There are a variety of resources supporting additional support needs, available online through the UK Scouts webpages or individual charity or societies pages.
The Scouts Scotland website pages on Inclusion link to the UK Scout Association website page of Scouting for All. Although this information is older, the content continues to be relevant and the link to the Scouting and Autism webinar April 2019 works.
On the Scouts UK website, under Information for Volunteers, there is a section on Inclusion and Diversity which provides information on Additional Support Needs. There is more of a variety of information on these pages, however, this is being constantly updated.
There is a section for Learning and Training, however this is not available at the moment. There was an Autism e-learning module on this page but it is currently being updated. It was produced by The National Autistic Society and is about people with Autism and although not developed specifically for scouting, the learning can be applied to scouting. I would suggest that this would be an interesting training session for leaders and hopefully it will become available again soon.
There is a section available on “making reasonable adjustments” to your scout programmes and completing badgework. This is worth reading as information is provided on reducing barriers and flexibility in the Scout Programme. There is also guidance on working in partnership with Parents/Carers.
On the National Autistic Society webpage, there is information on What is Autism and what this means for people. There are also webpages for The National Autistic Society, Scotland. On the Education Scotland website under Parentzone, there is further information and links to resources.
I have given various links to Autism and hopefully this will provide information that is useful for you in bringing Scouting to all. Of course, there are a variety of Additional Support Needs, however, I have been asked frequently for information on Autism. Each individual responds and reacts in a different way and it is important to remember this.
There are also websites that provide information on Diabetes, Epilepsy, Vision Impairment, Hearing Impairment, Asthma, ADHD to name but a few.
I am happy to chat with leaders try to provide further advice and information, please email me at r.allison102@outlook.com
