Ysgol Aberconwy has recently undergone the refurbishment and development of the building at the front of the school. This now houses ‘Y Ganolfan’ and is a modern environment that includes the County’s provision for students with ASD and neurodevelopmental difficulties as well as other areas.
The calming and comfortable surroundings have been designed to meet the needs of children with complex social, communication, emotional or behavioural difficulties, enabling students to feel safe and to help them achieve their full potential whilst at Ysgol Aberconwy.
Y Ganolfan currently has four main areas as well as a suite of sensory spaces. It has been expanded to include 6 classrooms as well as 5 sensory/decompression pods that are furnished with sensory lighting and equipment including weighted chairs to help students regulate and enable them to return successfully to lessons.
We have an acoustic POD that children are able to use for mentoring sessions with our experienced and caring staff. It may also be used by students as a quiet space to work whilst remaining within the classroom. As well as this, we have a series of intervention rooms that specifically cater for the development of key skills such as literacy and numeracy, emotional literacy and social communication difficulties.
Y Ganolfan now offers a nurturing environment that supports our students in a holistic way and offers a range of interventions to meet students’ needs and support their difficulties. We offer bespoke packages, where needed, working closely with school staff, to support students so that they are able to access and immerse themselves into mainstream education successfully. Our aim is to ensure that every student at Ysgol Aberconwy feels supported and meets or exceeds their full potential.
Medwen Brookes, Assistant Headteacher, said, “The expansion of this provision has enabled us to support a greater number of students in an inclusive and supportive environment. We have already seen a marked difference in engagement within the new provision and it has only been a few weeks! I’m very excited to see how these changes will impact on progress and the development of the provision over the coming months.”