Sarah Clayton
Simple Stuff Works, Simple Stuff Works Biologist, recovering teacher and mum of four one of whom lives with complex disability. 25 years experience of exploring supported lying, changes in body shape, measurement of body symmetry and co-productive working with children and families.
About this speaker
Firstly I am not a therapist, my first degree is in Biology and I hold a Post Graduate Certificate in Education. For five years I worked as a high school teacher in an inner city Birmingham school, a time that cemented my passion for working with young people and families.
I started working with families whose children use night time positioning in 1998, The Mansfield Project was published in Physiotherapy in 2000 and I have never looked back. I now lead a fabulous team at Simple Stuff Works, a training and equipment provider specialising in therapeutic lying support.
I am passionate about the need to understand the patterns of body shape distortion we see in children and young people who find it difficult to move independently. Changes in body shape are not random but a process that can be predicted, I published these patterns in the Tizard Learning Disability Review in 2010. As such these changes are amenable to effective therapeutic intervention. My home life is busy, I have 4 children, my oldest lives with a complex brain injury following a brain tumour and subsequent stroke. Almost 17 years into that particular journey I am still learning how to live with uncertainty.
