Crossroads

We are located in the Rutland countryside at Crossroads Farm. The Crossroads house group comprises of boys aged 13-16 years, with four experienced staff members who work closely with parents, outside agencies, education and the therapy team within the school to ensure a consistent approach to support individual boys and their specific special needs.

The house is spacious, with different living areas where boys can relax, play with toys, watch television, play games on the Xbox or just chat with friends.

Within the grounds we have a playing field, outdoor play equipment, climbing wall and sports hall to keep the boys busy on sunny days. Playing in tents, games of person-hunt, barbecues, toasting marshmallows and water fights all feature in our evening activities during the summer months.

Crossroads is usually seen as the group for boys who require slightly less supervised time, for older boys who wish to take support in to early adulthood.  Many of the staff have worked with this older group for years, and offer a different skill set, we are a staff group who have a good sense of humour and feel this is an important social aspect to help fitting in and making new friends in the school.

Our evening activities centre around giving boys the skills to help grow as people, from interacting socially in the local areas, to going to the skate park, to helping with a healthy lifestyle; such as going to the gym. There is always a wide range of organised trips during the evening, we increasingly encourage our students to take more responsibility for organising their own leisure time.

The boys have a wide variety of interests, from playing football to supporting teams, watching movies and playing video games. Though we understand the importance of relaxing, and giving the boys the environment and the time to feel comfortable. The Loft has a good sense of community and are very good at supporting peers, it is a welcoming and vibrant space for boys to grow and learn, while feeling part of a group.

The Crossroads group have strong ideas in our approach. We believe all students should be treated as individuals and regarded with respect and treated as young adults. Our approach to social care involves a lot of talking and self reflection, it is a strong belief that boys have a voice and are given a platform to speak out about their opinions and environment. In order to do this it is important that staff portray themselves as good role models and with a strong guidance from adults to help support the boys, staff encourage continued support from parents and carers. With this ethos staff look for progress and growth from the boys and we belief we give our students to do so.

At Crossroads we are lucky to have access to a multi-sensory room where boys can relax, interact with peers and have a quiet area to focus and relax. This is proving to be an excellent facility for all of our boys irrespective of needs.

With the older boys we have a life skills programme which concentrates on independent living skills such as budgeting, laundry, cooking and domestic duties.