Projects - School
"Little Beavers" Project of the new school and services for complex needs children in the Czech Republic
Why to start this project:
Czech Republic is one of the most successful countries in the world to save very
premature babies and has a high level of health care system. These babies being
saved unfortunately have many health problems and most of them develop severe
complex needs.
This is one of the reasons why the population of the complex needs children
grows rapidly every year in our country and also other countries of EU.
Unfortunately the education and care of such complex needs children later on in
their life is problematic and not easily accessible to all families in different
regions of CR. A considerable number of such children end up spending their
childhood in special orphanages.
For the last 7 years the program „Little Beavers“ successfully provided an
education program with therapies for children with severe complex needs
(bobrici-kombivady.cz). This program is inspired by UK and USA system from where
our therapists got the experience from. The aim is to help the children and
their families to develop and improve their life under the non-profit
organization Pink Crocodile (www.pink-crocodile.org).
Students from the Little Beavers are in majority deaf blind children, deaf
children with cerebral palsy, deaf and learning difficulties, deaf-autistic and
various syndromes. Several of these children come from the orphanages.
The current program runs once a week where the children and their parents from
all over the Czech republic, but also children from the orphanage and their
dedicated foster mothers (another program run by Pink Crocodile) join a number
of volunteer therapists. The parents are asked to repeat the therapies
throughout the week and keep a log book to monitor improvements and changes of
their children.
Most parents of the complex needs children have been asking asking for further
help since they cannot find proper care and future education for their children.
However, this voluntary class provides a once a week course only and has limited
services to be able to cover the needs of all the children which apply.
This obvious request from the parents and children is now to find larger and
permanent facilities, where daily education is available with more specialists
and caretakers. Many children live far away from Prague and would require
overnight stay facilities and services as well.
Therefore, Pink Crocodile is aiming to open a proper full-time centre for
complex needs children with the complex diagnostics, early intervention
services, individual and group therapies, kindergarten, elementary school and
residence for such children. The capacity of the children is planned for 30–35
children.
Our goal:
Establish a full time Little Beavers School in Prague with the following
capabilities:
* Kindergarten and elementary school program
* Special pedagogy diagnostics and care
* Individual and group therapies
* Early Intervention
* Occasional residence