We are embarking on our biggest project to date the building of a fully accessible playground for our students, their families and the wider disabled community. Receiving input from all the students and their teachers we have planned a new playground at the school that will include the following:

A wheelchair friendly see saw which will enable our ambulant and non-ambulant children to play together

A wheelchair accessible roundabout

A bike track for use with adapted cycles that all children regardless of their disability can use

A basket swing

Two hammocks to support sensory stimulation

A sensory path

A two person slide to encourage playing together and to help those less able children to get involved with the assistance of their teachers and peers

A wooden train for interactive play

Interactive boards

Currently, there is no outdoor play equipment for the wheelchair users who attend Paternoster School. Coupled with the fact that most of the children who attend the school are unable to access mainstream public playgrounds, this means that outdoor play options are currently highly limited for our children. The playground we want to provide will host state of the art equipment that all wheelchair users can enjoy and which will provide a positive sensory environment for children with sensory processing disorders. An inclusive sensory playground would provide invaluable stimulus for our children and help develop their social, physical and mental abilities. Being able to open up the playground to siblings and children from other special needs charities/schools will provide even more children with this opportunity to grow.

Disabled children and their parents can feel terribly isolated as their play opportunities are extremely limited. There are no other facilities like this in the South Cotswolds and is therefore much needed to ensure our children get the same play opportunities as mainstream children. Some children have never really been able to play with their siblings as there are no suitable places, this would provide them with a safe space to enjoy each others company something every family should be able to do.

We anticipate three stages to our project:

1. In the immediate term playground to be accessible to the 50 children at the school to engage with during break and lunch time and to be used as part of their curriculum and their Individual Education Health Care Plan to promote progression from the physical, social and mental developmental perspective.

2. In the medium term playground to be accessible to the 50 school children plus an additional 120 children who are members of a local childrens charity. We have been working with the Chief Executive of the local charity Allsorts Gloucestershire to formulate after school clubs, weekend clubs and holiday play schemes at the school which will incorporate the use of these new facilities.

3. In the longer term playground to be accessible to additional disabled children in the wider community by approaching other special needs schools and organisations.