Telephone 01473 437590 - 0115 9556045 - 0115 9567305
to discuss or FAX 01473 437590

What's New?

 

Colin Newton and Helen Mahaffey at June Book Launch of their book 'Restorative Solutions' the latest Inclusive Solutions Publication. Order here.

There is also a pack available featuring a great DVD created in Milton Keynes led by Tom McCready. Order here.

 

 

Connecting People

Check out this great article: Connecting People, a new approach to advocacy through a BILD project - community connecting through advocacy, and a community team helping people and their families develop their involvement in community life. This is an an article by Clare Wightman, Director - Grapevine (Coventry and Warwickshire) Ltd recently published in Learning Disability Today about their work.

'To be successful we have to start from a belief
in inclusion. A belief that:
we are all born ‘in’
all means all
everyone needs to belong
everyone is ready
everyone needs support
everyone can communicate
everyone can contribute
together we’re better.'

Who could argue?

Making good use of Third Places

'This term was coined by Ray Oldenburg in his
book The Great Good Place: Cafes, coffee
shops, bookstores, bars, hair salons (1999).
Oldenburg is an Urban Sociologist from Florida
who writes about the importance of informal
public gathering places. ‘Third place’ simply
refers to associations or connections between
people that are based on locations, like
becoming a regular in a cafe or bar. A third
place is a place of belonging, somewhere
that is comfortable, and conversation is the
main thing, a place where you can get known
without doing much. There are no qualifications
needed and no criteria to be met. It is
important to go at regular times, which works
well for people who enjoy routine. We have
learned that this method of connecting cannot
be used casually though – you have to be
active not passive in your support as you
need to spot opportunities for interaction and
relationship building. We have helped people
with high support needs to become regulars
of local places.'

(Whightman- as above)

National Meet the Dragons sponsored by The Guardian and the RSA...

Inclusive Solutions enter the Dragons Den..... and get on the long list with this proposal...

A Place in the World – Support Brokerage
This proposed social enterprise development will work through independent support brokers to create personalised solutions with disabled adults through community participation and citizenship, building on individual strengths. It will benefit from international experience and mentoring.

 

FREE Stuff!!

 

 

Books Books Books

Early Years Resource pack

Lancashire Early Years have just bought over a 1000 copies of 'Incurably Human', 'Seeing the Charade' and Magic Wands for all their Registered Childminders and for many of their Early Years workers! Now thats commitment to Inclusion....

 

Peter Keane on video talking about: Peer Mediation , Restorative work with children and the Role of Support Services in South Tyneside

'It is not a disease, it is a way of life'
the latest act of a burgeoning autism rights movement. Emine Saner reports on the campaign to celebrate difference, rather than cure it

Undercover Teams: (Bill Hubbard: New Zealand) A low-intrusion restorative approach to bullying.

Undercover Teams are a restorative adaptation of the influential and far-sighted work in the early 90’s of Barbara Maines and George Robinson of the UK. They labeled their support group approach to addressing school bullying as “No-Blame”. At the time and for years later, some people believed that this process was the single answer to school bullying that everyone had been looking for. Undercover Teams represent a unique tool that fits within the family of 'restorative responses' . Undercover Teams are a 'targeted approach to - repairing relationships.

Viewed using a restorative perspective, Undercover Teams (UTs) may not be regarded by some practitioners as ‘fully restorative’ because the victims of bullying and the offending students are not brought face-to-face as part of the process however this fact alone should not undermine the worth of UTs. Rather, UTs can represent a niche process for supporting young people who may be fearful at the prospect of participating in a restorative conference situation. For students who have been bullied for much or all of their school lives, this can often be the case.

INCLUSION SUMMER INSTITUTE

NOTTINGHAM

Fantastic Success!

JUNE 2008

Click link to read some feedback

 

Travellers Conference

Derek and Colin meet and share stage with the President of Ireland at the National Travellers Conference in April 2007. We loved her speech.

