This week, the Prep Divisions’ pupils and the Nursery children were visited by Eloise Pennycott. Eloise is an actor, playwright and fight director who is profoundly deaf and uses speech and sign language to communicate. She became deaf at age 11 and, by age 13, was profoundly deaf. After initially wearing hearing aids, Eloise underwent an operation so that she could use a cochlear implant to hear instead. Eloise became involved in the National Deaf Children’s Society. She taught herself to sign fluently using British Sign Language (BSL). At the age of 17, Eloise had won the National Theatre’s New View Competition with her play ‘Barrier(s)’ which was about Deaf culture and was staged and performed in one of the venues at the National Theatre. Eloise is currently playing Daisy in the CBBC show ‘Phoenix Rise’.  Her assembly was inspiring and motivating and was followed by a day filled with activities to engage discussions about deafness and, more broadly, inclusivity. Her talk raised a number of questions, and the pupils learned a great deal. They were surprised to hear that there are 1.2 million deaf people in the UK. One of our pupils, Alex H (Year 5) asked to speak with Eloise after her assembly and told her that he thought what she had achieved was “incredible” and that she was an inspiration.

Eloise led an assembly for the pupils in Pre-Prep and children in the Pre-School class in which she told them a little about her story and her use of hearing aids.  She brought teddies and dolls along who also wore hearing aids.  The children listened with such interest and beautifully showed our values of Care and Respect.  Mrs Griffiths read the pupils a story called ‘Can Bears Ski?’ by the Ted Hughes award-winning poet Raymond Antrobus.  The story follows a father and son’s journey through the discovery and management of deafness.  As Mrs Griffiths read the story, Eloise signed it and the children joined in.

The Prep Division pupils took part in a variety of activities and workshops throughout the day to learn more about the Deaf community. Pupils learned about the importance and symbolism of the Deaf (or Sign Union) flag, and took part in an art workshop before learning how to sign the song ‘This is Me’, from the hit film The Greatest Showman, in British Sign Language, which they had the chance to perform to the Pre-Prep pupils and Pre-School class children in the afternoon.

Similarly, the Pre-Prep pupils and Pre-School class children taught how to sign the song ‘I Can Sing a Rainbow’, and also performed this to the Prep Division pupils.  It was such a moving performance, and the children gave each other a huge BSL round of applause at the end.