Where in the world is Perkins?

(Continued from Perkins Insight eNews)

On a recent visit to the Perkins School for the Blind, teachers from the Children’s House for Deafblind in Sergiev Posad, Russia, spoke through a translator about programs at the school and how students are given practical experience to build independence and help them access the academic curriculum.

Svetlana Zarechnova, head of the Children’s House educational department, and Lilia Abdukamalova, head of the department for students with multiple disabilities, said subjects at the school are taught in accordance with the age and ability level of the students.

Young students studying life sciences focus on learning about the environment and the world around them. As part of studying plants and nutrition, the students tend to the school’s crop of potatoes, a Russian food staple. In addition to growing and harvesting the potatoes, the students are taught different ways of preparing the food. They receive hands-on lessons in everything from planting to peeling to mashing.

“They learn all the process so they can use the skills in everyday life,” Zarechnova and Abdukamalova explained.

When studying biology, students spend time outdoors at the school’s horse stables. Not only do they study the horses, ducks, birds, and rabbits on the school’s grounds but they are also actively involved in caring for the animals, which provides them with vocational experience.

The teachers focus on a holistic educational model with students gaining various practical and vocational experiences while building life skills including communication, orientation and mobility, and social skills. Students are taught in small groups to help them practice interacting with peers. Frequent visitors who come to observe the school provide more opportunities for the students to socialize and communicate.

“Multiple repetition and reinforcement is very important for students who have disabilities,” Zarechnova and Abdukamalova said.

Teachers at the Children’s House take full advantage of the natural environment surrounding them, coordinating lesson plans with relevant seasons, holidays, and events. For example, students might learn about harvest time and the foods that are in season during the fall or learn about snow and popular Russian sports in the winter.

“We are trying to make our curriculum not only based on concepts and units but also tied to nature,” they explain.

From June to September, teachers take their students along with their own children to summer recreation camps. The teachers become surrogate mothers for the students and give them an opportunity to interact with children who do not have disabilities and participate in all of the same activities as the rest of the family. While enjoying the fresh air and outdoors with such activities as swimming and sports, the students also practice safety skills, orientation and mobility, and communication.

To sum up the school’s overall philosophy, the teachers say simply: “Our children live their life as it goes on around them - we try to teach them to do all the same things everyone else does.”