This week is National Inclusion Week which celebrates inclusion and encourages taking action to create inclusive workplaces.
One of the ways that employers can be more inclusive is to think about the sensory experiences of their employees. We found an interesting article on LinkedIn which talks about things like lighting adjustments, sensory break spaces and noise control.
Of course, sensory considerations are not unique to the office environment. People who experience their senses such as smell, noise, or textures in heightened or muted ways may need reasonable adjustments to be made wherever they are.
Many theatres are now good at taking sensory needs into account. For example, The Lyceum has a scene-by-scene Sensory Synopsis of The Lion King available on its website. In addition, during relaxed performances the theatre turns off noisy hand-dryers in the toilets and provides alternative ways to dry hands.
Being in a healthcare setting can lead to heightened experiences – so it’s important that healthcare staff and those designing healthcare settings take sensory needs into consideration and act on requests for reasonable adjustments.
We had the founder of The Sensory Projects www.thesensoryprojects.co.uk Joanna Grace as a special guest at one of our Champions sessions. She talked with us about the reasonable adjustments that autistic people may need to help communication in a healthcare setting.
Many thanks to Jo for kindly sharing her own personal insights of how her autism affected her experience of healthcare during pregnancy and birth.
The NHS’s Sensory Friendly Resource Pack (Free here: NHS England » Sensory-friendly resource pack) describes 3 types of sensory experiences that people with autism may experience:
hyper-sensitivity:
extreme over-reactivity to sensory input
hypo-sensitivity:
extreme under-reactivity to sensory input
sensory-seeking:
unusual interest in aspects of the sensory environment.
The Include Champions have produced a newFREE Easy Read document to share about reasonable adjustments for sensory needs.
At Include, we work hard to ensure that communication needs or disabilities are not a barrier to access or inclusion in our projects.
We proactively make reasonable adjustments – and we keep listening and checking what else we can do to ensure people have equal access.
We admit that we can always improve in this area.
Probably most services, charities and businesses can do more to enable genuine equality of access. We don’t just mean how easy a building is to access if you have a mobility issue. But the whole experience – how people interact and communicate, how we experience an environment or service from a sensory point of view etc.
Focussing on improvements that help individuals and getting it right tends to enhance things for everyone, with or without an additional need.
As well as coproducing a FREE Easy Read on Reasonable Adjustments, our lived experience consultancy team The Include Champions are reviewing some of the things we do within Include and helping to fine-tune them.
By sharing this FREE Easy Read we hope more people with communication needs and disabilities will have better experiences when they go to work, interact with services or are customers in shops and restaurants.
Email
We recently talked about our emails.
We already use accessible fonts and Easy Read format – with a picture to reinforce each point.
But our members suggested that we use shorter and simpler links, and make the writing bigger.
Website
We’re becoming even more aware of the importance of colour contrast in terms of how easy, or not, it is to read and have started to use a new resource to check this: https://colourcontrast.cc
Furthermore, we are going to be working harder to make best use of alternative (Alt) Text to describe the images we use on our website and elsewhere. Thanks to Colin Grist from Few and Far for his free talk and tips on website accessibility.
Our website provides project information in a calendar format so members can check at any time what projects are running, where and when. One of our Champions, Hannah is encouraging everyone to use it – it means you don’t have to wait for the emails!
Visuals
Consultation and co-production are central to the way we do things, so naturally Include Choir members help to write lyrics and choose which songs we learn to sing and sign.
Visual and tactile prompts help people with communication needs. So, we make a physical list of song names with visuals using Velcro. Members choose from a whole table full of song options to decide which songs we perform at certain events.
Recently Hannah, one of our members has suggested that our song polls on Facebook also have an image to represent each song option to enhance understanding.
We also have a photo board at the choir sessions – this is for people to add themselves (sign in – without needing a pen) as they arrive and so everyone can see from the photos who is there that day.
