Thrive in the Hive 
What is Thrive?
Thrive is a therapeutic approach to help support children with their emotional and social development and build resilience.
The Thrive approach offers practical strategies and techniques and is built around online assessments which identify children’s emotional development and provides action plans for their individual needs.
Research has shown that how we behave is linked to how we feel and our emotions are linked to how we learn. By teaching children to recognise and notice these feelings and emotions it can help with their development and learning.
Children sometimes need some extra support with their emotional growth and this can be temporary or over a longer period of time.
Thrive promotes their emotional and social growth by building positive relationships between a child and their peers and helps them explore and understand their feelings through various activities.
Thrive at Walwayne
At Walwayne Court we are committed to supporting the social and emotional development of all children and their families. We are very passionate about mental health and wellbeing and proud to be the first school in Wiltshire receiving the Thrive Approach’s Ambassador school award in Environment and Reparative.
The school is fully embracing the Thrive Approach and this has enabled us to create a positive environment and relationships with all children to help them on their learning journey in school with enthusiasm and creativity.
We are very lucky to have a trained Thrive practitioner, Sonya Burrows, available in our school.
As a school we have two thrive rooms that all children at Walwayne Court school can access.
We also provide sessions on an individual basis, part of a small group or within the class. During each session there will be an activity which may include:
- Story telling
- Circle games
- Arts and crafts
- Sand play
- Mindfulness
- Movement and relaxation
- Hand and foot massage
- Cooking and preparing food
- Role play and puppet work
- Games
Why might my child attend a Thrive session?
Many children experience difficulties during their time at school. These may include:
- Issues with friendships.
- Getting into trouble at playtime.
- Finding it hard to settle in the classroom.
- Finding it difficult to manage their strong feelings.
- Not knowing who to turn to when feelings are too big to manage on their own.
These situations can lead to many different feelings which may seem overwhelming at times. They might include: anger, frustration, sadness, loneliness, confusion or anxiety.
All these feelings are very normal and happen to a lot of children. The Thrive sessions are to help children learn to manage their feelings and teach them strategies that will help promote their learning at school.
If you have any further questions about the approach, please speak to the Thrive team. thrive@walwaynecourt.wilts.sch.uk