Pupil Support & Nurture

LONGFORD LIONS

The personal welfare of each child is paramount.  We pride ourselves in the caring and supportive manner in which staff fulfil their pastoral responsibilities.

We have an established group in school, called Longford Lions.  Sessions at Longford Lions help to address the social and emotional development of children, whose needs are not met in class by Personal Social and Health Education lessons. 

Longford Lions provides a safe, secure, warm and stimulating environment for small groups and individuals. Children are offered the opportunity to build 1:1 relationships with adults and other children, and participate in activities that involve creating, sharing, caring, turn taking and building each others self esteem. The aim is to give children the confidence they need to be able to access learning. 

The sessions are very successful.  Children who participate thoroughly enjoy them and parents appreciate the extra support their child receives.

ELSA - Emotional Literacy Support Assistants

What is ELSA Intervention?

An ELSA in a school is an Emotional Literacy Support Assistant. ELSAs are specialists with a wealth of experience of working with children.  ELSAs are trained and regularly supervised by Educational Psychologists. Training covers many areas from emotional literacy to active listening.

Supervision

ELSAs must be supervised regularly by the Educational Psychologists who trained them. This supervision is key to good practice and allows the ELSA to bring up any problems with a group of other ELSAs along with the Educational Psychologist.

Scope of practice

It is important that ELSAs work within the their scope of practice and only cover things they are trained to cover. Any concerns out of their scope of practice should be discussed with their Educational Psychologist and potentially referred on to outside agencies. ELSAs SUPPORT NOT FIX.

ELSA Relationship

ELSAs are warm, kind and caring people who want to make children and young people feel happy in school. and to reach their potential socially, emotionally and academically. They understand the barriers to learning that some children and young people might have and can help them with this.  Their aim is to build children's emotional development and help them cope with life's challenges.  ELSAs will also help children and young people to find solutions to problems they might have.

An ELSA is not there to fix problems but to help them find their own solutions and offer that important support to a child through sessions run in either small groups or on an individual basis depending on children's needs.

Relationships are key in helping children and young people to feel safe and nurtured. ELSA is about creating a reflective space for the child or young person.

What areas does an ELSA help with?

• Loss and bereavement
• Emotional Literacy
• Self-esteem
• Social Skills
• Friendship issues
• Relationships
• Managing strong feelings
• Anxiety and worries
• Bullying
• Conflict
• Emotional Regulation
• Growth Mindset
• Social and therapeutic stories
• Problem solving

 At Longford we have two trained ELSAs - Mrs Machin & Mrs Eliison