Girls with Autism

"Girls with Autism" documentary shows life at Limpsfield Grange School

18:07, 15 JULY 2015
BY AMANI HUGHES

The specialist school caters for young girls with communication and interaction difficulties

The only state-run boarding school for girls with autism in the UK, based in Oxted, is the focus of a documentary being shown on ITV.

Limpsfield Grange School is a specialist school for girls aged 11 to 16, who have communication and interaction difficulties.

In September 2014, the school opened its doors to film crews for six months for the making of 'Girls with Autism'.

Headteacher Sarah Wild explained that she hoped the programme would raise awareness of autism among girls, and for people to realise it is different than in boys.

Ms Wild said: “At the moment the diagnosis tools that are used to diagnose autism are a bit boy-focused.

“Girls can be quite sociable, they want to have friends and connect with other people, some of them might well have boyfriends.

"They are a bit more interesting than boys on the [autism] spectrum, so sometimes they get missed.”

The headteacher, who has been at the school since September 2012, explained the school encouraged a “calm environment”.

In small 10-person classes, students work with animals to “try to get them to manage their anxiety".

“For them they find communication really difficult, they do not understand where other people are coming from, they can take a lot of things at face value, they think a lot of things are true," Ms Wild said.

“It makes them very vulnerable. For them having a teacher not be in a class can create worries, they think about what will happen, they can get into an anxiety chain.

“They look like swans, they look as if they are gliding along but underneath they are paddling fast.”

Ms Wild explained friendships were incredibly important for the girls at the school.

“They are really desperate for friendships because they do not understand how to make friends, they can get a bit obsessed when a friendship is going wrong.

“We teach them how to make friends, how to retain friends and how to repair a friendship.”

Staff, students and parents were behind Ms Wild when she talked about doing the documentary, explaining it was a “terrifying thing to suggest but it was positive as we wanted to raise awareness of girls on the spectrum".

“They [the students] are fantastic, if we can give them a little bit of support they can really succeed and be accepted and celebrated in the community.

“All of the girls are excited about having their voices heard.”

Girls with Autism will be broadcast on ITV1 on Wednesday July 15 at 10.40pm.