Talking D&T

"You're going to let me use THAT?" - Empowering special needs students in D&T

• Dr Alison Hardy • Episode 213

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Nicola Brown shares her experience teaching design and technology at Springwell Leeds North, an SEMH school catering to students aged 7-16 with social, emotional, and mental health needs. She discusses how building relationships, establishing micro-routines, and adapting teaching approaches helps students thrive in a subject that offers unique opportunities for personal development.

  • Working with SEMH students requires understanding dysregulation and supporting emotional regulation
  • Key Stage 2 (ages 7-10) sessions focus on basic skills like using scissors, threading, and completing small projects 
  • Key Stage 3 students access a full workshop with power tools, building trust and respect
  • Level 2 Construction and Arts Award qualifications are offered to Key Stage 4 students
  • The school practices early transitions to reduce anxiety about the new school year
  • Misconceptions about special schools are challenged - "it's just being in the right place for you at the right time"
  • D&T education creates meaningful progression pathways to further education and employment
  • Small class sizes (10 students with 3 adults) and specialized support enable personalised learning

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Alison Hardy:

you're listening to the talking dnt podcast. I'm dr allison hardy, a writer, researcher and advocate of design and technology education. In each episode I share views, news and opinions. This week I've got nicola brown on the podcast, who I had the fortune to meet with, along with a whole load of other dnt colleagues, up in leeds earlier this year. I had a really good time up there, um meeting people talking about design and technology, and we did have quite a fabulous lunch as well, um and I, when nicola got talking to me, I thought, right, yeah, I need you and your expertise to come on the podcast and talk about what she does. So, nicola, first of all, I'm going to hand over to you and can you just say who you are, where you are and what you do hi, I'm nicola.

Nichola Brown:

I'm the design and technology teacher at a school called Springwell, leeds North. We're a SEMH school, which is social, emotional and mental health, and we're a through school. So that means our youngest one is in year three, our eldest ones are in year 11.

Alison Hardy:

So year three. How, how old is year three? Seven, seven, right, so you go seven through till 16?

Nichola Brown:

yeah, okay um, all of our children have got an ehcp, which means they've got an educational health plan which gives them it means they've got a diagnosis to special educational needs help. Most of ours it's related to their behavior. Some of autistic, some are adhd, some have got trauma impact, which means they've got mental health issues. So they're a nice little mixed bag of individuals yeah, they're individuals, so how many?

Alison Hardy:

how many pupils are there in the school then?

Nichola Brown:

um, we've got approximately 120, I think, on roll. We have class sizes of up to 10 with three adults in the room and care team which support assistance for when children start to dysregulate a little bit so tell me a little bit about you, nicola.

Alison Hardy:

How long have you been teaching D&T and how long you've been at the school?

Nichola Brown:

I started teaching design and D&T in 2008. I did five years in mainstream teaching systems and control, but mainstream and I weren't a great fit because of the pupils I've got an affinity for. So I've been teaching in special, either SCMh or alternative provisions since then and I've been at springwell for three and a half years now.

Alison Hardy:

All right okay, okay, so you've been working with children with special educational needs for 12 years, then yeah, this is my fourth scn, school right, okay, okay. So you see I can say that you really are the expert for us to be having on here talking about teaching D&T to children with a diverse and severe range of needs, I suppose yeah, they're often the children, I think, that get left behind in mainstream.

Nichola Brown:

That's what why I got I got my passion for it. They're the children who, admittedly, often get thrown into what was resistant materials at the time because quote they're good with their hands.

Nichola Brown:

But those are the children that I had quite good affiliation with and I'm working with them on qualifications that suit them, rather than getting them to fit the qualification which didn't really work, or teaching them the way that they need to be taught rather than the other way around. Right, and so are you involved in teaching them the way that they need to be taught rather than the other?

Alison Hardy:

way around Right, and so are you involved in teaching right the way from the seven-year-old to the 16-year-olds.

