Workshop today

Today I was involved in my first training workshop. We were asked to do a general session about special needs to a group of Primary Teachers Grade 6 (top class). The three of us worked together and set up a participatory workshop in the style recommended by VSO. We did some things about disability awareness, causes of difficulties in learning to read, vision and hearing testing, teaching in different styles, adapting expectations to the needs of the child. It was very interesting as we all three have very different approaches, but all in all it went off well. We will be developing the ideas so that we can do similar for people at any level in the education system. The whole system is based on teaching the same thing at the same level at the same time, so there needs to be a root and branch change - it is difficult to see that happening within the reality of the education system here, along with current constraints financially. Still all we can do is to attempt to be models of good practice, and not be critical. Tricky though...
I am hoping to get my first project proposal in soon which is to get (charity) funding for a Braille embosser and use it to produce materials for people wanting to learn Grade 1 Braille, and to learn to read.
Cheers
Kate