In late 2010, a group of Transition Year students from Greenhill, Drogheda, decided to enter the 2011 Young Social Innovators (YSI) competition. Their project is about deafness, so they contacted IDK for initial information. The YSI competition is held every March at the RDS in Dublin, to encourage students to use their skills and talents to create a
IDK’s February 19th life-skills workshop for deaf/hard-of-hearing teens, was a chance to catch up with attendees from the first workshop (October 2010). Very satisfactorily, at least two attendees reported progress with big issues they’d been struggling with. After the first workshop, they felt empowered to look at their issues differently, and to try a different approach.
Schools in Ireland received a €43 million investment for IT systems in November 2010 from the Department of Education, but this total is insufficient, according to the National Centre for Technology in Education (NCTE). Here’s why all schools need IT investments. This €43 million allocation was good news for schools, but the budget fails to
IDK’s first Life Skills workshop for deaf and hard-of-hearing teens in Dublin yesterday, was high-energy and received great feedback (see below). Mike Rossney, the first presenter, used a board-break exercise to show the teens they can break through their own ‘barriers’ if they apply themselves. By taking charge of their fears, they can then move
In May 2010, IDK applied to attend the five-day Creativity: Unlocked international training course, in Salzburg, Austria, from July 12 to 18, 2010. This certified training, funded by the EU’s Youth in Action Programme, brings together individuals from European countries and backgrounds for several days, to develop personal, professional and intercultural competencies. Twenty-two participants from
In Ireland, the Early Childhood Care and Education (ECCE) free pre-school year is set to open up equal education opportunities to children nationwide. The scheme, which is to be rolled out from January 2010, will be available to all pre-schoolers in Ireland, born between 2 February 2005 to 30 June 2006 (exemptions are made for
A new study by the University of East Anglia (UEA) suggests computers are now better at lip-reading than humans. The performance of a computer based lip-reading system was compared to that of 19 human lip-readers. Results showed the computerised system was over 50% better at recognition than the humans completing the same task. Simultaneously, the
On December 5 2009, IDK and Helium will host another Learning Language is Fun! creative play session at the RuaRed arts centre in Tallaght, Dublin. In Sligo, a second, concurrent session will be held upstairs at The Factory Performing Space, Quay Street, with artist Helene Hugel. Both sessions will run from 10:30am to 12pm on
A Plenary Session on Child Literacy and Social Inclusion was organised on June 16 by the National Economic and Social Forum (NESF), at the Royal Hospital in Kilmainham, Dublin. By 2016, the National Action Plan for Social Inclusion 2007-2016 has the goal of reducing the proportion of pupils with serious literacy difficulties in primary schools serving
Reading is a key skill for deaf children to develop, as our world is driven by information. Think about it – your child and their peers will grow up with email, texting, computer tools, captioned TV, DVDs and online video clips. As this website noted recently, digital tools like email, webtext, Skype, video relay or chat, can
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