Nichola Brown:

I am yes. So that's another part of our we call it relational practice, where we try to build relationships with our pupils as much as possible. So in order to give them the opportunity to meet other adults, I go down and deliver 20 minutes of design and technology every week to the four primary classes and then I have two 40 minute sessions with Key Stage 3 and two 45 minute sessions with Key Stage 4.

Alison Hardy:

Right, ok, so you get that experience. So, if I've got this right, then. So one of the key things is is about building up the relationships and that you're also building up the children's exposure for want of a better word to different, different adults in different contexts. Yeah, as well, so you're building up their sort of expert, their, their development, isn't it?

Nichola Brown:

yeah, being able to accept different people's expectations, different people's rules and rig and routines, where we do a lot of focus on things called micro routines. So a lot of my work with key stage two might not look exactly like the key stage two syllabus because a lot of our children are roughly a key stage behind their age. Yeah, because they've missed a lot of school, because before they can get to our school there's usually been quite a few hurdles to jump and time missed our SMH skills, like they're just waiting, taking turns, really taking account for our own safety, taking account for our own tidying up.

Nichola Brown:

it sounds really simple, but it's for some of these children that'll be seismic, I would imagine, and and incremental yeah, which then leads all the way up to, like, say, my year, key stage four are doing level two construction, which is like the equivalent of a four or above at GCSE. So we do get there. We just take a slightly different path to yeah, mainstream school.

Alison Hardy:

So tell me, tell me a little bit then about what, what you do in the primary, in the key stage one and key stage two. What might that look like for those 20 minutes or a series of 20 minutes?

Nichola Brown:

it's a lot of you're going to cringe. It's a lot of the crafty things where we're just learning to use scissors, we're learning to use different glue tape, so a lot of the things they've got quite short tension span. So I like to get an easy win, something that they can see an end product at the end, because that boosts their confidence and they feel, yeah, more excited to see me every week. So we do threading textiles activities, we'll do designing and making small toys models. It's something different every week, which is time consuming, and I would like to build up to things that take more than one lesson. But that's what my key stage three time like curriculum looks like yeah.

Nichola Brown:

So I suppose that you know when they're what, between the age of seven and ten, it's, it's developing those routines, that satisfaction of seeing themselves complete something yeah that kind of being able to break it down with not too many variables I suppose them to have to decide upon it, but also getting them to make decisions as well, because a lot of our children have a lot of their decisions made for them yeah right? Yeah, I thought that, like you say, giving them a set of choices and they make a decision based on those choices and committing to their choice as well, which is also another thing for them to manage when somebody else's turtle looks better than theirs.

Alison Hardy:

Yeah, and that is something that's part of design and technology capability. Isn't it about being able to make a decision, explain why you've made that decision and then, yeah, sticking with it and recognizing it later on whether it was the right one, the best one, you know, and at that time they made that best decision with what they decided, and later on they might look back and go I might have done it differently, but that's kind of what's part of the process, I suppose. Yeah, so what's what's some of the things that you've done with them this year then?

Nichola Brown:

Key stage two we've done some paper lilies for Diwali, we've done some. We recently did some parachutes for the D-Day landing. Okay, we've done some laser cut hedgehogs for Hedgehog Day. Okay, we've done some threading activities for Halloween. So I try to mix it up so that we've got a different scale every week, rather than just cutting and cutting and cutting and sticking and sticking and sticking.

Alison Hardy:

Yes, they're doing some joining of different materials. They're doing some shaping, some bending, some assembly.

Nichola Brown:

It's very similar to the junk modeling that you see in early years, but a lot of our children have missed out on that early years because they either were too dysregulated to take part or the school wasn't suitable for them and they had time out. So just doing a lot of catching up and filling the gaps, can I?

Alison Hardy:

just ask about the word dysregulated that you've, that you've used. Is that a term that's used in your school or um?

