Approaches
In Pathways we use a variety of evidence-based approaches to provide
highly individualised support to each child.
TEACCH
TEACCH is an approach to educating autistic people and promoting learning through strengths and interests. It aims to support autistic people to live and work more effectively at home, at school and in the community by focusing on communication and social skills, independence, coping skills and skills for daily life. The principle of TEACCH is 'structured teaching' which involves looking at physical structure and the organisation of an environment as well as visual schedules (where/when/what the activity will be), visual information (what can we do in this work or play area), and task information (visually clear information on what the task is about, when is it finished and what happens next). We teach children to work independently at their level for parts of their day. Structured teaching brings meaning and predictability to learning and builds new skills and independence by breaking the tasks to manageable chunks, sequencing the activities and instructions and using reduced language by visual (pictorial or written) representation.
SCERTS
SCERTS is an educational framework used in Pathways to assess and teach children the core skills that are needed in order to have the best outcomes in later life, and to be able to apply functional skills in different settings. It focuses on social communication (functional communication and emotional expression) and emotional regulation (coping with everyday pressures).
ATTENTION AUTISM
Attention Autism in Pathways is used to develop communication skills in our children through visual and highly motivating activities. The approach was developed by speech and language therapist, Gina Davies and is based on the idea of irresistible desire to communicate through fun and exciting activities presented to children in a small group setting. It develops joint attention, shared enjoyment in group activities, attention in adult-led activities, spontaneous interaction and non-verbal and verbal communication. It is a fun way of developing vocabulary in a functional context.
CORE BOARDS
In Pathways, we use specific communication strategies to suit the needs of individual children. The communication is differentiated to reflect the language abilities of each child and may include a hierarchy of communication supports such as specific objects, photographs, symbols, line drawings and written text. Core boards in Pathways are used as an alternative communication system to teach children who are minimally verbal or have additional communicative difficulties to communicate their thoughts, needs and opinions by using pictures.
INTEROCEPTION CURRICULUM
Many of our children experience challenges with self-regulation. They may become overwhelmed, confused or unable to recognise their emotions. We build our children's understanding of emotional regulation through activities which are based on Kelly Mahler's Interoception Curriculum. We provide a variety of exciting sensory play activities as well as sensory breaks which help our children remain in calm alert state throughout the day and eventually manage their emotions when they become distressed.
ZONES OF REGULATION
The Zones of Regulation programme in Pathways supports teaching of self-regulation and emotional control with the aim of increasing social functioning. It provides easily understandable categories for different feelings and states of alertness: blue, green, yellow and red zones, similar to a traffic light coding. Students are taught to recognise and regulate their zone and manage it, according to the environment and social situation.
SOCIAL STORIES
In Pathways we use Social Stories to help children understand and respond to a range of situations, such as transitions, joining in playground games, visiting the doctor, change in their routine etc. Each story is personal to the child. It’s written in a language that the pupil can understand, taking an aspect of their lives they find challenging, terrifying or incomprehensible and presenting it in a fictionalised way that addresses the issue and gives the child a way of dealing with it. We use social stories to prepare our pupils for something new, introducing it well in advance so that they can be familiar with its more worrying aspects.
Please read more about approaches used in Pathways here: