Using familiar materials such as scrap fabric, plastic bottles, old water pipes, nylon…, teachers at Tuoi Tho 7 Kindergarten, Ward 7, District 3, Ho Chi Minh City, created teaching aids – toys for children with disabilities learning inclusively, with the model “The Multi-Purpose House”.
Sharing the idea behind the model of teaching aids and toys for children with disabilities, teacher Vo Le Thi Hoang Hoa, Deputy Principal of Tuoi Tho 7 Kindergarten, said: Toys are always children’s close companions and a basic means for children to learn through play. Toys help children feel less lonely and practise many other skills. Children with disabilities have the same basic needs as all other children. In addition, children with disabilities have their own needs depending on the type of disability and badly need help and support from the inclusive class and the community. Wishing to help less fortunate children develop faster and more fully, Deputy Principal Hoang Hoa came up with the idea of designing “The Multi-Purpose House” to organise activities for children with disabilities, creating special toys for the children, just as special as the children themselves.
With favourable conditions created by the school’s board of management and the support of parents, the school’s teachers used familiar materials such as plastic water pipes, buttons, zips, suction cups, Velcro, cotton wool, children’s old pillows, towels, dishwashing sponges, wooden blocks, pieces of plastic, mineral water bottle caps, nylon, pieces of flexible plastic, green dishwashing pads, rough scrap fabric, pieces of netting, old mattresses,… to recycle and create the Multi-Purpose House model. This is a playground model suited to each age group, helping children with disabilities learning inclusively to develop in areas such as motor development, including gross motor development, fine motor development, language and communication development, emotions, sensory development, cognitive development…. In addition, by making use of used items, the Multi-Purpose House model also helps protect the environment, thereby helping to reduce disaster risk and adapt to climate change.
The “Multi-Purpose House” model is designed as follows: the front is a jigsaw and picture-matching game, the right side is a button-fastening game using flowers, the left side is a fruit-picking game, and the back is a game of finding fruit for the rabbit and telling fruit stories.
The “Multi-Purpose House” model, both a toy and a teaching aid, was assembled and completed step by step and put into use in the second semester of the 2015-2016 school year, serving individual lessons and psychomotor therapy, or combined group play in activities to develop the sense of touch, adjust tactile disorders, and develop fine and gross motor skills… The model can be played with as a whole or taken apart to play with in sections, depending on the child’s ability and the teacher’s training purpose.
After a period of use at the school, Vo Le Thi Hoang Hoa said: The Multi-Purpose House model has improved the quality of motor development education for kindergarten children, created the best living and inclusive learning environment for kindergarten children with disabilities, and created favourable conditions for children with disabilities to study together with other children at school and in class; it helps children with disabilities learn and develop motor skills, feelings, intellect and aesthetics, form the first elements of personality and prepare children for first grade…. The model can also be used in special schools because most children with autism spectrum disorder have tactile disorders, or children with intellectual disabilities and Down syndrome often have difficulty recognising sensations…
The Multi-Purpose House model by the staff of Tuoi Tho 7 Kindergarten, Ward 7, District 3, Ho Chi Minh City, was one of 24 creative products commended on Creative Women’s Day 2017.
Le Thuy – http://phunuvietnam.vn