Multiple disabilities and the right to inclusion in physical education and sports leisure:
Reality or utopia?
The Conference, held last March 20, had the participation of teachers from the University of Barcelona and Vic, from the study group on the inclusion of students with disabilities in physical education at the Institute of Sciences of the 'Education and different people from the associative field in the round table.
ASPACE's participation was represented by Albert Tribó, sports technician of the sports service, Patricia Burgos, physiotherapist at CTO Poblenou, and Maria Galindo, mother of Sergio, one of the ASPACE participants who shares , together with Pablo the extracurricular activity of JUGUEM at the Llorers school, in Barcelona.
Dr. Ignasi Puigdellívol (Professor of Special Education at the UB) explained the benefits that unlimited inclusion brings to society, understanding all the "difficulties" that are put on the table as "opportunities" to improve the education system and social
Dr. Jesus Soldevilla, (professor of the faculty of education, translation and human sciences at the University of Vic-UCC), presented the cooperative methodology in the classroom as the engine of experiences and emotions enhancing learning. He explained, while summarizing his doctoral thesis, how the educational proposals must be able to:
Generate excitement; valuing error as a positive way of learning; make experiential and functional proposals, which lead somewhere, with a visible purpose; Taking into account the different memories and intelligences of the students; investigating and cooperating. And all this, precisely, to develop the competence to learn to learn and to accommodate everyone.
Next, the conclusions of the JUGUEM project were presented, with the presentation by the members of the ICE study group of different aspects:
From the point of view of the association that manages extracurricular activities in the Eixample; from the teaching point of view, with the standardized application of the cooperative methodology and the necessary conditions to carry it out; the incorporation of sensory stimulation within the range of motivating activities for students with multiple disabilities (and others), and the collaborative work that ends up being established between the teacher and the support teacher..
Among many things, it is worth highlighting the conviction on the part of the Eixample Sports Association to have generated an alternative to the conventional model of extracurricular activity.
The palpable reality that the cooperative methodology is necessary to reach inclusion, due to the power of the group assembly, generating a climate of trust; for the empowerment it gives to students to generate individual and group responsibility, being able to self-manage the group and find the necessary adaptations for everyone to participate.
The essential tandem formed by the teacher and the support teacher, who, from their specialty, end up adopting mutual roles.
We want to highlight the contribution of Maria Galindo, lawyer and Sergio's mother, who expressed that it is very difficult to find activities that are simply FUN, without the "therapeutic" label, and the relationship with the mothers and fathers of the other students, with those who in reality are equally united by the mutual desire for the son or daughter to develop and be happy.
Finally answering the initial question, we conclude with the statement that inclusion is a tool for change and social transformation. That the utopia of today is the reality of tomorrow and therefore, we are building this reality.
Towards the month of May, we will attach a link with all the issues discussed at the conference, as well as a new video of the JUGUEM project, two years after the previous one.
