Projects and events
SUPPORTING EMOTIONAL HEALTH USING DOG THERAPY
At the “Kozmutza Flora” Special School for the Deaf we’re always looking for opportunities to enrich our professional knowledge and the offer of therapeutic approaches available to our students. As of 2019, four of our special education teachers have been certified in animal assisted activities and therapy. One of them is also a certified dog handler, and along with her certified therapy dog Szellő, have long been volunteering their time to make school activities more enjoyable and more memorable for our students.
For this year’s edition of the MOL for Children’s Health project financing program by Foundation for Community, our school’s longtime partner institution, the Kozmutza Flora Association applied for a grant to fund a half-year therapy program for students living with intellectual disabilities.
The aim of the project was to support emotional health, and develop emotional intelligence using dog assisted therapy in a small group setting.
The beneficiaries, 21 students divided into three groups, were given an opportunity to learn recognizing, identifying and managing their emotions in varied playful social settings, as well develop healthy patterns of relating to and engaging with emotions of their peers.
We’re grateful for the funding that made this long time dream of ours possible, and look forward to continuing dog assisted activities and therapies.
Photos and testimonials available on the following playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLNVnKOuxptoiCP84sjvzzDJde1dc4fFKM
Treasure Chest of Learning Games for Support Teachers
In response to the chronic lack of funding for appropriate resources for the educational support services, our school, through the Kozmutza Flora Association has applied for a grant from the Bethlen Gabor Alap of Hungary to finance the acquisition of five sets of educational toys, games and other requisites to encourage playful, creative, experience-based learning during therapy sessions with students with learning disorders or difficulties integrated in mainstream schools. We are confident that by providing students with learning opportunities through diverse, attractive, playful, movement-driven problem-solving situations, we can improve learning outcomes and ensure active participation in these activities.
"Accepting diversity" Project
We launched this project in 2016 hoping it would become a framework for special schools from the Transylvania region to organize shared events. Most of these events were yearly competitions with many subsections to cater to the varied skills and abilities of special needs students. Our desire for our students to participate in competitions derives from the principle of equal opportunities for success in creative arts.
In the years that followed, with the support of the County Education Superintendents office and later of the Ministry of Education, these competitions became open to any and all students from Romania.
Although in 2021, due to the pandemic, the project was placed on hold, it is our hope to continue both drawing and painting competitions, and the subsequent art exhibits of students’ artwork in 2022.
Erasmus+ Project : IMPACT- Important and Meaningful Programs and Creative Therapies
Our school joined the project initiated by the ”Eltes Matyas” Special Resource School from Pecs, Hungary. Throughout the shared activities and mobilities, our school presented a hydrotherapy program and the tablet PC-based interactive learning scenarios to our partners, while they enriched our methodological competency base by presenting animal assisted therapies and activities and the ”Veronika” music therapy.
The runtime of the project initially was 2018-2020, but due to pandemic travel restrictions we obtained a one-year extension.
Participating in this project has been extremely constructive and beneficial to both teachers and students of the project team, and will undoubtedly contribute to the enrichment of the ….. of therapeutic approaches meant to aid the healthy development of our students.
Ref. no of project: 2018-1-HU01-KA229-047752
Project web page: http://impacttherapies.simplesite.com/
You can find photos from project activities and mobilities on the following social media page: https://www.facebook.com/eltes.pecs.impact/
”In Motiona" - Equipping the Sensory Integration Therapy Room
In the recent years, among our kindergarten and school students, and even more so in case of the young children of families that request our early intervention services, we became aware of a specific developmental profile, where at the base of the hardships or symptoms that we see in daily activities, we found a delay in the maturing of sensory integration in the brain. Therefore, we found it essential to seek out funding for a dedicated sensory integration therapy room. Through a grant offered by the Bethlen Gabor Alap of Hungary, we were able to complete the acquisition and setup of all the requisites of a colorful and effective sensory integration therapy program: hamacs, skywalker swings, platform swings, gym balls, small colorful balls, rings, tunnels, trampolines, a wood beam, ladders and slides, snuggle swings, etc.
Thanks to their generous support, the therapy sessions take place in a luminous and spacious room where children perceive all the hard work as an hour of boundless joy and play.
”Keeping Our Traditions Alive”
-Financed by The Communitas Foundation-
This project financed by Fundația pentru Comunitate (Foundation for the Community) is the latest era in our partnership and collaboration with the “Cserey-Goga” Technological School, a large mainstream school in Crasna, Salaj County, a largely agricultural town at apr. 100km from Cluj Napoca.
Throughout the years, our cooperation has materialized at mutual visits, play and creative workshops meant to break down boundaries, increase awareness towards peers with special needs, and bringing children of different abilities together through shared experiences.
This latest project followed several objectives some of were from the realms of skill development for students with special needs, and others from the realms of strengthening all sentiment of belonging together, through shared folk traditions, regional history and literature.
20 students and 6 teachers participated in the project.
It is our deep conviction that such initiatives contribute to building a more inclusive, more aware, and more respectful future society.
Make it, move it and bring it to life!- Art Therapy project
In the 2020-2021 school year, through the financing of ”Bethlen Gabor Alap” of Hungary, we set in motion our art education project aimed at developing the artistic skills and address the needs of artistically gifted students of our school, thus enhancing their chance at optimal social-economic integration in the future. Our institution firmly believes in the incredible potential of initiatives that contribute to the healthy development of the personality as a whole, instead of focusing solely on academic learning.
Through the creative workshops, the participants had the opportunity to familiarize themselves with the basic elements of a puppet theater show, to create and animate puppets of their own, to decorate a set and to become puppet theater actors in their own right, by putting up a show to the delight of all the other students of our school.
The workshops were led by Gal Orsolya, puppet creator and architect, and Demeter Ferencz, puppet theater artist, writer and playwright.
Our Puppet Theater”- Kindergarten, Group of Squirrels
In November 2021. the group of squirrels joined a transnational initiative launched by The Carpathian Program for Preschool Education (https://ovodaprogram.eu/babozzunk-egyutt). Led by special education teachers András Tünde, Hügel Timea and Vajda Orsolya Kitti, kindergarteners made finger puppets and enacted a little play based on a story they have learned "The Story of the Glove" https://fb.watch/9sUurvxC3Y/
The week-long project has been built on the following steps: getting acquainted with the plot of the story, making the finger puppets inspired by the characters during arts and crafts activities, participating in draga games, learning short children's rhymes and using all these elements to retell the story with puppets, songs and movement.
