Art is not only healer for the one who receives and enjoys it; also (and more, if possible) for the one who make it. Artistic creativity is a common good, and all people are able to develop it if they find the right environment. We truly believe in the power of art as a way of expressing, communicating and flourishing creativity, as a very useful tool to work different aspects about life with teenager/young students and with/without disabilities. In art there is no disability, there is expression and enjoyment, and our project pretends use it as a way to improve our students life’s, and promote inclusion in a European context. We want them to shine and find the best version of themselves, sharing this amazing experience with a school of other European country first, and then with the world. In this sense we also base our project in the power of art as therapy in its different disciplines. The main goals of our project are: Recognizing, expressing and managing emotions through art, sharing this artistic experiences with people from another country and work on good practices between both centres. Promoting cooperation, inclusion of young people with special needs and tolerance. We also intend to develop social skills and promote personal autonomy and give more visibility to people with special needs from a realistic and positive vision. And also solve the socioeconomic differences. The project "Inclusion through Arts" was born with the collaboration of a Spanish Special Education School from Madrid and an Italian inclusive education centre in Cagliari. We have been in contact for the last two years, and we are in tune in terms of working inclusion through arts. In the Spanish school will participate in the project all the students (184 between 12 and 21 years old, all with intellectual disability) and staff (49). In the Italian school will participate 100 students between 16 and 17 years old (8 of them with different disabilities) and 10 teachers. To achieve our goals we will develop different activities for two years, some specific of each centre, and some shared activities like “The Travelling Roll”, “Shared Drawings”, “Special Music” videoclip, “Collaborative Theatre” and “European Music Fest” (all of them developed in “Timetable” of this document). A very important activity are the mobilities of students and teachers: We have planned to make one trip each year to reinforce the experiences and learnings, to complete common activities and to program and evaluate the program. During this exchanges it is essential that students and staff involved could share a residence because of the special needs of both groups (behavioral issues, medication, wheelchair, social and autonomy issues…). We pretend to strengthen the use of arts in both schools, and reflect all the achievements in our curricular projects. We believe that this project could change our way of working and could be very good for our students, their families, other schools that want to work inclusion, and all the society (knowing the reality of a minority through their art). We will continually inform all the educational community of both schools, the educational authorities, organizations with common interests, media (press, local, regional and national newspapers, educational magazines and websites…), e-twinning, and our local and regional environment. We will do it through the blog of the project, websites of both centres, and inviting all of them to meet us at the Final Exhibitions. At the end of the project, final videos, photos and articles will be presented in all mentioned platforms, so they will show the impact that the project had on their communities, hoping that through its diffusion, future Erasmus + participants can benefit. Everyone could download the materials from the workspaces of the project so that anyone interested in their use can access them freely.
"Inclusion through Arts" has been our engine and compass, our shelter and also our responsibility, our joy and our goal, the place where we have been in the last three courses in two European schools: Colegio de Educación Especial A la Par (Madrid, Spain) and the classic liceum and Liceo Clasico e Scientifico Euclide (Cagliari, Italy). The title was already a statement of intentions, and tries to summarize many of the objectives that we marked when starting this adventure. We believed, and we believe, that all people, regardless of their condition, have a great capacity to communicate and, from there, express feelings, emotions and ways of seeing the world and society that surrounds us through the different artistic disciplines: A drawing, a photograph, a movement, a song ... are very valuable elements to relate to others, to get closer to the others without barriers, without prejudice, with a clean and new look. In short, to share on equality. And this, among many other things, is what art gives us. Initially the project was designed to be developed during two courses, but due to the complex situation created worldwide by the Covid 19, we had the option of expanding it one more course, so we did it. There have been many changes and certain complications in these years, but thanks to the work of both centers and the joy and excitement of all the participants, each bump has been an opportunity to do things better. And also, with a positive view, this situation has helped us reinvent and work in our creativity and imagination even more. The two partners have made a series of shared artistic activities, through which it has been intended to create a great network, in which they were included in one way or another, and always on a horizontal plane, many of the sectors of the society that surrounds us. We value very positively the results obtained, having overcome its fulfillment and expectations with them, and we are deeply satisfied and proud of the development and final result of this whole project. It has been an authentic boost for both educational communities, giving rise to the schools, encourage the use of artistic activities and reformulate certain aspects of the curriculum. It has mobilized students, families and staff, and even our communities, generating new expression and communication spaces and, sometimes, more simple and rich. It has been an excellent opportunity to put in touch and work together very different people and very diverse sectors. For students, specifically, it has been a reason to work on improving their social and autonomy skills, and has undoubtedly favored compliance with educational objectives at the center level. And also aided to generate a vision outside the centers, in society (neighborhoods, cities, even at the state and international level), more realistic, close and positive of people with intellectual disabilities. Furthermore, in the case of the Italian school, being an inclusive school, all the common activities proposed, carried out as far as possible through workshops, have absolutely favored the process of inclusion of disabled students in the maimstream school context. One of the pillars has been the constant and fluid contact that has been between both partners through mails, video calls, whatsapp ... Fortunately technology has allowed us to be permanently in contact despite the distance, which has facilitated development and taking of consensual decisions. Italian partners could take their trip to Madrid and enjoy, know, learn and be surprised by all aspects of Spanish culture in general and Madrid in particular. They visited places of artistic and tourist interest, learned the customs, they knew the city, gastronomy...Four of the students participating in the mobility had intellectual disability, one of them also goes in a wheelchair. The group was perfectly integrated into the dynamics of the Spanish center. They made music, theater, crafts, dance and cooking workshops, and participated in activities such as the mural "Vivir es convivir". One of the biggest difficulties has been that the Spanish center could not return the visit to our italian partners in Cagliari, because of the pandemic. So we had to adapt and reformulate some of the objectives and activities initially proposed; but this incidence made us sharpening the ingenuity and creativity, and thanks to online meetings between the two centers, we were able to continue working without problems the different activities, those scheduled at the beginning (some reformulated, such as the videoclip "Tú y yo") and those created during the progress of the project. As a final colophon of the project, a great exhibition with all the work carried out among all the students of the two centers was designed in the Spanish center. Each piece of art was accompanied by a poster with a QR code from which a video was accessed showing the protagonists telling how they had done it, as well as images of the creation process.