Nichola Brown:

it's what some people would describe as it's when kids are really struggling, when they've lost their control, when they're really upset and things can start to get thrown or they can start. They fail to be able to use their language properly and it's just a matter of bringing them back under control. We do a lot of talk about um. When we do some team teach, they're talking a lot about the zones of regulation and how people can get overexcited easily and I think very similar to what you see with a toddler, like when they get very excited and then they can't cope and they get very upset and then they can't cope, and it's just helping them to come round and have somebody to co-regulate with them and show them how to calm down and how to think with their words again.

Alison Hardy:

Yeah, yes, yeah it is. I can understand that as they get more stressed or happy or excited, then things can kind of move out. They lose kind of, it gets all fluffy around the edges and they can't kind of almost handle that. I mean, people can't see me, but I'm kind of making sort of bouncing arms with my arms.

Nichola Brown:

It's just the big emotions, just just coping. Yeah, emotions is a lot for them to manage and even at 10 years old, it's just a lot for them to be able to process.

Alison Hardy:

So yeah, so what about when they move into that age, 11 to 14? Then what's what's what's different?

Nichola Brown:

you've got a bit more time with them so that that's when I think it gets a little bit more exciting for's different. You've got a bit more time with them, so that's when I think it gets a little bit more exciting for them, because I've got a working workshop just like you would see in a mainstream, only it's a bit smaller. I've got scroll saws, I've got pillar drills, I've got all sorts of hand tools and tables with vices. And one of my favorite things about working in this setting when the SENCO is showing somebody around for the first time, they walk into my room, they go you're going to let me use that? And I'm like, yes, I'm going to let you use that until you prove to me that you can't use that. If you're safe, everything in here is for you to use. I'm going to jinx it tomorrow, but I've been doing this for about 12 years and I haven't had any significant dangerous behavior. Because they do respect that.

Nichola Brown:

I respect them enough to let them use what they think is very adult, very grown-up equipment yeah, crikey, I almost started to cry then.

Alison Hardy:

Actually, you talk about it's something there's something hugely powerful about that trust and respect and children having that space and knowing that they have it, and I think that's mainstream. Or in a special school, I think it's all of that it's stepping up.

Nichola Brown:

It's doing something very grown up, isn't it? Because, like we're saying, yes, this could hurt you, but if you use it right, it can also be amazing. So let's try it and let's do amazing stuff. So that's when we tend to do the more design process of I'll give them a problem for but it's again, it's very scaffolded because too much choice and too much decision making and our children would struggle. So my problem is that the zoo wants to make a new range of jigsaws for their visitors.

Nichola Brown:

So they design a jigsaw and then they make the jigsaw, we box it up and do all the graphics and talk about why boxes have all these important things on them, and that's when I tend to do the design make, evaluate process when we get into stage three and you have them for twice a week.

Alison Hardy:

At that point did you say yeah, so they've got, they've got longer time, they've got more time it's, it's more frequent, and so I suppose that helps them build up their confidence and security in this place as well, but they're all.

Nichola Brown:

It's also not too scary, because they've known me for two years, whilst I've been coming downstairs to do dt and now they're coming up to my room and they know I'm not as scary as I was you know that's scary at all to me but that?

Alison Hardy:

you know? That's okay, you're, you know it's the end of the day and you're relaxing, aren't?

Nichola Brown:

you so.

Alison Hardy:

So when they get into that you know 14 to 16. You said they do level two construction. Is that the only qualification you currently offer?

Nichola Brown:

so I originally offered um, the arts ward, and that worked quite well with some of our pupils. But it's still something that I could offer because we tend to fit the qualification to the pupil rather than what it is that we offer. So if somebody that came and they were more crafty and creative, I would probably do the Arts Award with them, which is still a Level 2 qualification, but without the examination. But a lot of our pupils wanted to go on to Leeds Building College. I swapped to the Open Awards, level 2 Construction, which again is a qualification without examination because it primarily assesses their practical skills to be able to do the activities needed to make.

Alison Hardy:

We primarily work around joinery, though and so, in terms of the, the physical space, you say you've got, you've got a sort of dnt room that is smaller than mainstream, and you've got, you've got some equipment within there. What? What adaptations, if any, have you had to make to that space?