Check out: Remarks by President McAleese at the National Association of Travellers Centres' Conference 'The Voice of the Traveller in an inclusive society', Glenroyal Hotel, Maynooth, 25th April 2007

President of the National Association of Travellers, President of Ireland, Colin and Derek

National Association of Travellers' Centres Conference Report 2007 (pdf download)

1. Great publications deal
2. Oxfordshire Community Consultation re Children Centres
3. Parent contributions and leadership
4. Circle of Adults Pack

Read and comment on latest Inclusive Solutions BLOG

 

Credo for Support!

Click on above link to view a video on YouTube illuminating the need for thoughtful help and support for anyone who needs it. Thanks to the work of Norman Kunc & Emma Van der Klift.

 

Hartlepool Integrated Working and Information Sharing

Check out the work we are doing in Hartlepool 2006/07 to seriously engage people in working together with graphics, fun and participation across all their agencies and work force!

House of Commons Inquiry into Special Educational needs: June 2006

Pdf File here

Select Committee report ignores 20 years of good inclusive practice in education > Read our July 2006 comments/press release on Legislation Page

The Big Red Bus (small word 42 kb file download)

Chris Johnson (dryden) and Lynn Turner, Educational
Psychologists have developed this lovely process designed to help set up a supportive team around a pupil in difficulty. A team is recruited and roles on the 'bus' agreed to meet identified needs. Check it out!

 

How about us providing you with an Interactive web site following one of our training days? This would include a slide show featuring all those who attended the day. Interested? Email us for full details or check out a sample here providing some images of the many faces of Inclusive Solutions on the road

Check out Popcorn and Skittles a really moving way of setting up a Circle devised in Vermont, USA.

 

HMI Report 2005 (Downloadable pdf file)

Inclusion: the impact of LEA support and Outreach Services

circles of Support and Accountability (link to their detailed manual of practice on-line) are an organisation in Toronto, Canada who are building circles of support around sex offenders. Did you see Guardian Article 17th June 2006 on this subject?

They were not formed to compete with existing service providers. They were formed to assist:

• those considered by many to be the "untouchables", or the most marginalized in our society,
• those for whom there was little or no support
• those for whom there was no support from other governmental or non-governmental service or agency.

COSA originated to meet the unique needs of Sex Offenders, because no one else was stepping forward to do so.

We are working now on a UK adapted version of this approach.

 

Stick with these pages its hard hitting but worth it!

Are you a parent in the UK and involved in a Statement Review? Download this exemplary letter written by a parent in preparation for a Statement Review and making a clear case for inclusion . The letter worked! Feel free to download, amend and reuse......

Press Release
                             Heading for Inclusion

'Heading for Inclusion' is a group of Headteachers and senior school leaders dedicated to the ideals of a fully inclusive mainstream education system.

Responding to Warnock

'Inclusion Works!

Headteachers and senior school leaders up and down the country are dismayed at the negative portrait that has been presented of inclusive education over the past weeks following Baroness Warnock's recent unfortunate comments.  We, of all people, are the first to admit that inclusion is not always easy; does not always provide quick fixes and needs to be properly funded.  Equally, we have daily experience of seeing how inclusion is powerfully changing the world for the next generation of young people - for the better.  Inclusion for us is ultimately about building a society in which all people are valued for who they are; where young people learn to throw away the prejudices with which we were brought up  and can work together to create a new 'inclusive' world.  Some of us are well on the way to modeling internationally renowned school environments which respond to the needs of each child - and develop them into the creative, intelligent, loving, thoughtful human beings that is their birthright.  Many of us are at various stages on the way.

Baroness Warnock is wrong when she says inclusion is not working.  We know that there are parents, children and indeed schools who are not completely happy with the current situation.  We need to remember, however, that the alternative Eugenic model of segregated education has failed many more children - through very low expectations, ghettoisation - and most seriously - an impaired ability of its recipients to engage in mainstream society when they leave.  Our system of segregated education must end! 

