Picture Presentation: Child-to-Child Workshop Facilitated by Habilítate Mazatlán
To date the Habilítate team has been most active in Child-to-Child workshops and special seating made with cardboard.
Child-to-Child activities are participatory, discovery-based, and fun. They involve simulation games, story-telling, and eye-opening, curiosity-rousing, problem-solving ventures. At its best, Child-to-Child is based on the principles of “pedagogy of liberation” in which the challenge is to draw ideas out of the learners rather than push them in. Innovative activities are facilitated, in which the children make their own observations, draw their own conclusions, think about things they might do to improve unfair situations, and make suggestions regarding collective action for the common good. Although a lot of thoughtful planning may go into such activities, the process often turns out delightfully spontaneous and inspirational … if somewhat unpredictable.
Child-to-Child was initially developed to help children learn what they can do to protect and improve health, especially of infants and toddlers. However the PROJIMO programs in Mexico have adapted diverse activities for disability awareness-raising and inclusion. One of the leaders of this approach in Mexico is Rigoberto (Rigo) Delgado, a spinal-cord injured (quadriplegic) young man who spent years at PROJIMO Coyotitán—first for his own rehabilitation, later as a program leader.
Rigo Delgado (in pink shirt), who is quadriplegic (paralyzed below the neck), as a student at the Autonomous University of Sinaloa, launched a program to promote disability rights and accessibility on the campus.
Here Rigo talks to a professor in front of one of the many ramps that the university constructed in response to the disabled students he mobilized for greater accessibility.
Because Rigo now has vast experience leading Child-to-Child workshops with a disability focus, the Habilítate team invited him to help facilitate their first workshop, with schoolchildren in Mazatlán—and in the process teach the team the methodology (through learning-by-doing). Rigo gladly agreed—and did a great job.
The first Child-to-Child workshops Habilítate held were in the colorful facility of Grupo Los Pargos. Los Pargos is a cooperative which was formed 20 years ago by families of disabled children. Now all the children have grown up, but they still gather at the center on weekday afternoons. In the mornings they loan a big room at the Pargos center to the Ministry of Education, which uses it as a primary school classroom.
Grupo Los Pargos, a cooperative started 20 years ago by families of disabled children, is now managed by the grownup children themselves. For a while they loaned part of their artistically-decorated center to Habilítate, to set up its special seating workshop and to conduct Child-to-Child training activities.
In a classroom at Los Pargos, Rigo, a social psychologist, (in wheelchair) helps Habilítate members learn the spirit and methodology of Child-to-Child, adapting it to enhance inclusion of disabled kids. Mothers and other family members of the participating children were also invited to take part.
Tomás, who had polio as a young child, shows the children his leg braces, which hold his paralyzed legs straight so he can walk with crutches.
The children were encouraged to ask the Habilítate team members any questions they wanted about their lives and their disabilities. It was one of the first time most of the children had a chance to get to know persons with disabilities, and they were very curious. A lot of friendly exchange took place.
The children also questioned me about my disability. I’d recently had surgery on my left foot, which was in a cast.
In one of the first activities the children divided into small groups and were asked to draw pictures of different causes of disability—and then of possible ways to prevent them. Here each group gets ready to draw on large sheets of paper.
The children took the activity very seriously and were quite creative and colorful in depicting their ideas.
Members of the Habilítate team participated with the children in their drawings and exchange of ideas.
After the drawings were completed, each group explained them and discussed their thoughts with the class. Everyone who wanted to contributed ideas and suggestions.
Simulation games helped participants get a taste of different disabilities. Here mothers help blindfold some of the children.
Here a mother leads her "blind" child.
Going up and down steps without seeing isn’t easy.
Here two of the Habilítate wheelchair riders lead the "blind" children.
Next the children lead their blindfolded mothers.
Here sighted children guide "blind" ones to play on a slide. Quite scary but fun!
In another activity, about seeing and hearing, a blindfolded child stands in a circle of rocks. Other children, taking turns, try very quietly to sneak up and steal a rock. If the blindfolded child hears them, he or she points at them and that child is out of the game. This activity emphasizes the importance of both vision and good hearing.
Here Tomás tries to sneak up silently in his wheelchair to steal a rock.
After these games everyone discusses what it is like not to see well. They also realize that a child with a disability has the same feelings, needs, and right to play as do other children.
The children are also given a chance to wheel around in wheelchairs.
Here two boys hold a wheelchair race on the basketball court.
Here the children learn how to assist a wheelchair rider go up a high curb.
All in all, perhaps the most positive outcome of the Child-to-Child experience is the camaraderie and playful exchange between the schoolchildren and the disabled members of the Habilítate team. The children begin to realize that people with disabilities are just as human and can be as good friends and as much fun as other people.
In a final discussion session the children commented on how they enjoyed the Child-to-Child activities and what they learned. Their feedback for the most part was quite positive. Some said what they enjoyed most was being to talk openly with members of the Habilítate team about their disabilities, and get direct, caring answers. The kids felt that in the future they would feel more comfortable about making friends with someone with a disability because, as one little girl put it, “On the inside, we’re pretty much the same.”