Recently we have had feedback to say that we should make the signing in board a bit more organised so that volunteers are shown in a board along with an idea of their role that day.
Objects
Hattie the hat stand is never far from our Choir Directors! There is a very good reason for that. We have Hattie because it carries all our props or objects of reference. We use physical props because some people find objects helpful to enhance understanding – because communication is more than signs or words.
Champion Beth feels the props are good as we have some visually impaired members – props can enhance their experience too. Member Philip loves the hat stand and Josh reminds us to include Hattie in some of our photos!
Location
Many of the adjustments we make are not to do with literal access ramps (often the first thing that comes to mind when people consider disability access). That said, when we run projects like our Stroll and Sign wellbeing walks, or perform as a choir in new locations we always risk assess beforehand.
An important element of that is assessing accessibility and working out what adjustments we may need to make. For example, regarding lighting in a car park, suitability for wheelchair users or access to a stage. And if we need to, we do feedback to venues about any issues to try to improve things.
If you would like some guidance on inclusive communication, or access to a lived experience focus group to look at this topic for your organisation please get in touch: info@include.org
Penny Sims
Communications, Fundraising and Partnerships Lead
The My Vote, My Voice group have accessible information about voting on their website too.
Our Champions have been sharing their experiences:
Hannah’s experience
During Covid times, Hannah, one of our Champions voted by post. But gradually she has decided to go to a Polling Station.
She knows she can ask for help from the people working there but Hannah has become more confident over time about being independent when voting in person.
First, she talks about it with her family and thinks really carefully about who she wants to vote for. She now votes independently.
Planning Ahead
The Include Champions pointed out that if you live in supported accommodation, or a block of flats you might not get someone knocking on your door or putting a flyer through your door about their party. So, it’s not always easy to get information to be able to make a choice about who you want to vote for.
Despite that, our Champions did know about The Conservative Party, SDP (Social Democratic Party), Liberal Democrats, Labour Party, Green Party, Heritage Party and The New Forest Party. There are lots of options and you can talk to your friends and family and get ideas to help you make a choice about who to vote for.
Ellie voted by post – you need to register to do this before the election. Ellie’s Mum helped her do this online.
Voting in person
Some people prefer to vote in person. David said that it is too far to walk to the polling station, so he needs to ask for help / transport to get there.
Remember your Photo ID to vote in person.
If you are voting on your own and don’t know what to do, you can always go into the polling station and say “I am here to vote, please can you tell me which desk to go to.”
The helpers can’t actually tell you which party to vote for – that has to be your choice.
Apparently, all the polling station staff have been trained to look out for sunflower lanyards – so they know that people may want to be offered extra help. So, you can wear one if you have one.
Claudia, our new Speech and Language Therapy Assistant, who we introduced you to in December’s blog, has been getting to know The Include Champions Group a bit better.
We’re really proud of the Champions Group because they do some really important things, and we’d like everyone to have a chance to get to know the group better – not just Claudia!
So, our latest FREE Easy Read resource is made by the Include Champions about the Include Champions! It explains what the group does, why and how – all presented in an Easy Read format.
In summary, The Include Champions Group is a lived experience consultancy team, generating ideas, feedback and free accessible resources on important topics including the Mental Capacity Act and Inclusive Communication.
Members have real world experience of learning disabilities, autism and other communication needs.
Dedicated group members meet every week via Zoom, and there is always something important to discuss, analyse and provide feedback on.
Time to Talk Day (2nd Feb), which encourages people to have conversations about mental health, seemed like a good day to re-share two of the Easy Read resources produced by our group:
As our CEO Alix says in her guest blog for Browning York; “Today is ‘Time to Talk’ day – a day designed to promote conversation and communication to benefit everyone’s mental health. Let’s also think about the communication which uses more than words to include people – the biggest kindness of all.”
