Areas of Operation
1. Special School.Lebenshilfe organizes a special school with day care facility from nursery to vocational.
2. Blossom Buds.
A special classroom facility creation for people with learn disabilities. This activity is supported by GILDA (Geneva India Learning Disability Association, Switzerland) with Nadine Kempf, psychologist as its president.
3. Vocational Units.
a) Carpentry: Making wooden vegetables
b) Candle making
c) Tailoring, embroidery and sewing
e) Book-binding
g) Toy making
i) Cleaning powder and phenyl making
h) Greeting cards preparation
f) Kitchen management and cafeteria organization
j) Leaf-plate making (preparation of laminated dry leaves) etc.
Mode of Training
1. Each child is taught under methodical guidance in a homely atmosphere creation.
2. Lebenshilfe Special School initiates simplest thinking process in the M.R. Children and prepares them for an appropriate emotional participation.
3. Emphasis is given on acquired basic skills through constant repetition.
4. Definite goals are set for developing each child's potential in view of the abilities and attitudes.
5. Each child is encouraged to complete a given task in the classroom as well as residential situations.
6. Love and Affection play a major role in shaping these M.R. Children suitable for social integration.
Therapies
Application of various therapeutic approaches intervention through:
1. Tiger Dance therapy
2. Theatre & Dance (Mythological and Folk)
3. Snoezelen, Dutch therapy, a sensory world creation.
4. Group Therapy: Group singing (Bhajans and Devotional songs), Group listening (story telling), group drawings paintings, group walk etc activities come under this program. Group participation plays a major role in this therapy
5. Music therapy (both vocal and instrumental)
6. Speech therapy
7. Physiotherapy
8. Yoga therapy
9. Raga Therapy (basing on Indian Classical Music)
10. Sports and Games
Academic Skills
Children are taught alphabet, arithmetic, concept formation, time-management, comparative value of money, a little bit of science, social, general knowledge, moral science, religion, self help skills, drawing and painting etc. aiming at personal and personality development. Each child's individual abilities to learn are taken into consideration.
Lebenshilfe's Sports Club
Encourages each child's full participation in both indoor and outdoor games. Several hundreds of Medals won by the mentally challenged of Lebenshilfe during the Special Olympics at District, State and National levels speak on the strength of this sports club.
Organization of Special Olympics: Lebenshilfe under the dynamic chairmanship of Mr. A.K. Khan IPS, the then Commissioner of Police, Visakhapatnam, Organized Special Olympics placing Lebenshilfe at its heights. Getting inspired by Eunice S. Kennedy, sister of former U.S. President J.F. Kennedy after meeting and personally speaking to her during the 11th IASSID's world Conference held at Seattle, Washington, U.S.A, founder Saraswathi Devi has taken up this venture by inviting M.R athletes to Visakhapatnam for this purpose. The humanitarian aspect of Visakhapatnam city police was focused while serving over 1000 M.R. athletes that participated from 17 institutions of Andhra Pradesh, with qualitative food, accommodation and transportation free of cost was flabbergasted by one and all.
Lebenshilfe founder T.Saraswathi Devi (Sarah) with Eunice Shriver Kennedy, sister of former U.S president John F. Kennedy and founder Spl. Olympics at Seattle, Washington Aug 2000.
Siblings Education and Recreation
Lebenshilfe organizes separate Seminars for siblings to create a sense of awareness over their responsibility. Siblings participate in the sports events planned for integration of mentally handicapped and non-handicapped with much interest.Transport facility
Lebenshilfe maintains 2 mahendra mini buses to transport the retarded children to special school and back home. These buses are also used to organize field trips, educational tours and excursions.Residential Facility
Residential facility is created at Lebenshilfe for 100 people. Another 100 people are wait-listed for want of accommodation. M.R. People having no parents and whose parents live outside Visakhapatnam are given prime importance for admissionInternships Available
Lebenshilfe made internships available for overseas students interested to study the possibilities available for developmentally disabled people from third world countries.All these retarded people hailing from poorer sections of the society will certainly generate sense of interest, opening new doors for learning and research in the related areas. The synthesis of methodologies drawn from all over the world and developed by the founder, Mrs. T. Saraswathi Devi (Sarah), is unique to special education and proven successful. Innovative therapies developed at Lebenshilfe will certainly open gates for new ideas for the students coming from advanced countries.
Tiger Dance Therapy, developed 26 years ago, with a research value, is a new conceptual and therapeutic innovation, utilizing the ancient and traditional folk arts, promoting total mental as well as physical development. As most of the Tiger hunt jumps are close to yoga postures, it is drawing major focus over the similar results it is producing. Other therapies like theatre, raga therapy, and the facilities from Nursery to vocational, will add value to the intern's experience.
Lebenshilfe is located close to the seashore in a building generously allocated by Municipal Corporation of Visakhapatnam, a city of 1500,000 inhabitants, located on the Bay of Bengal, having a university, a harbor with ship-building facilities, providing a seat for many industries. It will certainly create interest in the students for educational as well tourist reasons.
Valid certification will be provided by Lebenshilfe for submission to the concerned universities after completion of the voluntary working hours of service as per the university's requirement. On-campus accommodation with cooking facilities will be provided at a very reasonable cost.
Interested students may learn more about Lebenshilfe by contacting
Eve Neuhaus at eve@peacedividend.com,
Mary Gale Budzisz, former president IASE USA, at mgbudzisz@aol.com,
Dr Roxanne Gupta, USA at roxannegupta@earthlink.net,
Jaya Uruma, USA at jayasudha at yahoo dot com
T.Saraswathi Devi (Sarah), India at sarah@lebenshilfeindia.org