Kirstie Thomas

Kirstie Thomas is the Assistant Head Teacher of Lewis school Pengam, the last single-sex boy’s school in Wales.

She has worked at Lewis School for 19 years, becoming Assistant Head Teacher in 2018. During that time, her areas of interest have included teaching and learning, coaching and mentoring, additional learning needs, inclusion, pupil engagement, wellbeing, pupil intervention and support, and pupil equity.

Since becoming Assistant Head Teacher, she has focused on creating and developing an alternative provision setting for pupils who find the mainstream classroom too challenging.

The LPC (Learning Pathway Centre) was established in 2016, initially as a pilot and is now an integral part of the Caerphilly ALN strategy, supporting children from all across the local authority. The LPC is a reintegration facility with the primary aim to support our learners to return to mainstream education; however, this may not always be appropriate, and in such cases, we use a variety of interventions to help develop and strengthen our pupil’s ability to manage a small environment successfully in readiness for the next phase of their lives.