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To deliver Portage sessions to 40 disabled children (aged 0-4) in Ryazan baby home

100%
Categories

  • Education/Training/Employment Education/​Training/​Employment
  • Health/Wellbeing Health/​Wellbeing
  • Beneficiaries

    • Children (3-18) Children (3-18)

    Situation

    There are 600,000 children without parental care in Russia with at least a third living in institutions. Although disabled children are often placed in orphanages, many able-bodied children who enter the orphanages at a young age develop special needs purely as a result of institutionalisation. Widely documented research shows that many children growing up in the orphanage system are being denied one-to-one interaction, human touch, love and access to stimulating toys – all vital to healthy emotional and physical development. As a result many of the children lack self-esteem, a sense of identity, an ability to emotionally attach to others and any sense of security. This hampers all aspects of their development and many will receive the label oligophrenic as a result of institutionalisation rather than any actual disability from birth. The 1998 Human Rights Watch report states that: “based on independent investigations… 30 to 60 percent of orphans diagnosed as oligophrenic may be wrongly ascribed…It is difficult to overstate the significance of this examination, which for some children is a matter of life or death.” ThePromise has introduced Portage to Ryazan baby home. Portage assesses the needs of young children with special needs. It builds on abilities the child already has and teaches skills the child has yet to master. Initially the child's development is observed and recorded using a checklist across six areas: infant stimulation; social; language; self help; cognitive and motor development. A programme is then tailored to meet the requirements of the individual child and activities are designed to boost the child's development in those areas where help is needed - from very early motor skills to the more complex task of using language. It is designed to encourage the children to reach their potential and demonstrates that these children have so much more to offer if they are given a chance. The baby home has a team of 10 Portage workers caring for 40 disabled children. Disabilities are varied and include Downs Syndrome, Cerebral Palsy and Foetal Alcohol Syndrome but there is no disability that prevents a child benefiting from Portage. Children can now reap the benefits as soon as they arrive in the home as they are immediately included in the Portage programme. The children live in family groups of around 10 children of a similar age. Where possible, Portage workers work with children from their own group. This allows skills worked on in their daily Portage sessions to be continued in the child’s group area and makes for a more realistic practise of self-help skills.

    Solution

    100%
    Categories

  • Education/Training/Employment Education/​Training/​Employment
  • Health/Wellbeing Health/​Wellbeing
  • Beneficiaries

    • Children (3-18) Children (3-18)