Some areas of the Zoo are CLOSED to allow us to prepare for our Halloween events. ... read more
Until 3rd November, there will be restricted access at Bears of the Rising Sun (lower viewing) and our Elephant Bushwalk will be closed.
From 14th October 2024, our Woodland Hollow will be closed.
This pages contains details about SEND school sessions.
For more general information to help you plan your visit see our general SEND school grup page. If sessions at the zoo don’t suit your needs, we offer a half-term long Outreach Programme.
We are continually striving to improve our provision for SEND students at the Zoo. Our sessions can meet the needs of many different levels of learners with a variety needs, whether they are mild or complex learning difficulties or physical, emotional and behavioural needs.
Please ensure you provide any relevant information to our education team when discussing sessions to ensure we can provide suitable learning pitched at the appropriate level for your group.
Classroom Accesibility
Most of our classrooms are accessible to wheelchair users. When booking, please inform us if you have wheelchair users in your group. If there are multiple wheelchair users we may need to assign you to a specific classroom or modify activities to better suit your needs.
SEND Sessions:
Explore! Session for SEND Groups
This session uses a variety of animal artefacts (including furs, feathers, and reptile scales) to allow students to explore and touch. Depending on the level of the group, the session can focus on:
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Basic exploration or textures, shapes, etc. (active or coactive)
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Matching games (e.g. matching colours or images to objects)
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Describing objects (e.g. matching descriptive words and/or symbols with the objects)
If you feel that participating in any of these sessions can help you students work towards their targets under the engagement model do feel free to contact us to discuss this further and talk about how we can best support you and your students.
No live animals are used in this session.
Animal Career Session for SEND Groups
This session is aimed at SEND Groups looking into Post 16 options working with animals. It highlights a variety of job roles, including ‘a day in the life’, and different career pathways.
Animal Enrichment for SEND Groups
This session offers SEND students the chance to discover some of the ways zoos can keep their animals both physically and mentally active. Students then have the opportunity to make their own enrichment items for one of the species at Colchester Zoo.
Please note, while student-made enrichment will be given to animals at the zoo, for logistical and biosecurity reasons this will not be done during the session, but instead zoo keepers will use this enrichment at a later point in time.
Other Sessions
If the sessions described above do not suit your needs, please have a look at the full range of sessions we offer. All of our mainstream sessions are available for SEND groups working at differing levels. If you are interested in booking any of these, please contact the education department to discuss your groups’ specific needs and ensure the teaching sessions are appropriate for your group. Where possible, we can adapt and modify some of the sessions to better suit your needs.
Please note, none of our sessions include live animals.
During your visit you can meet minibeasts and other animals up close. Drop in anytime at the Discovery Den (by the elephant house), or at set times (see the sign at the building for details) at Sensation Station. You can also stroke or feed other animals in the ‘Familiar Friends’ Farm section of the zoo at Colenso Village (see signs at the animals to check which animals you can stroke/feed). Our Australian Rainbows walkthrough also has options for hand-feeding the lorikeets. All of these activities are all drop-in and cannot be pre-booked.