Nichola Brown:

up until I've got them quite well trained, all the hand tools and everything kept behind a locked door and only the specific things come out when we need them. We don't have things like that everything available all of the time. Um, I'm really lucky, to be honest, that I haven't had to make that many adaptations at all. I can leave other people's work on the side and they'll respect and not touch it. We have three emergency stops, so I'll occasionally have to use those if someone's being unsafe, and it's just the quickest way to get somebody to wear a pair of goggles to be honest.

Nichola Brown:

Yeah, yeah, yeah, it is.

Nichola Brown:

Power goes back on when the goggles come on yeah, yeah, emergency stop buttons are fabulous but even that, once we get to key stage four because I've trained them quite well about what we use and what we don't use and how we use it we have toolboxes with everything available so they can make the choice about what they need to go and collect. But I would say that that's probably the only major adaptation between my previous mainstream classroom and a SEMH school, that I tend to have a lot of things behind a locked door and then, and then you were also talking before we hit record, about how the end of the year pans out.

Alison Hardy:

We're into what? The last five, six weeks of the school year, aren't we? And you said that actually.

Nichola Brown:

So year 11s are due to leave in the next two to three weeks oh yeah, 11s will do their final GCSEs, I think, wednesday, and then they'll be put on a really short, basically just a check-in with them to check that they're okay and they're going off to post-16.

Nichola Brown:

So, rather than have gain time, as you would in a mainstream, we then roll over early, we do our transition early so that the children, it takes away the anxiety of what september is going to look like. So they get their new class, they meet their new class team, they meet their new pupils, they go to their new classroom because, with the exception of specialists like DT, music and science, they stay in one classroom, which creates a bit of safety, to be honest, and it less transitioning, less upheaval, um, but transitioning early, we've found, really helps take away the September anxiety of am I going to meet and what's it going to look like?

Alison Hardy:

and so what about um working with outside organizations? Do they come and set design projects or um?

Nichola Brown:

I've only recently started doing that. I've had a company called Turner and Townsend came in to do a lego building project. They were a quantity surveyor company and again it's just us trying to drip feed the idea to our pupils that there's more to construction than being a brickie and just the option to meet new people and get instructions from new and different people, and that worked really well.

Alison Hardy:

But no, I've not had a lot of other organizations yeah, I suppose on the other side, it's about managing that for the children, isn't it for the pupils, about how much they can cope with. Yeah, that, that, that as well. So what's next then? So we've talked about coming towards the end of the school year. What's? What's the new things happening next year, or?

Nichola Brown:

so I'm going to have a bigger cohort of yet level twos in key stage four. Um, when I first started I had two pupils go through the arts award level one, and this year we had three do their level two, and I think there's going to be five doing a level two in September, which is brilliant. It just goes to show that our school is working, because the longer they're with us, the better they become really, because the longer they're where, it works for them and what?

Alison Hardy:

and what about you? What about you and your development? What are you looking to grow or develop? I'm not sure I'm really challenging you, aren't?

Nichola Brown:

I. I do want to get more outside agencies in. I'm making some contact with leeds building college to see if we can get involved with them to try and do some different skills. We were in contact with leeds university about an architecture course. So now that I've experienced having an outside agency in, I feel a bit more confident about doing it myself now. So I think our schools have a bit of a reputation for sounding like one of those scary places where bad kids and the naughty kids go, and I think it's just really good to prove to the kids that that's not true and prove to other people that that's not true, that it's just being in the right place for you at the right time, rather than you not being good enough for mainstream or mainstream not being good enough for you.

Alison Hardy:

Yeah, it works both ways, doesn't it? Yeah, you know, not every. We're not all square pegs fitting into fitting into square holes. Yeah, we're just sometimes a bit a bit different. So that's what's next.

