HOP SHED THEATRE COMPANY The Hop Shed is Kent’s very own inclusive theatre company for children, young people and adults, developed and operated by The Symbol Trust with training, support and quality assurance from the internationally renowned Chickenshed. Following a hugely successful Open Evening on the 25th April The Hop Shed is now open for
Symbol’s residential family assessment centre in Bristol had an unannounced Ofsted inspection on the 3rd and 4th December 2012. We are pleased to have been awarded an overall rating of “Good”. – Well done to all involved! The following is a quote from the report: “A strength of the service is the provision of individual
Symbol Uk is delighted to be part of the All party Parliamentary Group which has published the Good Practice Guidelines for children and young people up to 25 years. The report calls on government to: Recognise the specific developmental and educational needs of children and young people with Down syndrome as a unique group Ensure
Private companies are to be stripped of the right to provide hospital care for patients with learning disabilities after the Winterbourne View abuse scandal. Norman Lamb, the Care and Support Minister said: “One of the most shocking revelations to come out of this case is that many of the 3,500 people with learning disabilities who
A Taiwanese study set out to look at the effects of a strength and agility training programme for a group of adolescents with Down syndrome. It was found that young people who took part in standardized exercises for 20 minutes each day for 6 weeks had significant improvements in agility and muscle strength compared to
As a member of the Communication Trust, a coalition of nearly 50 voluntary organisations with expertise in speech, language and communication, Symbol welcomed the publication of the Better Communication Research Programme on 27th December 2012, the most significant investment to date in research into the needs of and services for children and young people with
There is an evidence base relating to support for parents with learning disabilities , with studies suggesting that whilst parents with learning disabilities may experience poorer psychological well-being than parents in the general population, there is evidence that improvements in psychological well-being can be made through improvements in social support. The researcher in this study
2012′s Marks and Spencer’s Christmas magazine and TV campaign featured four year old Seb white, who has Down Syndrome. Seb’s mother has said: “Some people have been a bit negative and said M&S are only using the pictures because Seb is cute. But so what? He is cute. He just also happens to have Down’s
A few years ago, the older family carers initiative, run by the Foundation for People with Learning Disabilities published a series of reports and some excellent guidelines on providing support to help inform not only practitioners, but commissioners and of course older family carers themselves of their rights and the kind of support they could
There are about 3,660 children under 1 in the care system. While some will be returned home to live with their birth parents or with relatives, a significant proportion are adopted. But it takes an average of two years and three months for an adoption to go through for children in this age group. During