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Rhino Sensory

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Regions: Yorkshire & Humber, England

Miriam Lord Primary School

Project Background

Miriam Lord is a mainstream primary school in Bradford, West Yorkshire. The school has a diverse intake of students, which the senior leadership team are keen to support in every way they can.

Over the past few years, Miriam Lord has seen an increase in the number of students with additional needs joining their school community. Frustratingly, they felt like they couldn’t sufficiently meet their learning needs.

This prompted the school to contact our sensory team, with the idea of building an all-inclusive multisensory space where students with additional needs could go to de-escalate and regulate their emotions and senses.

So, our sensory team quickly got to work.

 

A Sensory Transformation

Using a variety of interactive sensory resources, we transformed an old storage space into a brand-new, inclusive sensory room. As soon as you step into the space your senses are immersed in calming light, sound and textures – perfect for de-escalating and relaxing.

Girl leans back against the ball pool, stood next to a sensory rocker chair. Students touch and explore the bubble tube

Calming Seating

Students can find comfort and self-regulate using the different seating options in the space. The rocker chair offers situating, proprioceptive, and vestibular sensory inputs, effective at calming sensory systems. Whilst a cushioned podium offers a front-row seat to the Bubble Tube’s beautifully bubbly show.

 

A teacher and two students sit and interactive with the Rhino WonderfloorA girl holds and separates the fibre optic tails, exploring their twinkle glow effect

Immersive Play

By diving deep into the calming colours of the illuminated ball pool, students can explore the tactile textures of the plastic balls that surround and situate them. Fibre optic tails fall into the pool from an overhead bracket, showering the area in twinkling lights, creating a unique sensory waterfall effect.

A Rhino Wonderfloor projector also creates a space for interactive games and learning, both for individuals and groups of students.

 

A teacher and a pupil interact with the sound and light panelA girl examines the endless light effects inside the infinity tunnel

Interactive Panels

Did you know sensory rooms also make for highly effective learning environments? That’s why we included some of our most engaging interactive panels on the walls of this sensory room. The infinity tunnel captivates imaginations and enhances visual skills, while the sound & light panel encourages users to use their voice to explore light, sound and cause and effect.

And what’s a sensory room without a classic bubble column to bring the space together?

 

A Sensory Success Story

Although Miriam Lord had only recently opened their new sensory space, they’ve already seen its transformative effects on their school community.

“There’s a young student at our school with a very, very high level of need. She came into school one morning severely dysregulated. We brought her into the sensory room, and within 10 seconds, without exaggeration, she calmed instantly.

I turned to my colleague and just said, that was worth the money alone, wasn’t it? That moment gives you an idea of what a sensory room can offer in the right situation” – Bryan Harrison, Executive Headteacher, Miriam Lord Primary School.

Miriam Lord Community Primary School is a mainstream primary school for children aged 3-11 years old in Bradford.

 

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Discovery Academy

Project Background

Discovery Academy is a brand-new learning provision for autistic students aged between 7 and 16 in Sheffield.

The school’s mission is to develop its students into dreamers, believers, and achievers – and part of that strategy was to create inclusive learning environments where students can do just that.

To help turn their dream into a reality, Discovery Academy got in touch with our Sensory Team, asking if we’d be available to collaborate on their big project. And, of course, we said yes!

Over the next year, we worked closely with the school to advise, design, and install four new sensory spaces tailored for their autistic school community, ready for their big September 2022 opening.

Sensory Room Design Brief

  • Inclusive learning spaces that support all students across the autism spectrum
  • Inspire a school of dreamers, believers, and achievers
  • Build areas where students learn soft skills of kindness, care and self-belief

 

Discovery Academy Sensory Integration Room

Sensory Integration Room

Designed to connect minds to bodies, the Sensory Integration Room is a physical space where students can learn more about their minds and bodies in a safe, supportive and inclusive environment.

Calming blue walls cushioned with soft safety padding create a thought-out environment for therapeutic sensory sessions. A large free-standing beam frames the room offering students a place to swing, rock, sway and therapeutically develop their vestibular, balance, motor and proprioceptive senses.

Other sensory integration items in the room include a body roller (for deep-pressure activities) and a SenSit chair (for calming anxiety and meltdowns).

Room Includes: Custom Free Standing Beam Frame, SenSit Chair and Stool, Body Roller, Floor and Wall Padding.