Nichola Brown:

I'm just want to ask you that you mentioned about laser cutting oh, yeah, yeah yeah, so you're giving them the opportunity to do some cad and cam work as well it's quite limited because I've only got one computer that can do it, so they have to come into my office and pick something. But yeah, we, they really enjoy, enjoy putting a lasered image onto their work. It makes it look so much more grown up and professional and they like watching it. Um, I would like to get them better at designing, but I think every design and technology teacher across the country says I'd like to get them better at coming up with their own designs, because you give ideas and the amount of times that you get two or three of your ideas bounced back, it's, but I think it's just a. It's scary, isn't it? The blank page when it comes to designing.

Alison Hardy:

If someone puts a blank page and says design, uh, in front of you and that's why I think giving them, giving them different things to as sources or handle I know that um down at goldsmiths, they do an awful lot about handling collections, and so if they're looking at asking them to design. You know some packaging then, having different types of packaging that they can touch or unfold, or different things that are related to protection, for example yeah all sorts of things.

Alison Hardy:

The other one is um bill nich's work, designing Our Tomorrows, where he has a box of things that you know is about understanding and having empathy for different people who might have, you know, different issues around sight or hearing or you know. So there's all sorts of different places that might have stuff, and I'll also send you a link and I'll put it in the show notes as well, actually, nicola, um a link to some resources that were probably slightly before your time about, you know, alternatives to the blank page yeah generating ideas yeah, the bill nichols thing sounds good because anything that encourages empathy is really strong in our school to trust.

Nichola Brown:

Yeah, accepting that other people are different and have different needs is one of our like mantras to be honest in school yeah, yeah, yeah, I'll.

Alison Hardy:

Uh, I'll send you the link to that and I'll put a link in the show notes thank you uh, to what build us?

Alison Hardy:

yeah, just some really interesting stuff. In fact, I've got. I've got some of his original stuff which isn't available anymore here, where he has photographs of different people they're more sort of cartoons, sort of photographs, if that makes sense with then loads of questions about you know what sort of what sort of things do you think this person reads, or what they watch on television? Or do you think they have a pet? And if they do have a pet, what might that pet be called? And just so they can start to look at people and think, oh yeah, they've got, they've got these different things about them, right, okay, so now if I was going to design for them what, what would that? What would that mean? What would that look like? What would I have to think about? Yeah, I'll dig some of that out and send you some, send you some stuff, so I hope that'll be useful. But yeah, it's always, it is always a challenge. But look, you know you're the first person I've had on who's got. You know the expertise that you have, um, and I'm sure I can hear people sort of, we can listen to this and go.

Alison Hardy:

Allison, you could have asked this and you could have asked that you know, and no, no, it's not a, sorry to you, it's a. It's a. It's a me, not um, thinking about it. So if people are listening and whether they're wanting to move into working in a school um that focuses on semh, or have got individual pupils in their lessons in dnt, I think what you've talked about, nicola, is aspiration. You know is aspirational in terms of it's challenging us to think differently and the success you've had. So I think if people have got questions that they want to ask you, then let me know. Let me know and we might do a follow-up. And I think when I've looked for research about design and technology and how it's working in special schools, there isn't any. So just having this conversation with you is a start to getting people to understand the different types of educational places and how it works. So, yeah, but thank you.

Nichola Brown:

Thank you very much.

Alison Hardy:

No, it's been really nice to talk to you. Thanks ever so much, nicola. Hopefully we'll catch up again. I'm Dr Alison Hardy and you've been listening to the Talking D&T podcast. If you enjoyed the podcast, then do subscribe, on whatever platform you use, and do consider leaving a review, as it does help others find the podcast. I do the podcast because I want to support the D&T community in developing their practice, so please do share the podcast with your D&T community. If you want to respond to something I've talked about or have an idea for a future episode, then either leave me a voice memo via speakpipe or drop me an email. You can find details about me, the podcast and how to connect with me on my website, drallisonhardycom. Also, if you want to support the podcast financially, you can become a patron. Links to speakpipe, patron and my website are in the show notes. Thanks for listening.

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