BAPMT opens a column and conversation on Context and Psychomotricity issues. In the section “Psychomotricity and Context” we will publish materials about the application of the method in institutional and social contexts – nurseries, kindergartens, schools, hospitals, nursing homes, psychiatric clinics and all places where the method can have an application. For this purpose we will look at world experience, show (describe) it and compare it with the Bulgarian context.
We take this task as creating a link with civilization and as preventing the identification ambiguity that always appears when we are starting out in something – a method, a field, a paradigm, a place – who am I when I learn something new and is it possible to learn it from a distance and without touching and exploring how it is done through good examples of application. In an attempt to create a contextual connection, we will seek explanations of who, when, why and how Psychomotricity is offered for children and in what institutions, and explore Psychomotricity as part of the culture of all child development settings.
In August, BAPMT will have its first exciting events – some members of the association will make a study visit to the municipality of Reutlingen in Germany, where they will learn about the application of Psychomotoricity in a children’s hospital and in a full-day kindergarten (called a kitty there).
The first visit will be to a clinic for child and adolescent medicine. There, psychomotor principles are an integral part of the treatment facility – architecture, play areas, staff training to support hospitalized children and their parents emotionally (in addition to medically), ethics of treating children, application of play approaches to alleviate possible traumatization resulting from medical procedures, etc. This is an example of hope.
There will also be reports from a psychomotor (sports) kindergarten and interviews with the people there – how did they come to have the children play all day with the facilities, in nature or in the water, together with each other and with the adult, what is the secret of raising and educating children through movement, freedom and play and why do the children play all day long and does it please their educators instead of bothering them and making them “stick” to chairs? It turns out that psychomotor kindergartens are commonplace in Germany. One such can be viewed here. Note how systematically psychomotor thinking is present in the architecture, furniture, agendas, groups, activities with the children, etc. We’ll have a first-person account of it soon.
Special thanks to prof. Amara Eckert for revealing the psychomotor side of kindergartens and children’s hospitals in Germany. Note how systematically psychomotor thinking is present in architecture, furniture, agendas, groups, and activities with children. We await more revelations, Prof. Eckert?
Vania Dunkova
