The Gurgly Magic of Bubble Tubes - What’s your favourite bubble tube story?

A (very) long time ago I was privileged to be given the task of setting up a specialist nursery class for children with profound and complex learning difficulties. I look back with amazement at that time as at the start I had little idea of what I was doing. I quickly learnt!

I was lucky enough to obtain a grant from the RNIB to set up a Sensory Room, and my favourite piece of equipment in that resource was an Interactive Bubble Tube. It was the multi-sensory nature of the bubble tube that appealed to me, and that engaged many of the children – light, colour, vibration, moving bubbles and a bubbly noise, and easily controlled by the children using switches.

A memorable activity from those days was a sensory drama. The sensory room became a woodland environment for ‘A Walk in The Woods’. The bubble tube was a gurgling stream, complete with a tray of water

Our web site is changing by the hour. We are working on adding more than 300 products at least 150 unique to Spacekraft . There are lots of products to use in your Sensory Room from the bigger bubble tubes to hand held sensory products that are great to use in the classroom or in any sensory room for all ages from children to adults. We will be also lots of new blogs so watch out for interesting snippets about the history of Sensory Rooms and how they have developed down the years.

The update of the site has been a big challenge for us moving to a new super fast platform that supports video clips across mobile devices better.

We genuinely want the site to have good information and be easy to navigate so bear with us a little longer.

I’M IN CHARGE!

Isn’t it a pleasure to remember those magic moments when a child or young person you have been working with begins to understand cause and effect, begins to understand that if they do something then something else will happen? I remember one little boy, Robert, laughing every time he knocked over  a pile of bricks built up on the tray of his supportive seating (it was a challenge for him as he had cerebral palsy that severely restricted his controlled movements, especially when excited), then showing gleeful anticipation through his facial expression and his vocal utterances as his very patient supporting adult rebuilt the tower again and again …

This is a hugely important step in learning and in developing cognitive development – ‘if I do something then something else will happen’. Translated into learning situations this can be as seemingly simple as realising that ‘if I move on this space blanket it will make a lovely crinkly sound’ or ‘if

FIDDLE AND CHEW!

 It seems to me to be a miracle that most of us can cope with the sensory complexities of everyday life and the complex myriad of information that comes to us through our senses. Not only the 5 senses of touch, sight, smell, sound and taste but also our proprioceptive (body awareness) sense that tells our brain where our body and limbs are positioned in space and our vestibular (movement) sense that gives the brain information about our body’s movement.

Think of the last time you were in a crowded, busy space and consider how much sensory information you had to deal with in that situation. It might be your journey to work, or at a sports event, or even at the supermarket.

Not everyone has a sensory system that can cope with the sensory saturation that is part and parcel of everyday life.

Do you have a child in your family or in your class who may fit some or all of the following traits?

• Finds

Abbey Hill School & Performing Arts College has always endeavoured to be a forward thinking school, a place where every child really does matter. Abbey Hill prides itself on providing quality education, support and care for all its pupils. The staff always try to go "the extra mile".

Abbey Hill is held in high esteem by parents and the local community and it is their aim to be even better!   Independent accolade from OFSTED inspections, confirm this; "From low starting points most students make rapid progress in all subjects" (Ofsted 2014), "The sixth form is outstanding" (Ofsted 2014).

"We have approximately 230 pupils on roll, with over 40% having Autistic Spectrum Conditions.  In our new build, we were keen to develop a range of sensory rooms to meet the wide age range within our school, 3-19 years."

Our aim

Activate - Discover, Create, Inspire!

Activate is a truly inspiring facility and the result of over 12 years of unwavering and dedicated effort by the Chief Executive Officer, Vivienne Guy, to provide effective alternative education programmes.

Activate is based at the Bracknell Centre, Kirby, Liverpool and is a fully accessible integrated community and education facility for young adults with learning difficulties and the local community. It is deemed to be the first of its kind in the country as it incorporates social enterprises, education and community services to ensure sustainability. The site itself boasts a range of facilities such as a small animal care centre, on site café, horticulture base, SpaceKraft Sensory Pod and community room.

Activate's aim is to provide a facility that promotes inclusion and integration between

Late in 2006, SpaceKraft completed work on a major four-year project to design and install an extensive array of multi-sensory equipment across 20 separate areas of the new purpose-built Bridge Special School in Telford, Shropshire. The implementation of SpaceKraft's multi-sensory environments as a major part of the school's ongoing inclusion programme has proven so successful that in November 2007, the school won the 2007 BECTA Award for Excellence in ICT Practice in the Inclusion (Primary) Category.

Originally based at sites in Brookside and Stirchley, The Bridge School was relocated in January 2007 to the Hadley Learning Community (HLC) Telford. This is a £70 million PFI (Private Finance Initiative) project which has created a 21st century learning campus incorporating three schools within a single, modern building on a 39-acre site. The campus consists of a primary school, a secondary school and The Bridge Special School, a centre for children with severe and profound learning

Award winning Multi-Sensory Rooms in Cardiff.

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The 232-pupil school which specialises in Autistic development but cares for children with a wide range of conditions, collaborated with SpaceKraft on the development of two Softplay Rooms and two Multi-Sensory Rooms.

"We knew from experience at the original site the kind of products we really liked," explains Deputy Headteacher, Lesley Love. "We had a very good understanding of what we wanted before we came here."

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A recent move to new purpose-built premises was the perfect opportunity to upgrade the existing facilities for the staff at the Pioneer School in Basildon, Essex. The new Pioneer School is a Model Special School catering for 90 children in the age range of 3 to 13 years and 80 pupils in the age range of 14 to 25 years with SLD, PMLD and ASD. SpaceKraft designed and installed a dual-purpose sensory room with an unusual sunken waterbed in the floor and also equipped the school's new swimming pool with Sensory Show Magic interactive sound and lighting.

Sensory teacher Helen Carpenter explains how plans for the sensory room developed. "At our old premises we had a room that had some SpaceKraft lighting in it but we didn't actually have a full White Room. For the new building we decided to install what is technically three sensory rooms: a tactile room, a teaching sensory room and a relaxation sensory room. What we decided to do was bring all our old equipment from the other site and