loss with a subsequent language delay. The purpose of the Deaf Learning Base is to provide a team of specialist staff, equipment, resources and teaching methods/strategies that will support the pupils ability to acquire language, enabling them to communicate effectively. We incorporate a variety of communication methods to ensure that the student has full access to the National Curriculum.
Miss M Duffy (DLB)
Miss Duffy's energy, expertise, warmth and dedication are viewed as the driving force behind the transformation of Percy Shurmer's Deaf Learning Base. Colleagues say her zest for life is infectious! The children under her leadership believe their life is full of opportunities and being deaf is something they are very proud of.
She has developed and led a team that has ensured the Deaf Learning Base is an educational haven that develops the confidence, learning experiences and outcomes for all who attend.
Miss Duffy works tirelessly to ensure the deaf children have an abundance of opportunities including after-school clubs, residential trips and community links.
DLB provision at Percy
Requested PDF of brochure to upload - and for EfDL booklet - Deaf Provision in Birmingam
School enrichment
At Percy Shurmer Academy, we place great importance on enriching our children’s education and learning experience. All Enrichment broadens horizons, develops new skills and contributes to children’s personal social development. We try and extend learning beyond the classroom as much as possible and link it to real-life experiences. All children take part in year group trips and events. Additionally, the children experience a broad range of activities as a Deaf peer group.
Experiences include:
Residentials
Signed Theatre performances
Inter-school sporting events
Deaf Career / Role Model visits such as musicians, athletes, jewellers, dancers etc
Miss Duffy Principal: Deaf Learning Base Miss Burrows - Deaf Learning Base Lead / EYFS + KS1 Teacher of the Deaf Miss Kirsty Gray: Deaf Studies Teacher/BSL instructor Mrs Fuery - KS2 Teacher of the Deaf Mrs Cockbill - Assistant Principal and Teacher of the Deaf Miss Stevens - Trainee Teacher of the Deaf Mr Lawrence: Specialist Teaching Assistant of the Deaf Miss Pervez: Specialist Teaching Assistant of the Deaf Miss Hussain: Specialist Teaching Assistant of the Deaf (EYFS) Mrs Wilson: Specialist Teaching Assistant of the Deaf
Interventions
At Lift Percy Shurmer, we want to ensure that all our children do as well as they can and achieve their full potential. This is provided through quality first teaching in the classroom.
Sometimes, an intervention may be necessary to support a child's language development further or to help them develop their social skills or self-confidence and self-esteem. As a specialist provision, we utilise a range of specific interventions to support our Deaf Learners.
Smile therapy
Strategies and Measurable Interaction in Live English
importance of practical life experience in the real world.
SmiLE Therapy was developed specifically for Deaf students.
Successful communication is more likely when the people can both understand the communicative message as well as being mindful of other factors that rule interactions such as the intensity we knock on someone’s door, the time to wait before making a request.
creates opportunities to expose children to a variety of real-life situations and encourages them to take an active part
Develops self-esteem and motivation
The essence of Smile Therapy is for students to learn how to be actively responsible for their own communication and social participation without the constant need for adult backup or support.
Strategies:
SmiLE Therapy is about how the student can manage the interactions with the person talking to them to make it a successful encounter for both parties. When there is a mismatch of communication modes, certain strategies need to be put into place so that both parties can succeed and feel positive about the exchange. Students need strategies that can be applied to all situations. E.g letting people know they are deaf. The key element is to ensure that what the students learn and experience during smiLE can be generalised so it is applied to other situations in the future.
Measurable
The focus on students’ self-monitoring of their communication is at the heart of the key term.
Being able to measure interactive performance is a key factor at all stages.
Achievable task
Assessment of individual students needs raise awareness of their specific needs and determines the design of the module
Both students and practitioners measure performances test -teach - test
This is extended to parents
Interactions
Refers to both communication task itself and within the group
Collaborative approach
Live English
Functional skills
Step 1: Preparation
Step 2: pre-therapy filming of task chosen
Step 3: Each class session
Step 4: Practitioners act and students ‘direct’ to elicit Communication Skills Checklist (CSC)
Step 5: Learning and Role Play
Step 6: watching film and self (supported) evaluating
Step 7: role-play practise of skills and variations introduced to start generalisation (student able to demonstrate they are ready)
Step 8: After therapy filming of similar communication task, watching films & self (supported) evaluation
Step 9: Generalisation with parent/carer group and staff group (Practitioners follow up 3 weeks later)
Step 10: Sharing Outcome Measures
Entering and Leaving an office
Entering and leaving a shop
Making a simple request in an office
Requesting and refusing in a school office
Requesting in a local shop
Independent Travel 1: managing if you get lost
Independent Travel 2: asking for directions
Independent travel 3: requesting at tube/train station
Ordering in a café
Work experience: meeting your supervisor
Interview Skills
MDT SmiLE: preparing for shopping and requesting in a local shop.
Colourful semantics
What is Colourful Semantics?
Colourful semantics is an approach created by Alison Bryan. It is aimed at helping children to develop their grammar but it is rooted in the meaning of words (semantics). Colourful semantics reassembles sentences by cutting them up into their thematic roles and then colour codes them. The approach has 4 key colour-coded stages. There are further stages for adverbs, adjectives, conjunctions and negatives.
