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About
Us
Sensiscapes (or sensory-sensitive scapes) are spaces that are adaptive and carefully curated to be supportive to Autistic people and others who live with sensory-processing challenges.
Sensiscapes are never designed to be a 'one-size-fits-all' approach and at the heart of the concept lies not just with the physical environment, but the more crucially, the person or people holding the space.
Sensiscapes maximise the potential of people who struggle to process stimuli in everyday spaces including the classroom.
Paula has worked as a Specialist Teacher in the education sector for over 20 years, amounting a wealth of training and experience in the UK, Auckland and Hawke's Bay. She has developed holistic programmes for teachers, support workers, and those in the health, social care and recreational services, helping professionals to curate skills and qualities that underpin effective support for Autistic tamariki and adults, those with complex learning needs and the wider Neurodivergent community.
Paula has a Bachelor’s Degree in Psychology, a Post-Grad in Early Years and Primary Education, and with 1000 hours of Yoga Teacher Training, she has expanded her mahi beyond the classroom, with a focus on addressing setting-specific challenges and creating inclusive spaces to celebrate neurodiversity and elevate wellbeing.
Services
Our services include advisory and in-house training for groups of professionals in schools, extending to community organisations and the workplace.
Support is tailored to meet the needs and resource-capacity of each organisation.
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Create a Sensiscape
This package comprises three elements: initial consultation, an in-house renovation workshop and follow-up support.
ELEVATE:Workshops
Each of our ELEVATE:Workshops focuses on one aspect of creating a Sensiscape: Relationships, Wellbeing and Engagement. These are designed to be accessed as a package, each with practical elements tailored to your target students.
PLD
From TODs to ongoing PLD, we offer schools and organisations advisory, information-based workshops catered specifically to the needs of identified students.
Our Commitment
We stand as allies for the Neurodivergent community in education.
Our focus, PEOPLE + PLACE, centres on adaptivity: our ability to respond to needs and how we transform the environment to be conducive to learning.
Sensiscapes specialises in taking a holistic approach to elevating wellbeing.
We believe that every child has the right to access quality education in Aotearoa and that our schools should prioritise connection, relationships and a sense of belonging as the cornerstone of teaching.
We understand that wellbeing is the route to engagement in the classroom and is the primary tool to promote readiness to learn for our complex learners. Our role is to support schools to realise the power of mindset shifts that reframe Autism and Neurodiversity, creating equitable outcomes for all tamariki.
Te Tiriti o Waitangi
At Sensiscapes, we respect the cultural identity of our tamariki through valuing and perpetuating local knowledge, observing tikanga, understanding te ao Māori and upholding te reo Māori.
We commit to building community and collaborating with other agencies to maintain high expectations for the wellbeing of our ākonga.
We engage in relationships with whānau to ensure the design, delivery and monitoring of our mahi is relevant, culturally-aware and elevates wellbeing.
We acknowledge Ngāti Kahungunu as the guardians of the whenua on which we have the privilege to learn, work, and grow. We are persistent in our commitment to advocate for equity in education for tangata whenua.
Julie, Hastings
Paula presents as a calm and serene presence when facilitating her sessions with Jaime. She is very flexible in her thinking and approach and she has a great deal of knowledge about autism and neurodiversity from her many years of teaching.
Her sense of humour, creativity and beautiful empathy allows Jaime to feel safe, calm and relaxed, as well as challenging her to do more.
Charlie
Paula is open and accepting so that I can be comfortable to express myself in ways that work for me. I like that she is playful and she is respectful, which is important to me.
She adapts routines and customises the space to suit my needs on any given day, like picking up on if the room needs to be darker. She knows that playing familiar music is a useful anchor to help bring me into the space.