WHAT WE DO

THERAPEUTIC INTERVENTION

Therapeutic intervention plays a vital role at Satya Special School. The services are provided in the form of individual sessions, group therapy, counselling, and a parent training programme. Each therapy provided to the child helps them to build up his/her personal self-help skills, social skills to help integrate with society, functional academic skills, and group activities for overall development.

Occupational Therapy

Occupational Therapy (OT) promotes the health and well-being of individuals who have conditions that are mentally, physically, developmentally, or emotionally disabling by helping them to improve their ability to perform tasks in their daily living and working environments. This type of therapy assists individuals in performing activities of all types, ranging from using a computer to caring for daily needs such as dressing, cooking, and eating.

Although Puducherry does not have sufficient number of professionals practicing OT, understanding the importance of this therapy in enabling children to develop skills for their everyday life, Satya Special School had started an OT division in 2008. The therapist evaluates the child’s abilities, recommends and provides therapy either in groups or individually as per the needs of the child. The most important aspect of this therapy is the involvement of the family. The needs, desires, and values of the child and family drive the direction of their assessments and intervention. The focus of OT intervention directly reflects the child’s and/or family’s priorities.

Speech Therapy

The most important goal of speech therapy is to provide state-of-the-art therapy facilities free of cost to the disadvantaged population to whom these services are either not available or too expensive. The main area of focus is to improve the child’s existing disability through individualised therapy sessions thereby making them as independent as possible which is an important step towards social inclusion and acceptance.

The children covered under this therapy are those:

who cannot produce speech sounds, or cannot produce them clearly
who have problems with speech rhythm and fluency, such as stuttering, stammering, etc.
who have a problem with understanding and producing language
who have cognitive communication impairment such as attention, memory, and problem-solving disorders
who have swallowing difficulties

Video/audio software is used for enhancing semantic and syntactic abilities, articulation drilling, and vocal parameters include voicing, pitch, and loudness. It will provide visual feedback which will encourage the child to perform better. Satya Special School has had this facility since 2009 and 50 children are provided training using this software

Physio Therapy

The physiotherapy department plays a vital role in the school. It caters to over 90 physically challenged children. Physiotherapy is given to children attending the Early Intervention Centre (0 to 6 years) and Special School (6 to 18 years), children with multiple disability (0-20 years), Adult People with Disabilities (PWD) (15 years and above). The services provided are individual sessions, group therapy, counselling, and parent training programs.

In group therapy, the children are divided into various groups according to their ability level. Group therapy sessions help in peer learning as children are motivated to imitate or repeat activities done by the other children in their group.

Hydrotherapy, Prosthetic & Orthotic Unit

Hydrotherapy

Hydrotherapy is implemented once a week on a one-on-one basis. Children love to play in water and hence hydrotherapy movements are easily achieved inside the water. Weight Reduction Therapy also keeps the children from becoming obese and remain healthy. Around 25 children benefit from this programme.

Prosthetic & Orthotic Unit

Set up in November 2015 to provide assistive devices not only to students of Satya but to the general public as well. It provides low cost, high quality aids and appliances for CWSNs in Puducherry. 350 Aids and Appliances have been distributed in the last 3 years.

For children at Satya, Physiotherapists make the necessary assessments prior to prescribing appliances like splints, bracers, belts supportive chairs, etc. Satya conducts regular training sessions with staff and parents on the use and maintenance of the aids and appliances.

Sensory Integration Therapy

Sensory Integration Therapy is a direct one-on-one therapy with the therapist in an environment providing a variety of sensory opportunities. This therapy helps the therapist achieve the following goals in a child:

Functional Behaviour
Motor Skills
Attention
Cognitive skills
Social skills
Self-stimulation

CWSN who show signs of visual dysfunction, auditory dysfunction, tactile dysfunction, vestibular dysfunction, proprioceptive dysfunction connected to the five senses of touch, smell, hearing, vision, and taste need sensory integration therapy. At Satya Special School, we use various methodologies in providing sensory integration therapy:

Stimulation through one-on-one sessions
Stimulation through outdoor activities like sand pits, pebble walks etc.
Secondary stimulation in classroom while teaching other skills and adaptation to actual daily living environment. This facility is one of the few options available for CWSN in this part of the world.

The Sensory pathway cum play ground

For years, we at Satya Special School struggled to find a park for our children’s leisure activities. Normally, equipment such as swings, see-saws, or slides are just not designed with inclusion as a criterion. In 2014, we were able to make this dream a reality for our special needs children when we were able to put together an ‘all-inclusive play park’ and opened it to our children and the public at large. What makes this play park special is that all play equipment has been designed to accommodate children with disabilities. For instance, the park has been furnished with swings and modified swings for children in wheelchairs. Similarly, the merry-go-round has special seating with ample support for children to sit without any kind of discomfort. In addition, a sand pit has also been provided for leisure activities.

The Sensory pathway cum play ground is accessible, inclusive, and welcoming for children of varied abilities, and which offers opportunities for supporting sensory and motor development, as well as facilitating positive social communication and active participation.

To make inclusion a reality, Satya Special School works with the community towards awareness through trainings and workshops, capacity building and knowledge sharing through partnerships, livelihood programs to support the family of children with special needs, and works towards training and research.

Alternative Therapy

Right from the beginning, we were always aware of the positive effects of alternative therapies. In addition to traditional time-tested therapies, our focus has also been on alternative therapies such as dance, music, and art therapy. The response from both the children and the parents towards these therapies has always been positive.

Play, Dance, Music & Art Therapy

Play Therapy

Play is a fundamental activity which is indispensable to the development and blossoming of every individual. For children, it is complementary to all activities connected to learning. Children with Special Needs often do not get an opportunity to play without any inhibitions. In order to provide these deprived children an opportunity to express themselves through free play method, the project was launched in partnership with Chemins D’Enfances, Leon, France, an organisation involved in running play centres to relieve children from unknown fear, stress, and a way of improving inter personal skills. Launched in 2010, the play centre and Ludo Mobil project has been very successful in helping children from difficult situations gain self-confidence while learning problem solving and communication skills. A total of 536 children from Satya Special School and three partnering organizations are being benefited by this programme.

Dance Therapy

The students are trained in techniques that help them gain a better posture, balance, and coordination. Simple body movements and group activities help children gain immense confidence which is evident from the public performances of these students. All children between the ages of six and 15 years undergo dance sessions three hours a week. The children enjoy these sessions immensely and actively participate in them.

Music Therapy

Mr. Nigel Osborne, world-renowned music therapist, University of Edinburgh, UK has visited our premises twice to train our students in using music as a means to communicate with each other. By combining the five senses along with rhythms and sounds created, he made CWSNs of Satya Special School develop a song with rhythm and sing it. He explained how music therapy works and how we can make differently abled children improve their speech and psychomotor skills.

Art Therapy

What started as an experiment in 2007, materialized into a regular session with artists, educators, and volunteers. The children learn to play with colour using various mediums like paper, hard board, canvas, etc. The colours used by the children are a direct reflection of the mood of the child – with a happy child using bright colours and a troubled and disturbed child using dull/pale colours.

Mobile Therapy Unit

Was initiated understanding the difficulties of large number of severely disabled children found hidden away in the four walls of their homes due to lack of –awareness, financial resources, transportation, level of mobility or in some cases lack of will from the family members in treating the children. Since the launch in February 2010, the Mobile Therapy Unit, has helped us "REACH THE UNREACHABLE".

Satya covers 44 villages with the aim of providing facilities like physiotherapy, speech therapy to the door step of the children with special needs with the emphasis of the mother or any family member being a part of the process as a co-therapist. Most of the children with severe loco motor disabilities have been helped by our MTU service.

Neuro Developmental Therapy

The Neuro-Developmental Therapy (NDT) is a therapy that helps children carry on with their life functions with the least amount of effort but utmost efficiency. NDT is also called the Bobath Method of treating cerebral palsy; the method developed by the Neuro-Developmental Treatment Association holistically combines physical therapy, occupational therapy (OT), and speech language pathology. It is based on the brain’s ability to reorganize and recover after neurological insult (neuroplasticity). This approach to neurological rehabilitation is multidisciplinary with the aim of helping children address aspects such as controlling movements to aid mobility and independence.

At Satya Special School, around 50 children with multiple disabilities receive NDT in addition to physiotherapy and hydrotherapy. Periodic training programmes are held to create awareness amongst parents wherein case studies are presented, and experiences shared among therapists, parents, and special educators.

Participate

Sponsor therapy for a Child with Special Needs

Participate