scottish learning association

Scottish Support for Learning Association

If you wish to download a copy of the January 2006 newsletter please click on Newsletter (letter is in PDF)

Newsletter, Summer 2005

As I write this I am psychologically getting myself back in tune for the year ahead and wonder how long it will be before I experience an “I need a break” feeling. Our usual newsletter writer, Tim Wright, has taken some time off from SSLA after having supported his wife through terminal illness and we wish him some well earned rest. Another of our executive, Sheena McAnulla from Ayrshire has also retired and we wish her an enjoyable time. (She’ll be glad she doesn’t have to deal with databases any more!)

Journal

The journal will be out before the end of the year. Bill Sadler is in the process of completing its formation before he retires from education and SSLA. Bill has given many years service to SSLA and we wish him an enjoyable retirement. We would also like to thank his wife for the many years she has been an “SSLA widow” as opposed to a golf widow. The journal will consist of articles from our November conference on inclusion and a selection of “best of” articles from our recent publications.

GIFTS

We had so many people requesting these at our last conference in April that we have decided to reprint them so the entire collection should be available soon plus a few recent additions. If anyone would like to send additional ones these would be gratefully received. A GIFT is an A4 sheet “Good Ideas for Teachers” and we have around twenty focusing on such things on phonological awareness, lenses, motor difficulties etc.

Conferences

As mentioned above, the November conference was on “Inclusion, How Are We Doing in Scotland?”

We enjoyed presentations from Morag Gunion HMIE, Ruth Campbell SEED and Kathleen Marshall, Children’s Commissioner for Scotland. Needless to say, this conference was so well attended that we needed a full conference hall and had people from all over Scotland who were not disappointed.

Our April conference was held in Dundee and it has to be said that it was one of the best ever for seriousness with fun! Not only did the sun shine as we looked over the Sir Walter Scott’s “Discovery”at the Tay Bridge but we had a full day of information. After being welcomed to Dundee by Jim Collins of Dundee City Education Services, proceedings were led by Dr.Katheen Long on the importance of high self esteem and how to achieve this. She had us all standing up, sitting down, rolling about the aisles and wiping away tears of laughter!

Alison Townley, from the West Lothian Science Team then gave us some tips on how to tackle formative assessment in Science with children who have additional support needs and again the queue of people waiting to see her at the end of her presentation was impressive. Tim happened to pass by the lecture theatre at this time and said he could hear from the laughter that people were listening!

In the afternoon we found out how to make maths interesting from Joe McLaughlin, principal teacher of Maths at St.Kentigern’s Academy, West Lothian. Joe must have been one of the first people in Scotland to start using an interactive whiteboard and obviously said what people wanted to hear as people acknowledged his comments.

Lee Pascall from England(via Canada) gave us an update on methods for dyslexia in the classroom and again we were rolling in the aisles. He delivers at breakneck speed and must have been exhausted after the hour, I know we were just watching him!

November conference

We have now finalised all details for this and flyers will be hitting the schools shortly. The date is 5^th November at the Erskine Bridge Hotel, Erskine and will be a full day conference. Our speakers are Dr.Kathleen Long who will give a repeat performance (make sure you have tissues to wipe away tears of laughter). The middle slot will be Laura Ann Currie, Head of West Lothian Education Psychological Services who will be speaking on emotional literacy in the primary school and Brigid Daniel of University of Dundee who has just had a research paper published by SEED on Resilience in Children who face adversity in their lives and how we can support them. This will also be of interest to social workers so if you know anyone who is then let them know. The cost will be £60 for members and £80 for non members.

All authorities have been invited to become corporate members as this means that people from an authority who have become corporate members are entitled to the reduction in conference fees. Make sure your authority joins!!

Good Practice Awards

The final six schools have now been selected from a large entry and they will give their presentations on Friday 30^th September at the Cairn Hotel in Bathgate. The judges will be John Bissett of the Additional Support Division,SEED, Gwynedd Lloyd of University of Edinburgh and Simon Macaulay of the EIS. We are also hoping to have a well known media presenter but this has not as yet been confirmed. All link representatives have been invited.

Website has been reconstructed and back up and running. Well done to our web maker!!

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