Gift special education to a mentally challenged child

Program Update

Below are some recent activities and updates in our school from Apr-18 to Sep -18: 1.14th ANNUAL DAY: On 18th April, we celebrated the 14th Annual Day. Our District Differently Abled Welfare Officer S. Sivasankaran, and Rajapalayam Raju's College Principal & Head Dr. V. Venkatraman, presided the function. 2. ACHIEVED SUCCESS IN SSLC STATE BOARD EXAMINATION: 5 of our student's appeared in 10th state board exam results. The results are published and our students have passed and scored well in the exam. 3. POLYTECHNIC PRINCIPAL VISITED SCHOOL: Our school was visited by Arasan Ganesan polytechnic Principal Mr. M. Nanda Kumar on 26th July. We have initiated discussions about non formal vocational training course for our students. 4. ACHIEVED IN SOUTHERN REGIONAL SPORTS EVENTS: The Special Olympics Bharat Virudhunagar and Rotary club of Sivakasi conducted southern regional sports on 24 & 25 August. We won five 1st, six 2nd & four 3rd prizes.

Story from the field

V. Pommurajan is a moderate mentally challenge child. He is far away from the school. In their city two special schools are present, but they are admitted only mild level student. So their parents kept him at home. When we went for door to door survey programme, we got to know about this student.

Our staff explain the importance of special education, occupational & speech therapy and behavior modification to a child. We briefly explained to the parents about the capacity of the child right guidelines and also spread awareness related to rehabilitation of the Mentally Challenged children.

He stays in Sankrankovil which is 30km away from school. Since his father used to find it difficult to drop him at school every day, his attendance was very irregular. Realising this, our school provided transportation facility. We arranged for a mini van for his transport.

After intensive special education, his behavior has improved. Waving hands has partially reduced, he is sitting in one place and his fear about objects has also reduced. Now their parents are happy. He also came regularly to school.

The School celebrated Children’s Day, Diwali, Krishna Jayanthi, Independence Day, Teachers Day, World disability day, Christmas and New Year, in which, students, staff and parents participated in many programmes. The State Sports Development Authority of Tamilnadu conducted district level sports on 05.01.2018 at Virudhunagar. In track events, the school students won six first prizes- six second prizes and two third prizes, after which the district winners were selected for State Sports. The Tamil Nadu state government conducted district level sports on 22.11.2017 at Sivakasi C.S.I Deaf School on the occasion of world disability day, in which 16 students from Ritham participated and won four first prizes, five second prizes and one third prize.

Senior Special Educators and Chennai Executive committee members from The Madhuram Narayanan Center for Exceptional children spent their valuable time with Ritham’s special educators and shared their knowledge with them. They conducted orientation classes for parents and staff, assessed the kids and counseled the parents. A total of sixty-eight students benefitted through this programme.