There are, of course, dedicated professionals with highly valuable skills in special schools.  As special schools close these people need to come and work in the new inclusive mainstream schools and bring their expertise to support all children.  There are numerous examples of mainstream schools adopting new practice to respond to the needs of a child with special needs and finding that many other children also benefit from the change.

One school, which included a child with Downs syndrome, taught all the children and staff Makaton only to find that many of the children were able to benefit from receiving information in that way.

In one school with provision for children with Emotional and Behavioural Difficulties the children repeatedly elected a child with an EBD statement to represent them on the school council because they knew he would not be afraid to put their views to the Headteacher.  When he first started at the school many children had been afraid of him.  Because of inclusion he put his temper and violence behind him and became a valued member of his society.

School Councils, circles of friends, peer counseling, circles of support are just some of the ways inclusion is improving the lives of children - every day.

Inclusion is  a radical agenda - we are talking about changing the whole of society.  Baroness Warnock would do well to come and talk to Headteachers to see how wonderful those changes are proving to be.  We look forward to meeting with her.

nigelutton@btinternet.com
Chair of Heading for Inclusion 

Telephone 01420 84400 

Some of the following headteachers may be available for comment:

: head@buckingham.w-sussex.sch.uk ; headteacher@cottingley.leeds.sch.uk ; sue.billingham@hiheathn.bham.sch.uk ; head@hillbrook.wandsworth.sch.uk ; brak10@blackburn.ac.uk ; admin.lister@pop3.newham.gov.uk ; headteacher@brookside.stockport.sch.uk ; shackleton, lorenne; office@davigdor.brighton-hove.sch.uk ; head@turvesgreen-pri.bham.sch.uk ; office@wbjs.com ; daviesr.gibbsgreen.lbhf@lgfl.net ; Sue Eagle; amy.white@bedford-pct.nhs.uk ; kenny frederick; L.Gracey@blackburn.ac.uk ; diane.gunn@upton.kent.sch.uk ; headteacher@ripple.kent.sch.uk ; fao@jubilee.lambeth.sch.uk ; admin.cleves@pop3.newham.gov.uk ; kenn jupp; garnet.bryant@sarisbury-inf.hants.sch.uk ; s.j.j.keefe@btinternet.com ; kenwardh@filshamvalley.e-sussex.sch.uk ; enquiries@hartleybrook.sheffield.sch.uk ; enquiries@hampsteadschool.org.uk ; jayne.lates@hallgreen-inf.bham.sch.uk ; l.manford@normandcroft.hammersmith-fulham.sch.uk ; zelda McCollum; fmheadteacher@hotmail.com ; janmillington@billesley.bham.sch.uk ; joan@sheringdale.org ; aphillips@cottesbrooke-inf.bham.sch.uk ; mouseholekat@beeb.net ; office@stmaryspri.worcs.sch.uk ; office.westborough@kirklees-schools.org.uk ; smith, terry; rsturgess2002@yahoo.co.uk ; kathy thompson; nigel Utton; vaggers@btopenworld.com ; office@franchefirst.worcs.sch.uk ; enquiry@newoscti.bham.sch.uk ; admin@ethelred-nursery.lambeth.sch.uk ; admin.langdon@pop3.newham.gov.uk

 

Disability Debate Discussion forum

We want to hear from you about your priorities, ideas and thoughts concerning a fresh agenda - one which by 2020 could truly see a Britain in which disabled people have become equal citizens.

Recent Feedback from a Young person

Dear Colin and Derek,
Many people have helped me with my problems over the years, but no-one has helped me as much as you (and The Circle) have.
Without the Circle (Your own very brilliant invention), I don’t think I’d have made it into year 11 let alone the sixth form.
The Circle has tought me much about respecting other people and their wishes and now I send my respect to you Colin and Derek
Thankyou very much for the Circle.
Jason
 

The Assistive Technology Boogie : Click here for a musical and educational treat!! A brief but informative look at the role of technology in the lives of disabled people!

