ONCE’s Educational Resource Centre
The ONCE’s Educational Resource Centre “Antonio Vicente Mosquete” is located in Madrid, Spain, and it takes charge of the attention of blind and visually impaired children. The Centre has twe different areas: an educational centre, which includes different classrooms for the education of visually impaired people and people with deafblindness. On the other hand there is a specific team of professionals responsible of providing resources, human, technique and bibliographic, to the Centres where visually impaired and deafblind people are integrated for their education.
ONCE is the Spanish National Organisation for the Blind and it is intended to focus on the education and the rehabilitation of people with blindness from their birth or since they lose their sight, in order to integrate them into society. ONCE was founded in 1938 and all through these more than 70 years it has developed a complete system of social assistance, that has been changing to be adapted to the different needs in different times.
Historically the Institution’s main incomes have come, and still it comes, from selling the so called “ONCE’s Cupón”. The profits of this lotery game, very popular and extended in Spain, have allowed that the educational attention offered by the ONCE’s Resource Centres is free for the students and families, as well as other social services provided by the Institution.
On the inside of the ONCE’s Educational Resource Centre facilities there are different areas for the recreational and leisure time: TV room, didactic playroom, music room, ball pits and so on). Outside the Centre there are different sport areas: a covered swimming pool, a sport Centre and an athletic track.
Besides the Executive Committee, the Resource Centre has a multidisciplinary professional team, made up of: social workers, psychologists, educators, teachers, rehabilitation teachers, tiflotechnology teachers, speech therapists and a physiotherapist. The Centre has as well a permanent medical team, a visual assessment team and a bibliographical service.
Students learn and improve their daily living skills thanks to living in the residential area within the Centre. Workshop classrooms enable the students to start learning different tasks directly related to employment.
From the beginning of the project the Centre has got a Body Expression classroom and has set up a prevocational workshop classroom for adult people with deafblindness.
Specific programmes aimed to adult people with deafblindness focused on the training for the employment, the personal autonomy and communication are developed in the Centre, where professionals of ONCE and ONCE Foundation for the Attention of Deafblind People (FOAPS) work together.
Why did we join MDVI ACTIVE Project?
The ACTIVE Project focus on looking into the difficulties that multidisabled visually impaired people or people with deafblindness have to join and integrate themselves into society as active citizens, when their education period is finished.
Visually impaired people with additional disabilities as well as people with deafblindness in Spain, like in the rest of Europe, have got many difficulties in gaining access to an activity, occupation or employment. Because of that and with the aim or sharing with other countries with different culture, economical development and social welfare their experience in solving difficulties and their efforts to look for solutions, we join the Project by the hand of the Lega del Filo d’Oro (Italy).
The Project in Spain is coordinated by the Unidad Técnica de Sordoceguera (Deafblind Department) of ONCE and it has counted on the cooperation of the Education Resource Centre “Antonio Vicente Mosquete” in Madrid. This Centre has appointed a professional to work in Body Expression and Creativity, since this area was missing in the educational curriculum of the students.
The activities carried out in this area are directed towards the students becoming aware of the motor possibilities of their own body and improving their body expression and personal image. To To achieve this different activities are made: activities intended to improve the postural control, practicing different rhythms, relaxation and facial expression exercises, etc.
Two classrooms have been assigned by the Centre for the Body Expression and Creativity Area, area born from the Project: the first one for individual or in pair working sessions and the second one, the psychomotricity classroom, where they work in group.
The Project has a Chief Coordinator and a Coordinator of the “habilitation for the active citizenship programme”, carried out in the Centre. This Coordinator has acted as a link between the different professionals involved in the Project. Coordination has been implemented through weekly meetings with different aims: gathering information, producing audiovisual materials, monitoring project activities and writing final reports.
A new programme has been set up during the project second year, with the idea of dealing with the project purpose in depth: the prevocational workshop classroom, where a teacher works with a small group of adult students with deafblindness. Activities carried out in this workshop are based on handling different materials and producing ornamental objects.
The main objective is developing creativity and imagination and providing students with basic skills for producing objects, in addition to improving their self-esteem and motivating them to get into the habit of working.
Cooperating with other countries in this Project has been a very fruitful experience. It has enabled us to get to know the work that is being developed in these countries and their difficulties. It has meant a hard work, but it has made establishing new links possible. In conclusion, we can say that it has been worth it.
