At St. Lukes, we're committed to providing a supportive and enriching environment for every student. Two critical components of our educational provision are the Emotional Literacy Support Assistant (ELSA) program and Speech and Language Therapy (SLT). These programs are designed to address the emotional and communication needs of our students, empowering them to achieve their full potential.

ELSA

Mrs Jenkins is our trained ELSA specialist, who delivers emotional literacy provision to support students in the progress of their EHCP outcomes, such as support with developing understanding of emotions, how this feels in their body and different strategies they can use to help manage them. Mrs Jenkins will spend time observing students in lessons and communicating with staff, then tailor the ELSA sessions around the skills that need work. Following these activities are regular reviews to see if students are using the agreed strategies and if they are working well for them.


Example: EHCP outcome – Social Emotional, Mental Health

[Student] will have a better understanding of his emotions and the affects they have on his body. He will be able to ask for help from an adult to manage his emotions by supporting him to adopt safer ways to express his feelings (e.g. having time out, doing a calming activity).

Below are some activities that have been put in place to support the above EHCP outcome.

 

Emotions boardgame

He rolls the dice and lands on an emotion (proud/scared/angry). We discuss the last time he had that emotion. What happened? How did he deal with it? What could he do differently next time?
 

 

 

Social skills scenarios booklet

We discuss the scenario (getting frustrated with someone because they are taking too long). How does it make him feel? How is the other person feeling? How could he react better? We agree on strategies he could try and use going forward.
 

 

 

The Iceberg

I completed my own Iceberg, whilst he completes his. We discussed the different emotions he says he shows on top of the water and the ones he hides underneath too. 
 

My emotions

We discuss the different emotions he uses. With this he made his own emotions sheet. He got to choose any animal/person/emoji that he wanted for his emotions sheet. He chose to use the same type of dog he already has (happy face dog/sad face dog).
 

Wellbeing catch-up

On the days he does not seem settled enough to do an activity, he tends to stand at the window and watch people on the field. I give him his ‘Emotions’ sheet and he will point to or say under his breath which emotion he is currently feeling. With this, I allow him to lead the conversation and often he will start to relax and open up about how/why he is feeling that way.

Speech and Language Therapy


Mrs Jenkins provides intervention support for speech and language. Each term, the student, supported by Mrs Jenkins, hold an online meeting with her S&L Therapist. She reads out the sounds she was previously given to practice in school and at home. She then reads part of her chosen book (currently ‘Giraffes Can’t Dance’) for her S&L Therapist to pick up other sounds needing attention.  
We then discuss how well she is doing and work out ways to support her with the sounds she is struggling with. 
 

Her school S&L Therapy lessons work as follows –

1. Warm up – selected sounds practice
 


 

2. She reads words and identifies the images out loud using the sounds she finds difficult. She then makes a sentence including the words. 

                                
 

3. She then focuses on her chosen book, putting together the sentences and working on key sounds; she must focus on the individual words circled. Once she has completed every page of the book, she will then have her own book to practice at home. 
 

 

We believe that addressing the emotional and communication needs of our students is fundamental to their overall development and success. The ELSA and Speech and Language Therapy programs are integral parts of our commitment to providing a nurturing and supportive environment.