WHO – Orange
WHAT DOING – Yellow
WHAT – Green
WHERE – Blue
This is an example of a child working at level 4. The approach helps children to organise their sentences into key levels. The approach is used in stages and helps children develop language and vocabulary in addition to grammatical structure. It can be used to help children who are starting to develop language and have limited vocabulary to confident talkers who struggle to organise the grammatical content of their sentences.
Who can use Colourful Semantics?
The approach can be used with children with a range of Speech, Language and Communication Needs.
Why use Colourful Semantics?
There are a range of benefits to using this approach, including but not limited to;
Encouraging wider vocabulary
Making sentences longer
Helps children to answer questions or generate responses to questions
Developing use of nouns, verbs, prepositions and adjectives
Improves storytelling skills
Can be transferred to written sentences and written language comprehension
Can be carried out individually or in small groups
BSL
Our whole school has a strong commitment to the use of sign language. To promote the positive use of signs across the whole school, every child receives a lesson in British Sign Language each week. As a result, children across the key stages build up a strong foundation in sign language, enabling friendships between Deaf and hearing children. In addition, we have a range of BSL resources in all playgrounds so that BSL can be developed during social times. For pupils who are part of our Deaf Learning Base ( PSA DLB), we want them to see themselves as experts and advocates of BSL and Deaf awareness. This will further develop their Deaf Identity and increase their confidence so that they are proud, empowered Deaf individuals with the highest of aspirations for themselves. As a Centre of Excellence for inclusion, we also aim to share our practice with other settings.
We also offer complimentary weekly parent BSL sessions. Additionally, our staff are invited to develop their BSL skills and gain qualifications ranging from Level 1 - Level 6.
Our Deaf Learning Base runs various Deaf awareness events every year, including NDCS Bake-off, Sign2Sing, Deaf Awareness, and BSL recognition week.
Speech and language
We work closely with an NHS speech and language therapist with specialist training to work with deaf children. They regularly work with pupils to develop communication skills including speech production. In addition, speech and language sessions are arranged for individual students or small groups according to need. Our Teachers of the Deaf and specialist teaching assistants work closely with the speech and language therapist to deliver speech and language development programmes. As a school, we also buy in private speech and language therapy.
Personal understanding of deafness
The Personal Understanding of Deafness (PUD programme) was developed to address the specific social, communication confidence and self-esteem needs of deaf children. It is designed to accommodate children who:
Use a variety of aids - hearing aids, cochlear implants, BAHAs
Use a range of communication modes
Attend a variety of educational placements.
Aims
The PUD programme aims to help teachers of the deaf to deliver a programme that will enable children and young people to:
Be confident with who they are as a deaf person
Understand the nature of their deafness and the impact it will have on their lives
Understand how hearing people communicate and use auditory information
Accept the responsibility for ensuring effective communication and knowing how to help people to adapt
Feel confident to move on from someone who is not prepared to make adaptations
Understand the hearing aid technology they use, know how to maintain it and to be aware of other technologies that can help
Know and understand the role of the different professionals they will encounter
Manage times of transition effectively
Remain safe
The PUD programme consists of 5 strands, each of which consists of a set of progressive learning objectives.
1. Independent Management of Audiological Equipment
A checklist of audiological management skills, including a range of technologies
2. Knowledge of Personal Hearing Level
To develop an understanding of how ears work and their own specific hearing loss
3. Deaf and Hearing awareness
To develop an understanding of the differences between how deaf and hearing people communicate
4. Confidence and Understanding to Ensure Effective Communication
To develop the skills to enable them to anticipate, understand and resolve communication difficulties
5. Transition
To understand the particular needs their deafness brings at periods of transition
Foundations for Literacy
ACTION RESEARCH WITH THE UNIVERSITY OF BIRMINGHAM
Developed by the Center of Literacy and Deafness (America)
A language experience-based curriculum that develops:
Alphabet Knowledge and Phonological Awareness
Vocabulary and Language Learning
Emergent Literacy Skills
Research suggests Foundations is effective in improving
All checks are conducted on the hearing aid/implant and then with the radio aid attached. Our daily checks will also include visual inspection, where we will check for cracks, tears, physical issues that could stop the aid/implant from working optimally.
Electroacoustic checks - these are conducted at the start of each half term. We use the Auricle hit to check the output of the hearing aid, BAHA or implant. The test box produces printed gain curves, these are kept on file, and each time the child is upgraded or seen at an audiology appointment, new ones are made. The purpose of these curves is to give us a point of reference when the aid/implant was working optimally. Therefore if through any of our other checks that child is responding inconsistently or we hear distortion, we can re-run the hearing aid/implant again and check that the output matches the original curve. If it does not, we know that there is an issue with the device's programming, and it needs to be repaired.
Radio aids are the best way we can give our deaf children an auditory advantage. Classrooms can be noisy places, and high-quality access to sound is vital. We set up and verify each radio aid using our test box to balance the hearing aid/implant with the radio aid system. This makes sure that the radio and the hearing aid/implant are working together optimally.
