Introduction to Day Services
Our day services provision is all about adults with learning disabilities and autism (trainees) becoming as independent as possible. We provide support, coaching and teaching to help each individual reach their full potential. We "stretch them" in a safe environment alongside our talented and dedicated team.
There are opportunities to get work experience in our commercial kitchen, serve customers in our community cafe and/or scrapstore and learn new skills in a wide diversity of activities with partner organisations such as Yeovil Men's Shed, Prodigal Bikes, Leonardo Helicopters, Carymoor Environmental Trust, Lofty Therapy Horses, Hilfields Friary, Somerset Cricket Foundation etc. Many of these sessions are at different sites, giving our trainees the opportunity to gain new experiences and to engage with the wider community.
We run arts and crafts sessions, life skills, digital skills, health and well being, make to sell, junk remodelling, themed learning, creative reading and writing, photography, media recycling, ebay sales and the list goes on.
There is always something for everyone. With new exciting sessions regularly being introduced to provide you with plenty of choice, no two days are the same at the Hub!!
The sessions are always fun and interesting, but also always aligned to our ultimate goal to help our trainees become as independent as possible.
Onsite Sessions
Our talented work coaches run up to a dozen different sessions on site every week here at the Hub. These sessions will fit into one of the following three categories, whether it is work experience in the café, woodwork or themed learning.
Skills for life
It is vitally important that trainees are supported with activities that will help promote mental well-being, as well as gaining the skills and awareness needed for the realities of life. The development of life skills can help you make informed decisions, solve problems, build healthy relationships, empathy as well as skills to help you manage your life in a healthy and productive way.
Life skills can provide you with different opportunities to develop and promote your personality, as well as realising your true potential through learning new skills during sessions, and in our in house work experience programme.
Communication
To give our trainees the opportunity to use their receptive and expressive communication skills is an important transferable life skill. By supporting your reading and writing skills, we will not only develop your knowledge, but also keep your mind active, enhance your creative ability as well as helping you to understand the world around you. Reading and writing at all levels will support your vocabulary and develops your communication skills.
The Arts
By using different media in various sessions we support trainees to be creative. These sessions will encourage you to use your imagination as well as your technical skills. By creating and finishing a piece of work on any scale will give you not only personal satisfaction, but a feeling of great achievement. These sessions will give you the opportunity and ability to express yourself through activities such as, drawing, sculpting to construction. During these sessions you will learn many different techniques as well as learning to use various tools for a purpose. Being creative is inspiring as well as being relaxing.
Sessions run by our partners
We are constantly sourcing new partners to work with to provide sessions whether in house at the Hub or off site at our partner’s location. Below are just a few examples of these sessions, checkout our news blog for other sessions we have experienced, from cricket, to drama groups and even a drum bus!
The Men’s Shed
The Men’s Shed is a place where men (and women) can meet to pursue activities together making and mending that they would normally have done on their own in their garden shed. We go on a weekly basis to our local Shed in Yeovil, where the trainees, working alongside the men shedders and a work coach, will learn to design and make projects out of wood.
Eastfields of Bowers Hill
Spring 2023 saw a new friendship with Eastfields of Bowers Hill. Trainees will get an opportunity to visit once a week for 4 sessions, for a therapeutic experience with the horses, pigs and other animals, learning skills in maintaining, cleaning and grooming or just having cuddles. They will also have the fantastic opportunity to ride if they would like to give it a go.
Prodigal Bikes
Prodigal Bikes is a charity based in Crewkerne that collects old bicycles, repairs them and then ships them to Africa to be used. The trainees learn the process of stripping the bikes down, repairing and putting the bikes back together in a number of sessions over 2 months.
Hilfield Friary
In 2022 we teamed up with Hilfield Friary over the summer months to take a group of trainees on a weekly basis to enjoy the tranquillity of the countryside around Hilfield, helping in the vegetable garden and experience other tasks to help with the on going running of the farm.
A typical day at The Hub
Either our Office Administrator or Work Coach will greet you at the door with a welcoming smile. They will let you know which room your morning session is in and you will be asked to make your way to the room (stopping at the cafe to order lunch if it is needed).
The morning session will start at 9.30am with a general update from everyone on what they have been up to since they were last at the Hub. The Work coach will explain what will be happening in the session and then the fun begins.
Lunchtime will be from 12-1pm. If lunch has been ordered from the cafe it will be delivered for 12pm to the trainee tea station. Work Coaches will help trainees to make drinks for themselves and their friends.
The afternoon session will begin at 1pm with a similar structure to the morning. The day will finish at 3.30pm when the Work Coach will escort you to your transport home.
What our Hub service users have to say…
“I like coming to the Hub because the staff are all very friendly and welcoming, I enjoy the sessions I do here as well and I have made some good friends whilst being here.”
- Day service user