The Bumblebee Children’s Charity provides a unique and holistic form of pre-school education inspired by and using some of the methods used at the Andras Peto Institute for Conductive Education in Budapest. We believe that this form of education is designed to stimulate and awaken the child’s senses and encourage self-awareness through activities and experiences that are fun for both the parents/carers and their child. Conductive education is about maximising a child’s potential by breaking down the complexities of learning, by structured and achievable targets, which are repeated time and time again until the child is able to do them independently. These challenging yet achievable activities are planned to enable children to succeed and become independent. The children are active participants in their learning and can adapt skills learnt to a range of situations. This promotes problem solving and independence. The earlier they begin, the more successful they are likely to be. In addition to Conductive Education we follow The Early Years Foundation Stage curriculum and adhere to all statutory regulations.
The strength of this type of education is that the parents/carers are the primary focus of the sessions; we have always recognised that parents are the primary motivators of a young child. Working collaboratively with parents increases the effectiveness of intervention by promoting the child’s development, but also helps to increase parents’ confidence in their own knowledge and abilities. The Bumblebee Children’s Charity aims to empower parents by developing their skills and confidence in identifying and addressing their own child’s needs and achievements. Parents also have needs, such as coming to terms with their child’s diagnosis and these have to be addressed if the family is to function well. The Bumblebee Children’s Charity offers the opportunity for parents to support each other in dealing with the everyday challenges and issues involved in having a child with disabilities. It offers a vital lifeline to others who understand what they are going through. We actively encourage these friendships and provide opportunities for the parents to meet socially with or without their children.
For further reading about Conductive Education in peer-reviewed scientific publications click here.