Cliddesden Primary School

Learning Together, Growing Together

Cliddesden Primary School, Cliddesden, Basingstoke, Hampshire, RG25 2QU

01256 321571 - Fax: 01256 3336

adminoffice@cliddesden.hants.sch.uk

World Down Syndrome Day - Lots of Socks

To celebrate World Down Syndrome Day all the children came to school in their fabulous odd socks.  We're celebrating this cause because we have two children in the school and it is really important for us to be as inclusive as possible and help raise awareness.

 

Down Syndrome is something you are born with.  Everyone has 20 chromosomes when they are born but babies with Down Syndrome have an extra one on the 3rd chromosome, hence why every year it's celebrated on the 21st day of the 3rd month.  Down Syndrome is not the person it's just a small part of a person.  Our children play sports, they read, write, sing and do everything all our other children do just sometimes in a slightly different way.  A big challenge for our children is speech as it can take a while to find the words or say the word clearly.  To help this they use Makaton, alongside speech to help communicate.

I held an assembly about World Down Syndrome Day and to make it fun I taught the children a few Makaton signs.  By the end of assembly they were all signing to the Greatest Showman's song, a Million Dreams - absolutely brilliant!  To watch them all sign and sing was fabulous and they enjoyed doing it too.

 

It's so important to teach everyone that different is OK and everyone is essentially the same.

 

Please help us to help your children to understand that inclusion means so much and if we start with our youngest maybe we can make the difference.

 

The children and staff raised £111.66 for
down Syndrome Awareness. The money will go to the related charity Stepping Stones.
 

Tracy Nye