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Arti Deo’s experience as a mother with a special needs child inspired her to start a school to help others.
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Anupam Kher, actor, director and producer |
Mother of a child with special needs, Arti Deo experienced challenges due to lack of awareness, techniques and schools that could assist and accommodate her daughter. Over the years, she took up several courses and learnt different tools from around the world, practised the latest and effective exercises, tools and techniques to make her daughter’s life better.
This motivated Deo to start Academy of Learning and Development: School For Children With Special Needs in 2012 to provide an inclusive and safe space for children with special needs. The academy is managed by the Sushilabai Nanasaheb Deo Charitable Trust and is open to children with autism, cerebral palsy, Down Syndrome, global developmental delay, or any genetic disorders.
“In my experience of 12 years since starting this school, parents come to us when they are up against a wall — when their kids don’t get admission in other schools because they are not toilet trained, they don't have sitting tolerance, they cannot sit in a group, they are not comfortable in groups, etc,” says the founder director.
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They also have students in wheelchairs who need help with daily activities.
Deo explains that what she teaches at school evolves, keeping in mind newer and better ways to teach and assist children with special needs. When she started the school, she had adopted the Doman-Delacato programme and set up the required infrastructure — crawling tracks, creeping tracks, patterning tables, inclined slopes, agility ladder, respiratory patterning machine and so on.
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Students of the academy |
“I learned about the Anat Baniel Method NeuroMovement (ABMNM) and made changes in the school accordingly. We moved slightly away from the physically intensive programmes and we started on a more holistic one,” explains Deo. The school now offers functional academics including concepts of time and money; they encourage group activities, art therapy, pet therapy; they also teach computers, among other things.
Deo, the only ABMNM practitioner in Maharashtra, is the only one in India to have completed all levels of the training.
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As most children have sensory and auditory issues, special care is taken to enable sensory integration. Children of different age groups have attended the school, the youngest as young as two years, and the oldest 27 years.
Introduction of BEMER Vascular Therapy and Integrated Listening Systems has led to great results. BEMER helps better microcirculation and has resulted in up to 29 per cent increased microcirculatory blood flow and 29 per cent increased oxygen utilisation. “This results in improved supply of oxygen to the body, especially the brain. In the Integrated Listening Systems, children hear specific music tracks through bone conduction headphones while they are doing different activities. This helps in overall body and brain functioning, and it also makes activities fun,” explains Deo.
Since 2012, Deo has learnt, trained and implemented various therapies and methods in the school that is located in Andheri. With special educators, Montessori teachers and nutritionists on board, so far, around 120 kids have benefitted. They are now able to integrate into the society, at a much better level.
Actor, director and producer Anupam Kher, who has known of Deo's work for quite some time now, is amazed at the work she has been doing at the academy. He thinks the work is especially vital in India, as the awareness about what children with special needs require, is quite low. "It is remarkable that Arti underwent several courses abroad and implemented it in her academy, a feat that not a lot of people have achieved. She is kind and compassionate and her academy has had far-reaching effects on the students,” says Kher.
