First of all, I'd like to apologise for not posting for so long!
I've had an absolute nightmare with the Project Planning and Development unit, resulting in me having to start it afresh this semester.
As a last minute decision I decided to take a long break in the summer and did some bar work in Zante, during my time there, I reflected on the last year of my degree work, but more specifically about this unit.
I am a big believer that everything happens for a reason, and took what positives I could from my failure to complete the project last semester. Looking back, I didnt seem to be able to stick to a strong idea, and have also since then, changed my employment.
I am now a teaching assistant working specifically with secondary school aged children with physical disabilities, chronic diseases and learning difficulties. At the school that I am working at, they run a wheelchair basket ball club, where a significant of able bodied children join in with the disabled ones.
I thought about the after school dance club, attended exclusively by able bodied children and considered what I would do if for example, a wheelchair bound child came along to the club. I concluded that I would admittedly struggle on an inclusion basis to cater for everybodys needs and am considering setting up a dance club for wheelchair users and children with other disabilities or difficulties.
Im still not really sure where I am going with this idea and am finding it hard to home in on a more specific angle/ research question. At the moment I just know that with working in an environment where I am constantly surrounded by children with disabilites and learning difficulties, and my passion for teaching dance, my research should perhaps be based on inclusive dance. This would not only give me a better insight to inclusive teaching methods, but would also benefit a number of young children. I am currently unaware of any other dance classes offered to disabled pupils in Staffordshire, and would therefore perhaps be one of the first to offer this.
Your thoughts and ideas would be much appreciated!
Hope you have all had a lovely summer!
Your dilemma sounds familiar to me. I once had a class where one of the participants was severely disabled with cerebal palsy. She was wheelchair bound and had severe communication problems. The able bodied students were absolutely wonderful in ensuring that she was as included as possible. There is no easy answer to this which is why a project approach would be helpful in uncovering some answers. Good luck
ReplyDeleteI've had a think about this and am really excited about this new idea. There is a lot of controversy which I am faced with on a day to day basis regarding inclusion with the arguement of children with special needs being in mainstream schools? Right are wrong.... Its very interesting to hear both sides, and conider also my feelings and opinions on this.
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Hi Sarah
ReplyDeleteI think you should bring your project to life by holding an inclusive dance lesson, with able and non-able children learning together and researching into whether this is beneficial for all participants. Especially if this is new to your area!
I support and teach a dance group solely with young people with a range of disabilities at a theatre once a week. Last term we worked towards a performance at the Theatre event night called Clive. This went amazing... watching over the weeks the progression of every young person was unreal. At first I did not know how this was going to work or plan out. But it did... ok the dance routine was very basic but they became more confident, flexible, could balance a lot better, and remembered and performed the moves like divas! There is one young person who is wheel chaired bound with no verbal communication, but could move her hands and head, so we focused on these within the routine and warm ups. This does work but I think it's about finding out what each individual needs and how it benefits them.
Also in my workplace we use an inclusive theatre approach where able and non-able bodies or any disability will work, learn and perform together. Within the dance side of the theatre I have been a part of dance numbers where I have paired up with a disabled cast member which benefited me as this individual brought a new element to the performance and dance where he pushed my dancing ability. My workplace learns from everyone and creates performances from individuals for example if someone only has use of their hands we will create moves from using them as a stimulus. The strength of the cast is very strong were everyone is being pushed to their best. Have a look on my blog for more information on my workplace.
I hope this helps, my project is about an TIE (theatre in education) outreach programme; a performance workshop on behalf of my workplace. I am devising this from researching into sexual health awareness and young people. "How can T.I.E educate and help explore sexual awareness through an inclusive method?"
Good luck just get cracking... I really didn't think I could do the last module the research proposal but as soon as I understood what I was doing it just started to flow, just push yourself.... I'm now back at that stage with this module of trying to get my head back into to it all!
Sorry if some of this writing is a bit random, thought I should just write something! :-)
Laura
Hey Sarah,
ReplyDeletei hope you had a lovely break away in Zante... don't panic! you will be fine, you just need somwhere to start then you can finish... i know of a dance company called Candoco that work with abled and disabled dancers with all different types of disabilities, as far as i am aware they are all adults... however ipop is a young persons centre/ youth club for young people aged 13-25 with disabilities and i know they have dance projects that go on at the Arts Depot... that may be useful? i hope this helps even just a little. Good luck see you tomorrow (",)
Thanks so much for all your help guys I think I am finally getting my head around it. Please see my most recent post with my initial thoughts and ideas. I would be extremely grateful of any feedback that you can provide.
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