Education Advice
Do you support a deaf student? If so, we can help. We work with support/advisory services, schools, resource provisions, Teachers of the Deaf, mainstream teachers, and teaching assistants to develop and extend good practice. Access and inclusion are at the heart of our work.
Our input is negotiated on an individual basis to meet specific areas of need for individuals or groups and may be undertaken in collaboration with our Technology Consultants.
Our Education Advisors are all experienced Qualified Teachers of the Deaf and have additional qualifications and experience in educational audiology, early years provision, Ofsted inspection and transition issues.
Case Study:
ACE (Assessment of Comprehension and Expression) training
‘Thanks Helen for providing an interactive session on the effective use of ACE language assessment with Deaf children. It gave us the opportunity to reflect on how we use this tool and the confidence to use it more widely. The session was tailored well to both newly qualified and experienced Teachers of the Deaf, as well as peris and resource provision based staff. We are planning to meet again this year to look at individual case studies and do some peer analysis. We are also expanding the range of Assessment tools that we use across the City’ – Suzanne, Area Lead Teacher of the Deaf (Leeds East)
Case Study:
Supporting a new Teachers of Deaf Children Team within a Specialist Teaching Service
‘We are a newly created Qualified Teacher of the Deaf (QToD) team, following a Local Authority SEND Service restructure.
Helen has suggested routes we could take in establishing priorities for our whole team development. She has provided us with relevant and up to date policy and rationales to support us in leading our team forward e.g. guiding us in effective use of the NatSIP Quality Standards framework.
Helen has supported us in a team review of assessment and monitoring. Her extensive knowledge of assessments for deaf children and young people has helped us prioritise what to purchase and where to spend our limited funding. Her knowledge and expertise has helped us to reflect on our practice and procedures and supported professional dialogue amongst the QToD team. She has helped us to clarify ‘why we do what we do’ for maximum impact, in these days of reduced Teacher of the Deaf contact for deaf children and young people.
Helen has supported us both informally and formally via telephone calls, MS Teams meetings and with face-to-face delivery to staff meetings and INSET. Knowing that no question is ever a silly question for her, we feel very reassured by the pragmatic and realistic support Helen has offered us!’ – Manager for Teachers of Deaf Children and Young People