Penny Sims
Communications, Fundraising and Partnerships Lead
You may well do our quiz and find out lots of things about Halloween traditions and how it all started…but our Champions Group decided that these days Halloween is actually an opportunity to demonstrate some more up-to-date values!
We have to respect that some people don’t celebrate Halloween – even if they did as a child.
It can be difficult to enjoy the idea of people you don’t know knocking on your door and asking for things!
Philip one of our members, remembers an event from his childhood when his Dad chose ‘trick’ but what happened next, (with foam coming in through the letterbox) was actually quite intimidating and Philip can appreciate that for some people Halloween may make them feel nervous. Others in the group recalled tricks involving eggs being thrown at windows.
When you live in shared accommodation, as Ellie and Hannah do, they know that they need to respect the fact that other residents may not what any involvement in Halloween.
So being kind and remembering that is important.
However, at least half of our champions do have plans to dress up and do fun things for Halloween. Anna is dressing up as a vampire with the teeth and everything for a party she is going to with a group…and she hopes to have some red wine to drink, if not any blood!
Philip has already dressed up as The Joker, and Simon as scarecrow, for a Halloween disco.
Hannah has plans to dress up for a spooky themed Zoom.
There is also the opportunity to do our quiz instead of Trick or Treating!
We talked about other things that can help to make Halloween more respectful and inclusive.
It was agreed that the idea of only knocking on doors where people have left out a pumpkin and decorations is a good way to leave people alone who do not like to celebrate Halloween.
Equally it is possible to be considerate as a home-owner too. Neighbourhoods can make a plan to ensure everyone can still get involved in halloween safely.
For example, if you notice someone with a blue pumpkin / collecting bucket at your door it is good to know that this is a sign that the person has autism and may find it hard to speak or interact in the conventional way. We also heard of an example where the parents of a young boy (who has severe food allergies) give treats to local houses to give back to their boy when he goes trick or treating in his own road, so he feels included and is still safe.
These are good examples of empowering people with additional needs and their communities to take part in Halloween in ways that work for everyone.
I first found out about The Include Choir by word of mouth, from my friend Hannah. She recommended it to me because she knows I enjoy fun things and singing takes your mind off your worries.
When I came along, I found that everyone is very friendly, this group does not separate out one type of person from another.
If people have autism or mental health needs etc they are accepted. Everyone is accepted for who they are.
I decided to Run Reigate to represent Include.org and help raise money for the charity and its work. It is the first time I have done a race to raise money.
My journey to doing this half marathon was a long one! It has taken me a few years to get here.
There is no magic wand – I had to put the graft in!
I was very good at running when I was in college, but I stopped doing it and wasn’t even able to do a 5K at first. What got me back into running was seeing my friends Tina and Andrew, who I met at the Prospero Theatre group, doing so much running. Tina did the London Marathon and Andrew is training to do an Ultra marathon which is 50miles and also a 100mile race – they have inspired me and helped to coach me.
Once I could do a 5K comfortably, I gradually built up from there to a 6K and 7K and so on. Over the last 2 or 3 years I have got better and better at it. It goes to show that if your body is healthy enough you can do it.
I will never be like Mo Farah winning gold – but I still love it and for me it’s more about the journey than getting a gold medal.
Run Reigate was actually my 3rd half marathon! I did Denbies and Woldingham, and for those I had never run that far before (and not with so many hills), but once I got to 12 miles I just pushed myself that extra bit to get to the end.
I feel I haven’t achieved a lot since my college days – but I was ready to take on my next challenge and fundraising for a great cause like Include.org has made me feel like I have achieved a lot. It is a super feeling to help the choir – not just running for myself.
The day of Run Reigate didn’t go completely smoothly for me! I was going to get a lift there but the person who offered forgot and so I was then running late and had to drive myself there. I was still in Redhill at 9am and my race started at 9.15am in Reigate! When I finally arrived, I had to jump over the railings to get to the start line on time! I had my backpack on too – but it had my water in it and I knew I would be glad to have that.
