Curriculum

TreeHouse provides a balanced and wide curriculum throughout school but we have to approach this in a different way from mainstream schools so making the curriculum accessible at the level a child is working at is crucial.

“Pre-requisite skills are needed before addressing teaching targets. A good example would be teaching a child to undress and use a tap before they can be taught to use the toilet.” (Key stage teacher)

The curriculum provides:

  • personalisation for each pupil based on full assessment and ongoing review
  • a differentiated National Curriculum, that has breadth and balance. The pupils’ needs determine their curriculum and where appropriate they work within the National Curriculum
  • learning targets to match the child’s development and needs
  • an early emphasis on learning to learn, and the enjoyment of learning
  • the teaching of communication skills – as well as teaching strategies and visual resources which encourage pupils to actively communicate their needs, we have excellent IT resources including devices which give a child a voice
  • teaching and learning opportunities spread across the school day: we use lunch times and breaks as opportunities to develop communication and social interaction and encourage self help skills
  • opportunities for play and leisure interactions both between staff and students and among students: our breaktime and lunchtime circuits are open to all, for example

“Teaching a skill like using a mouse is necessary to access specially designed programmes for TreeHouse pupils. A typical child will learn how the mouse works through play and trial and error. We teach it more systematically, breaking it down task by task. We may begin by showing how the cursor moves on the screen when you move the mouse up and down. Once the horizontal and vertical movements are understood we’ll move on to teach clicking and so on.” (IT specialist)

Staff adapt teaching to the unique qualities and needs of each pupil. This is informed by knowledge of the strengths and difficulties associated with autism in general. The TreeHouse School curriculum addresses these in the following ways: