Lydia’s grandparents Ernest and Nora Otter moved from Yorkshire to Oxfordshire with two of their sons and bought Pennyhooks because they ‘loved it at first sight’.
Known as those ‘new-fangled Yorkshiremen with their new-fangled milking machines’, the brothers brought the first automated milking system to the valley.
Lydia began working with children with autism in the 1970s while she qualified as a teacher, with a special interest in music therapy.
Seeing the success of the day trips to the farm, in 2001 Sheila Coates asked Lydia to host regular sessions with a school leaving group.
When students started visiting the Farm they used the farmhouse facilities until a mobile home was donated as a classroom.
As the Project was increasingly recognised for its achievements it became clear that the students were ready for further practical learning opportunities.
As the Project expanded funds were found to build again and the woodworking lessons were relocated to a new purpose built workshop in Hedgerow House, which also has a small kitchen and shop area. The woodwork teacher began full time work with 30 students to produce good quality garden furniture & other products such as photo frames which are sold to order and on Open Days.
As part of the Farm’s Conservation work Natural England offered a grant for classroom space to allow more educational access to the Farm.
Emma Masefield is now in post. Through Emma’s wide range of experience ,we have been enabled to broaden our service & our support to a wider range of young people on the spectrum & their families.
Robert & Vesna Mlakar greatly enriched all our lives by sharing with us, their skills in autism, craft, dance & music. This resulted in many more products to sell at our Christmas Fayre, as well as songs sung with visitors by our Singing Group. We look forward to further developing this relationship between us as soon as possible.
A mother, Willow & her yearling kids, Honey & Buzz came to Pennyhooks in January. These delightful creatures have added so much to all our lives. They are calm & kind & enable students to work with animals more independently
Students went home for a week, while we re-thought our services. Families soon reported the difficulties created for their children through loss of routine & not enough to do with their time.
In February we began to offer sessions to new referrals from the waiting list & to give our own students slightly longer sessions.
Pennyhooks screened on BBC 1 TV February 16th at 7. 30 pm, called ‘Farming on the Spectrum’.
Our vision for the future is to see Pennyhooks continue to develop into a compassionate, purposeful and productive farm community for people with autism. We would like to see:
