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Brazil is
a signatory both to the Jomtien Agreement (Thailand, 1990) and to the
World Declaration on Education for All (Salamanca, 1993) which support
educational practices aimed at satisfying the basic learning needs of
individuals, the full development of their human potential, and the improvement
of their quality of life and knowledge and participation as citizens in
the cultural transformation of their community.
In line with this commitment, Brazil's
National Educational Guidelines of 1996 and the National Guidelines for
Special Education in Primary Education recommend the inclusion of people
who have serious disabilities or significant learning difficulties in
mainstream education systems. To this end it proposes that the Union,
the States and Municipal governments collaborate in order to implement
inter-sector initiatives that facilitate and put into operation educational
systems that will address the specific and educational needs arising from
disabilities.
There has been significant development
in Brazil relating to the concept of Special Educational Needs, and national
guidelines have been produced to encourage educational systems to organize
and restructure themselves and to develop educational programs and inclusion
plans jointly with families, schools and specialized institutions that
provide support for inclusion.
In the area of childhood education,
there has been a great advance in the acceptance of the concept of education
as a social right. The medical model of caregiving, based upon a clinical
approach to early intervention, has evolved towards a social-educational
focus that values diversity, family life and the modification of the environment
to promote the development and learning processes of children with Special
Educational Needs.
The Ministry of Education, acting
through the National Office of Special Education together with Primary
Education, has developed practical advice in the form of Educational Strategies
and Guidelines for the Education of Children with Special Educational
Needs (2003). The eight volumes of the guidelines include: Introduction,
Accentuated Learning Difficulties or Limitations in the Developmental
Process, Autism, Multiple Disabilities, Physical Disabilities, Communication
and Signing Difficulties, Visual Impairment, Hearing Impairment, Deafblindness
and Gifted Children. These materials will be distributed to each of the
5.800 Brazilian municipalities who will become responsible for their local
dissemination and for putting their content into practice.
Similarly, materials have been developed
for the development of human resources to support the inclusion of students
with disabilities in mainstream classrooms at the level of primary education.
These include guidance for class teachers on teaching strategies, access
to the curriculum, curricular access, adaptation of materials and the
additional curriculum. In the area of visual impairment three documents
have been prepared: Understanding Visual Impairment, The Education of
Visually-Impaired Students and Rehabilitation.
The Ministry of Education, through
the National Office of Special Education in partnership with ABEDEV -
the Brazilian Association of Educators of People with Visual Impairment
- created 25 CAPs - Teaching Support Centers for Inclusion - a project
conceived by Marilda Moares Garcia Bruno, a member of ICEVI-Brazil. This
project was implemented by the Ministry of Education to provide support
and assistance for the inclusion of children and young people with visual
impairment and support for teachers and parents in various Brazilian states.
The Teaching Support Centers produce
Braille and large print books, run workshops on adapting teaching materials
and resources and make available assistive technology resources that students
can use at the centers. They also take on responsibility for providing
training and carrying out educational research in partnership with universities
and specialist organizations.
Large urban centers are served by
specialist organizations such as Laramara, the Fundacao Dorina Nowill
and the Santa Casa de Misericordia in Sao Paulo; CEPRE in Campinas; the
Instituto Benjamin Constant in Rio de Janeiro and the Instituto de Cegos
in Salvador, Bahia among others. These organizations provide a range of
services incuding the assessment of vision, early intervention programs,
evaluation and guidance for integration developments, and student based
programs such as orientation and mobility, daily living activities, communication,
Braille and abacus techniques. They also provide adaptive technology and
other special aids.
The great challenge facing our country
is the inclusion of students with multiple disabilities in schools. To
respond to this challenge, Lararama, in Sao Paulo, has led study groups
on inclusion and has provided further education and training for teachers
with an ecological focus aimed at developing leadership within families
and communities to face problems encountered in daily life. It has also
created specialized support materials on inclusion for students, teachers
and parents and furnished specialized equipment and technical assistance
to enable access to the curriculum. For example, since 1999, Laramara
has distributed 1681 Perkins braille writers and 152 Tatrapoint braille
writers throughout the country, 1001 of which have been delivered at no
cost to visually impaired users with the support of sponsors and donation
campaigns.
Brazil is an immense country, full
of contradictions. It is undeniable that in the last 10 years our country
has made great strides in the area of legislation, and has developed recommendations
and guidelines to ensure the social rights and inclusion of people with
visual impairment in schools, the workplace and society. However, what
leaves us perplexed is the fact that even though there are services available
such as the ones we have mentioned, in practice, students with visual
impairment and their families cannot find in all schools the necessary
resources and support to meet their specific needs.
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