Inclusive Solutions T Shirts featuring Keys to Inclusion Graphic are

NOW available. Email or fax an order (£15 for a large T shirt) or visit our online store.

The 2020 campaign is led by disabled people with the support of many allies of which Inclusive Solutions is one. It is a campaign to end the practice of educating children and young people with extra needs in separate, segregated schools, colleges, units or classes by the year 2020.
Instead we want all young people to have the right to learn together in restructured mainstream provision, based on the principles of inclusion, equality and social justice.

Inclusive Solutions: PRESS RELEASE JULY 2005

Responding to Warnock

Inclusive Solutions is a team of educational psychologists who together with a national and international range of associate trainers, teachers and psychologists specialising in inclusive education.

We are very concerned at the negative publicity emerging around inclusive education and the lack of clear and bold leadership in this area from education ministers at this time.

In our extensive experience of working in mainstream and special schools across the UK and tracking the lives of individual pupils with severe and complex needs we are convinced that children and young people do much better socially and academically when included alongside their local peers in mainstream schools. Typical pupils also gain hugely as they learn to live with pupils who may be very different and even very challenging. They are learning to live in a world of diversity. It can make no sense to segregate some pupils from the start of their education and then somehow expect to end up with a more inclusive society once school is over.   This is the real world and it is inherently messy!

Successful inclusion is not a matter of chance but a result of effective planning and provision. Both academic fulfilment and relationships need to be planned for and we have seen at first hand how approaches such as Circles of Friends have made a difference to children's social inclusion and acceptance however challenging their behaviour may be.

The research is in and the rights issues are clear. Children need to be included from the earliest of years in their local community schools. This where they belong and have a right to be. http://www.inclusive-solutions.com/research.asp

International research confirms this many times over.   Listen to Mary Falvey - Professor at California State University in LA:

Since (1977) hundreds of rigorous research studies have been undertaken to determine the effectiveness of integrating and including students with severe disabilities. As a result of a comprehensive review of the extant literature by myself and my colleagues, we were unable to identify even a single research article that that found that segregated service delivery models are more effective than integrated models for students with severe disabilities."

We would have to agree with regard to both research and practice in the UK.

We work with teachers, educators and parents virtually every week of each year exploring the ethical, practical and emotional aspects of inclusive education and have found wonderful humane, positive and individual responses to the issue leaving us in little doubt that no longer should we ask 'should they be here' but rather 'how do we figure out how best to include them?' These words were shared with us by a Scottish mum battling to have her child with autism admitted to and welcomed to his local school.

Join with those across the UK who simply dream of a time when all pupils regardless of behaviour or disability can attend their local mainstream school and be both welcomed and well resourced there.

Read Review of our new 'Creating Circles of Friends' book by Association of Educational Psychologists, October 2004

OFSTED name Circle of Adults process as an example of outstanding Practice:

Example of outstanding practice
Formation of a Circle of Adults to prevent exclusion of a primary age child.

'You don’t often get staff meetings like this! The outreach support team invited adults who had contact with the
child causing concern to a twilight session and the whole school staff were there. The headteacher of the
Dacorum centre led a brainstorming session where the adult circle raised issues and concerns and later,
hypothesis, reasons and solutions, in a semi formal setting.
Only one person talked at a time and one person took on the role of the ‘voice of the child’ – his representative.
Comments, concerns and suggestions came swiftly. They felt angry, the pupil was aggressive and there were
complaints from parents. The head of outreach created a large and colour coded ‘graphic’ wall display of the
issues as the session went on under headings of ‘Hot Issues’ ‘Relationships’ ‘System Issues’ ‘Hypotheses’ and
‘Strategies’. Amongst the comments made - under ‘hypotheses’-staff wondered if the pupil felt overwhelmed or
left out or found it difficult to adjust to changes. The remarks made by the voice of the child included “people say
different things” and “people say I am aggressive, but I don’t always mean to be”.
The result, a very clear insight by all into the pupil’s needs and following from this, practical plans and
programmes of work specifically for this child created by the circle and therefore fitting perfectly into the work of
the school. For example, finding a male role model, and a Year 6 buddy, also meeting and greeting each
morning. Their solutions, copied and sent to the school later for reference, to make a positive difference - a
happy child, learning effectively and no longer in danger of exclusion.'

