Since Aristotle in his Nicomachean ethics (350BC) used the term eudemonia, which today we refer to as well-being, academics continue to debate its definition often using objective measures that include social and economic conditions such as income, educational resources and health status whilst others have used subjective indicators including life satisfaction, anxiety and emotional well-being. Two of the most basic human needs are health and education and if we look at the UN Convention on the Rights of a Child we see that the right to be educated and the right to be healthy are two of the key principles. Education and health are underlying basic and intermediate needs.
Morrison, Gutman and Vorhaus’s study (2012) demonstrates the importance of well-being for children and adolescents throughout their primary and secondary school education. For academic progression, better emotional well-being is a key factor and studies indicate that activity and attention problems are associated with lower educational outcomes for children with SEN.
It is obvious that early intervention strategies are needed to identify and support children in their emotional well-being when they have difficulty learning. Children who exhibit signs of troublesome behaviour may even be prevented from taking a downward spiral of disengagement. Therapeutic intervention can enable effective learning which in turn supports positive health and well-being, and good levels of health and well-being support effective learning.
Across Great Britain governments are mindful of the capability approach of equality and they all strive to try to balance things out and promote well-being in schools to ensure pupils realises their potential and schools are inspected on how they manage pupils well –being. In May 2014 the National Assembly for Wales brought out an act to reform social services law; to make provision about improving the well-being outcomes for people who need care and support and carers who need support and has implications once again for the use of special schools in extended well-being provision for adults with learning disabilities.
The act specifies that in relation to a child, “well-being” also includes physical, intellectual, emotional, social and behavioural development. It is a school’s duty to create a nurturing and stimulating learning environment and to promote and enhance health and well-being. It is essential that staff recognise when and what kind of support is needed to ensure the mental, emotional and social needs of pupils are met. Dr Anthony Seldon, founder of Action for Happiness and Head of Wellington College, claims that the education system now ‘focuses too heavily on academic learning and attainment and not enough on education for life.’
It can be difficult to measure well-being accurately. Measuring objective well-being usually consists of collecting data. If we try to measure subjective well-being we come across the problem that feelings, like happiness, anger or enjoyment, are actually difficult to measure. In a special school where pupils have difficulty communicating all that we can do is study the behaviour of a person to gauge their well-being.
Pupils in a special school often have health difficulties as well as learning difficulties and sometimes they have emotional difficulties. Before they can actually access an education they have to feel able to access it. Special schools throughout Great Britain provide various therapies to aid pupils’ access to education and improve their well-being. The way we interact with our most vulnerable members of society teaches them about their perceived value and place in society.
Do these therapies have any impact on the pupils’ educational progress and their health? Do these therapies have an impact on their well-being? In the data driven society that we have become evidence is needed to show whether any therapeutic intervention has any impact.
Ysgol Pen Coch is currently researching the effectiveness of its therapeutic intervention. The school uses B Squared assessment software to assess pupil’s progress in the curriculum. The school provides a number of therapies- physiotherapy, speech and language therapy, dark room therapy, hydrotherapy, reflexology, therapeutic music, Tacpac, Sherborne therapy, Rebound therapy, Wii therapy, play therapy, therapeutic music, therapeutic art, therapeutic riding and vibroacoustic therapy.
The therapies have also been linked to B Squared curriculum targets and well-being targets. A target has to be met three times before it can be assessed as being achieved. The class teacher is informed by the therapist once the target has been achieved and a new target has to be selected before the therapy can continue. The attainment of the target is added to B Squared. At the end of each school year the B Squared GAP analysis software uses the data recorded by teachers throughout the year and produces reports and graphs and allows progress tracking week by week, month by month or year by year.
To measure the impact that the therapy has had on the pupil the therapist gives the class teacher an evaluation sheet to complete at the end of each therapy session. The most recent set of questionnaires on the use of therapies went out in November 2014 to all parents/carers and staff who were asked to comment through a different questionnaire. Pupils’ views were sought.
Neuroscientists claim that what people say about how they feel corresponds closely to actual levels of activity in different areas of the brain and that therefore you can measure subjective well-being or happiness simply by asking people or their carers how the person feels. That is what we have done. All of this information is analysed and a report produced. (p.106 The Future of Special Schools and Therapeutic Intervention :Amazon:2015)
There is a need for a systematic study across special schools to focus on how they promote access to the curriculum for children with profound and multiple learning difficulties and children with severe learning difficulties and how this can improve their well-being. There is also a need to provide data analysis to show how effective this is.
What happens when our pupils become adults? How is their well-being catered for? When the government says people should have access to lifelong learning opportunities are they including adults with learning disabilities? Surely they must be or else they could be accused of discrimination. Therefore they have a right to access whatever is available in special schools today.
A gentleman with learning disabilities, who is in his fifties, attends our hydrotherapy pool once a week after school with a group of adults also with learning disabilities and their carers. His mother, who is in her eighties, comes along every week to watch him enjoying the experience. Not only is his sense of well-being improved, which is obvious to all onlookers as he enters the water and visibly relaxes but surely you would agree that his mother’s sense of well-being has also improved..
I believe it is the duty of county councils to work closely with special schools to ensure adults with learning disabilities have the opportunity to access lifelong learning opportunities which in turn improves their well-being.
Visit https://twitter.com/ImpactTherapies to see photos of adults and pupils experiencing well-being opportunites.