 

Discovery Academy Soft Play Room

Soft Play Room

Bright, colourful and ready for active adventures and social play. Discovery Academy’s Soft Play Room is an ideal space for students to break out of formal classrooms and release pent-up energy.

Students can develop their balance skills by rocking back and forth on top of the colourful Rocker Roller, stimulate their proprioceptive senses swimming through a sea of ball pool balls, or have a contemplative moment whilst they explore their visual senses in the bubble mirror.

Room Includes: Bespoke Ball Pool and Soft Play Area, Rocker Roller, Convex Bubble Mirror, Vibrating Bumpers, and Soft Play Shape Matching Set.

 

Discovery Academy Sensory Dark Room

Sensory Dark Room

Built around the school’s ethos of believers, dreamers and achievers, Discovery’s Dark Room glows with sensory magic.

UV lights surround the room, illuminating all its elements in a warm sensory glow. From the patterned UV carpet, interactive bubble tube, and twinkling fibre optic lights, it’s a great place for students to escape the classroom, find calm and focus on their senses.

Room Includes: Interactive Bubble Tube, Fibre Optics, Solar Projector, Sound & Light Panel, Infinity Tunnel, Tactile Panels, Chair Beanbag, UV Carpet, Line Lite Mirror, Illuminated Round Corner Pool, Safety Padding.

 

Discovery Academy De-Escalation Room

De-Escalation Room

De-Escalation Rooms are practical and functional. They’re designed as a safe space for students to release any built-up emotions, energy and anxiety in a controlled manner.

Discovery’s calming room features royal blue floor and wall padding, framing a large window that allows lots of natural light into the space, connecting students’ senses to nature.

Room Includes: Safety Floor and Wall Padding

Cascade Academy Trust Schools

Following a successful application process, Cascade Academy Trust Schools were awarded funds from Sheffield County Council to create specialist SEND wings within three of their mainstream primary schools – Beck, Whiteways and Hucklow. Allowing them to provide a more inclusive learning environment for their students with special educational needs.

It was a collaborative process from the very start.

Our sensory team joined forces with the Academy to draw up designs that would illustrate how the SEND spaces would operate, ready for submission to the council for approval.

The spaces needed to work for every student. With areas that could be used for relaxation, sensory stimulation, and alternative spaces to learn.

The approval process was swift, and soon enough, our installation team were packing up their tools, ready to develop the new areas across the summer holiday, ready for a spectacular September opening.

More Rehab

More Rehab is a specialist rehabilitation centre based in Sheffield providing physiotherapy, neurological rehab, and paediatric therapy for clients across the Yorkshire and Humber area.

Anna Wilkinson (More Rehab’s Managing Director) got in touch with our sensory team as she was looking to create a brand new Sensory Integration Room. Her team could use the space to provide important Sensory Integration and Occupational Therapies to nurture clients’ physical and mental development.

As always, our team of sensory experts were thrilled to start working with Anna to create a sensory area perfect for her clients and her business.

Designing More Rehab’s Sensory Integration Space

We worked closely with More Rehab’s team of Occupational Therapists to make sure the room design matched the needs of their wide array of clients.

Sensory Integration Rooms are used by lots of people with different needs and abilities, so coming up with an inclusive design that will support everyone was an important job.

Our design reflected the need for flexibility. One corner features a large O-Frame & Platform Swing for vestibular development and therapy, whilst another corner is transformed into a therapeutic sensory space. The centre of the room has been designed to be used transitionally to suit each individual therapy session.

Blossom View Care

Blossom View Care is a popular respite home in Sheffield for adults with physical, mental, and sensory disabilities. Offering visitors a space to relax, recuperate and feel more like themselves. After acquiring a large office space, our design and installation team were contacted by Blossom View to help them transform the space into a specialist sensory day centre.

Senseabilities Day Centre needed to be flexible, exciting, suitable for collaborative use, and effectively support users’ physical and mental wellbeing.

Oakwood SILC

Oakwood SILC is a part of the East Specialist Inclusive Learning Centre in Leeds that support children between the ages of 3 and 19 with complex learning difficulties. The school contacted us as they wished to refurbish and create a selection of inclusive sensory spaces to support and enrich the school’s students and their learning journeys.

Waves Daycare Centre

Rhino UK provided a unique design to create sensory bays for multiple group use and make best use of the mill.