Integration suitcase for children with special needs

Latvia

Association “Education Initiative centre”

Rīgas street 216b, Jēkabpils, LV- 5202, Latvia Phone: (+371) 65235635 Email: info@iic.lv Website: www.iic.lv

NGO

Aim: to facilitate integration of children with special needs into education system, providing necessary knowledge and skills for teachers to support cognitive development of children with special needs, by implementing Neubourg cognitive development theory and Norvegian practical experience, to support co-operation between Latvian and Norwegian teachers co-operation and promote mentoring work in education.
Main activities: seminars, creative workshops, consultations, experience exchange. Activities were organised in several schools, to maximise mutual interaction of teachers and experience exchange. Within mentoring programme face-to-face and distant consultations took place, with class work observation and suggestions for future work. Regular feedback sessions were organised.

1. Great opportunity for teachers to get acquainted and use a new methodology for the support of cognitive development working with children with special needs; to teach also parents of children to support their child at home learning.
2. Every participant practically created their own toolbox to use it latter when working with children with special needs and their families
3. School directors and other teachers have become mentors, to support effectively teachers in everyday work.
4. Face-to-face mentor consultations have been proved to be very important as this kind of cooperation has not been used in schools so far.

At the end of project teachers and mentors in 15 schools of Latvia who has mastered M. Neubourg methodology, have included it into their classes and are working with 261 children with special needs and learning difficulties. It is foreseen that these schools will enrol new pupils with special needs in school year 2009/2010.

Here are few quotations from evaluation forms after seminars and workshops:
- Teachers have improved their professional capacity
- It helped to master a new methodology and to get information about mentoring in educations establishment, mentoring basics
- During consultations answers to the unclear questions were received.
- It strengthened the confidence about importance of inclusive education in comprehensive school
- Provided psychological support and encouraged to work more with pupil using new knowledge
Mentors have set up a regular co-operation with parents, provided information to Parent’s council, parents clubs about teaching process using M.Neubourg method, consulted parents about possibilities to teach their child differently.

In July 12 -14, 2010 an international conference on inclusive education “Education Approaches for Children and Youth with Special Education Needs” will take place in Riga. It is organised by Division of International Special Education and Services (DISES), Council for Exceptional Children (CEC) www.cec.sped.org , International Step by Step Association (ISSA), www.issa.nl and Education Initiative centre.

Long term co-operation has been developed with all project participants.

Education, inclusion, cognitive development according to M.Neubourg method, mentor, mentoring