BSL Sessions

British Sign Language (BSL) sessions offered in school

The Deaf children within the provision receive a weekly 1 to 1 BSL sessions.
Each year group in the school has a weekly BSL session with our Deaf instructor. These sessions are a brilliant opportunity for all Bentley West pupils to learn a second language.
BSL Level 1 for a small group of Year 6 children,
BSL Level 1 for parents with Deaf children within the school and some from surrounding schools,
BSL Level 1 for the Federation staff,
BSL taster sessions for Year 5 (Summer half term only)

Whole school BSL sessions

The BSL sessions for the whole school have a weekly focus. For this year, we will be learning about signs around the school such as the signs for the different school subjects, school equipments, places and rooms around the school, describing your favourite hobbies and asking and giving directions around the school.

This is what we have been learning about each week:

3rd October: Deaf Awareness and fingerspelling the BSL alphabet.
10th October: Deaf awareness and fingerspelling the BSL alphabet.
17th October: Deaf awareness and and fingerspelling the BSL alphabet with our names.
31st October: Celebrations during Autumn and basic greetings.
7th November: More celebrations during Autumn and how to finish a conversation.
14th November: Signs of different school subjects.
21st November: Signs of different school equipment we use.
28th November: Signs of school furniture around the classroom.
5th December: Christmas signs
12th December: Sign the Christmas song, We Wish You a Merry Christmas in BSL!
9th January - Names of rooms/places around the school (as part of the Directions topic)
16th January - Directions vocabulary.
23rd January - Giving directions around the building/whole school.
30th January - Asking and giving directions.
6th February - Lankmarks around Bentley
13th February - Towns and cities around Bentley.
27th February - No classes due to timetable changes
6th March - Signs of different weather
13th March - No classes due to school strikes
20th March - Describing the weather .
27th March - Easter signs

BRITISH SIGN LANGUAGE LEVEL ONE QUALIFICATIONS

BSL sessions for Year 6 pupils

We would like to welcome our ninth cohort of Year 6 children to undertake their BSL Level One course. This course runs throughout the year, as the children complete the three modules that make up the level one curriculum. Throughout this, the children's productive (signing) and receptive (understanding) signing skills will be developed and assessed. The weekly sessions will cover everything the children need to gain their level 1 certificate.

This term the children will focus on the first module, BSL 101. This contains:

basic conversation skills when meeting someone
basic number knowledge
a range of family signs
a range of signs linking to our school
basic directions

The children have been workng hard so far. Before the February half term, the Year 6 group have completed their BSL 101 exams. They did really well leading up to the exams and we are awaiting for the results from the awarding body, Signature. We have started workin on elements of BSL 102 which we have worked on describing people and pets. Now we will be working on describing our homes and the school.

BSL SIGNING CLASSES FOR PARENTS/ADULTS

Every Wednesday, the Deaf Instructor, Mr Page delivers a free signing class specially for parents of Deaf children. These sessions are open not just to parents of Deaf children at our school, but to parents of children with all degrees of hearing loss who attend to the weekly Field Mice sessions.

The parents/adults will be taught British Sign Language (BSL) They will have an opportunity to learn some sign language based on what their child/ren are learning in their classroom, events happening around us such as Easter or Christmas for example and some basic Deaf awareness. The signing classes provide a valuable opportunity for the adults to meet a Deaf adult and learn some simple signs to use around the school and at home! This is an excellent opportunity for the adults to develop their conversational skills in BSL with a Deaf adult.

For the parents who are learning the BSL Level One qualification, we have started working on the BSL 103 Unit. They are nearly there now! We have started working on describing our journey from one place to other. It can be the school run or the journey home from work. Plus as we had a lot of changeable weather recently, it is a good time to practice our conversation about the weather as we British people love to chat about the weather!

For the parents who are ust started to learn BSL, we have started learn the signs of the colours, clothes and the weather. We have some interesting discussions about anything linked to deafness and BSL during our coffee mornings.

The signing classes take place every Wednesday between 9.00am -10.45am. If you are interested in attending the class please contact us for further information and to make sure you are part of the right group at the right time.

BSL SIGNING CLASSES FOR STAFF

Our Deaf instructor delivers weekly signing classes for Bentley Federation staff (Bentley West and King Charles Schools). This is a great opportunity for the staff to develop their signing skills in order to communicate more effectively and confidently with the Deaf staff and children within the Federation.

The class is working through the BSL Level One curriculum as well as covering academic language they will be teaching as part of their topics in school. They will also cover some topical language including celebrations and current affairs as they happen.

We have started our signing classes again, we have been focusing solely on conversational skills and using appropriate vocabulary to include in their conversation in BSL. The staff are currently working on their conversational skills discussing events in everyday life to complete their BSL Unit 103. As we are aiming to complete the final BSL unit at the end of the academic year, we will be practicing our vocabulary and polishing up our conversational skills.

Shortly, we will start working on the elements from the BSL 103 unit which will cover topics such as their every day lives, the weather, and travel/transport.

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