(OFSTED Report on Dacorum Education Support Centre April 2004)

Check out another great piece of writing from a fabulous mum..... Nancy Huggett of Ottawa: Labels

 

Sensory Super - Sensitivities

Elaine, a Nottinghamshire mum attended an Inclusive Solutions event: 'Including Children with autism' and took notes of the day. You can download a copy here.

PRUs. Are they good or bad?

Check out the arguments in this paper by Colin Newton and Derek Wilson which draws upon DfES policies as well as research.

There is still a massive amount of serious strategic work needed at Government, LEA, and school levels if inclusion is to become a reality in the UK. This is made very clear in a recent HMI report:

 

The Long View. We must take the long view in our planning for complex individuals however young they are.

‘What do you want to be when you grow up’?

How often have you heard this question asked of typical children? What was your own answer as a child to this question?
However we so often will not ask this same question of disabled children and families will often say ‘we dare not think beyond today’ let alone into the long term future. So we go about planning for children with complex impairments as if they did not really have a long-term future and adulthood. We make major decisions such as placement in a special school or unit without having regard for the long term implications of such a move. The child when they do become an adult are greatly at risk of vulnerability and isolation from the wider community into which they find themselves a part, or not a part. We live in a society that does not have special shops or special bus stops….

Check out Colin and Derek's thinking on this....

Check out feedback on our work!!

 

Removing Barriers to Achievement

(DFES) Training

We provide a range of training opportunities that link directly into supporting the Governments strategy for SEN.

Specialist Skills - Advanced Skills - Core Skills

Click here for full listing

 

 

Micheline Mason's unpublished 2004 poem "Beware of the Baubles"

 

Check out Philip Awofesobi's rap .

 

Making Inclusion Happen!

 

Purchase Now!!

 

Resourcing Special educational Needs

This issue causes school, LEAs and parents all kinds of headaches and if not done effectively can become a serious obstacle to inclusion. We are very interested in approaches to resourcing that do not rely on statements. We worked in Nottinghamshire and Nottingham and were involved in the development of the Mainstream Support Group system of resourcing that has reduced reliance on statements for resourcing in these two LEAs.This approach involved increasing the involvement and ownership of the process by school based staff. Such approaches support inclusion and increase trust.

We offer training and development work based on these experiences.

A recent research publication which shows the benefits of reducing reliance on statements can be downloaded here.

Reducing reliance on Statements

Did you know that Inclusive Solutions offered advice to Comic Relief and helped shape up the materials they sent out to schools? We also had fun at the Comic Relief thank you party rubbing shoulders with Lenny Henry, Hugh Laurie and Ben Elton!!

Inclusion in the Early Years

Need training or development work around Inclusion in your LEA?
'INCLUSIVE SOLUTIONS' can help

We provide inclusive, creative and practical tools that help everyone to belong.

Comprehensive Training, Planning and Consultation Opportunities for Early Years Teams and Partnerships across the UK from Psychologists who specialise in inclusion

We are training with Early Years providers in many LEAs including Nottingham City, Oxfordshire and the London Borough of Southwark
Press here for more detail

 

Colin and Derek featured in the LLAIS 2003 SCOVO magazine.....

 

Check out the latest entries in our Ideas Workshop: Teams for Inclusion, The Bugle, Rolling the Die, Circles for pupils in public care

Check out our latest Training Opportunities
for new learning opportunities