There was a good vibe at Run Reigate. I enjoyed seeing everyone – some people also running spoke to me. They reassured me when I had to stop for a comfort break that I wasn’t the only one to need to do that!
It’s not just the running but the people, the stalls, the music – that’s the reward after the run!
The weather was also good and I enjoyed exploring parts of the countryside of Reigate and Horley that I wouldn’t normally see.
And finally, it was great to see the finish line ahead!
The world feels alien to lots of people right now.
Covid 19 affects everyone in some way, no matter who you are, where you live, what you normally do, your beliefs, your status in society – Covid 19 doesn’t care about any of that.
And so, in some ways this pandemic brings parity. Living with unprecedented restrictions right across society puts us all in the same boat.
Okay, there are still differences. Some people are out on the deck toiling away as the storm hits us, some are upfront navigating a path through the chaos, some confined to the sickbay, some making sure passengers are still fed and entertained, some hiding away in their cabin. But basically, we are in this together. We are all being thrown about by unfamiliar and unpredictable forces. No one is in their comfort zone.
People with Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND) are pretty much always weathering a storm. And other marginalised groups too – the elderly for example – always trying to make sense of a world that communicates so differently to what they knew. The usual world order does not necessarily offer them a welcoming place in which to live and interact.
For these people can the pandemic bring some parity and increased understanding? And if so, what long-lasting changes can society make to sustain the positive aspects of this moment of clarity?
I have one neurotypical (standard) son and one who has a blend of SEND. Guess who is struggling the most during the lockdown? It’s the neurotypical one.
What I’ve noticed is other people now facing some of the struggles my son with SEND regularly faces. He is never really in his comfort zone, so the surreal Covid 19 world doesn’t feel too distant from his usual world.
For example, he can find conventional verbal and/or physical greetings or goodbyes quite difficult. He can feel especially awkward and unsure of what to do if he sees people he knows out of the usual context. But now nearly all of us feel this. Almost everything and everyone is out of its usual context. Many people are only truly comfortable at home. And most feel awkward about how we greet each other if we do see someone, even people we know well.
Then we look at strangers on the street when we go out for our daily exercise and we can’t tell by looking at their faces if they are a threat to us. Covid 19 doesn’t show itself in facial expression. And so, without that knowledge, we may feel anxious. We may not find the time to smile at people because our mind may be in a heightened state of alert. Are we 2 meters away, should we cross the road, should we walk faster? These kinds of thoughts can be overwhelming.
Busy thoughts are quite common amongst people with autism and anxiety. They may not know how to interpret facial expressions, they might feel threatened, and may not smile reciprocally – it doesn’t mean they are not thinking about you or wanting to connect with you. But they are sometimes overwhelmed by other sensations and distractions. Covid 19 has given us all an insight into this. People are turning to more virtual interactions during lockdown – the online world can seem more manageable than the real one. This is something many people with SEND can relate to.
An ex-colleague of mine recently wrote this on LinkedIn:
And this too reminds me of how the autistic mind can work. There can be a tendency to take things literally – asking questions to which they want a truthful answer, and giving honest and detailed answers themselves. So that ubiquitous and sometimes empty “how are you?” statement we so often make, and barely listen for the reply…well, that doesn’t really work for the autistic person! They might think you actually want to hear how they are! And who can blame them – surely they have got it right? They are genuine.
Here again, Covid 19 brings some parity. These days when we say “How are you”, guess what – we might actually mean it, and we probably even want to hear a truthful answer! And when I sign off this blog with ‘take care’ – I really mean that too.
Here’s a thought…once this storm subsides, we could continue to look out for our shipmates and hang onto the increased understanding, sincerity and parity we are experiencing now
‘Music is the most inclusive form of communication there is. The Include Choir sums up with a song‘
Take care.
Penny Sims
Communications, Fundraising and Partnerships Lead
