Zoe Thompson is the Head of Development at Bright Futures School. At Bright Futures School, alongside the academic curriculum, we run a curriculum that helps to foster social and emotional development in children with autism.
Recognising that autism is a developmental disorder, we use an approach that seeks to fill the developmental gaps that kids have missed out on. We work on a range of competencies including social referencing, joint attention, co-regulation and self-regulation.
Zoe’s son, autistic Philip Milburn, has also written for SNJ. Find his posts here
Zoe's posts on SNJ
- Does spending time with peers help autistic people to improve their social ‘skills’?I’m sharing this post with my 19-year-old autistic son, Philip, who is looking for the experiences of other autistics who've…Continue reading »
- Matching needs with provision to make a dog’s doodah EHCP (Part 2)This is the follow up post about the dog's breakfast EHCPs produced by Oldham. In part one, I outlined what's…Continue reading »
- Taking a stand against the dog’s breakfast EHCPs of Oldham (part 1)I’ve seen a fair few EHC Plans now – those of the pupils at Bright Futures School (BFS), those of children…Continue reading »
- Helping autistic children experience the joy of connectionRecently Lucy has started to experience-share more with us at Bright Futures School. She has come a long, long way…Continue reading »
- Co-regulation in Autism: synchronising emotions, intentions and thoughtsIn a previous post in my series on co-regulation in autism, we looked here at what it is and how…Continue reading »
- What autistic schoolgirl Lucy, did next: An explosion in developmentIn my last blogpost, I shared my intention to show footage of other pupils from Bright Futures School. In light…Continue reading »
- Teaching children with autism: The Guided Participation RelationshipWhen development is typical, infants at around six-seven months begin to show signs of an insatiable drive to grow…to stretch, learn and…Continue reading »
- Guiding children with autism to learn co-regulationIn my first SNJ post I gave a brief overview of Bright Futures School and how we use ‘guiding’ (derived…Continue reading »
- Why there’s a bright future using ‘Guiding’ for children with autismTania: Today we start a new series of articles from Zoe Thompson, who has been a regular contributor to our…Continue reading »