Karate and mental health; Teaching children with disability and the results are amazing
Karate for better mental health; Lets make inclusion easier.
About You
Location
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Your idea
Sport
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Year the initative began (yyyy)
2007
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Project URL (include HTTP://)
Positioning of your initiative on the mosaic diagram:
Which of these barriers is the primary focus of your work?
Few effective tools for personal improvement
Which of the principles is the primary focus of your work?
Include through sport
If you believe some other barrier or principle should be included in the mosaic, please describe it and how it would affect the positioning of your initiative in the mosaic:
Use of karate for psychological and physiological change for physically and mentally disabled population is not much appreciated. Its a slow process, of course not to forget you need to be a trained person to teach them karate apart from just being a black belt.
Name Your Project
Karate and mental health; Teaching children with disability and the results are amazing
Describe Your Idea
Karate for better mental health; Lets make inclusion easier.
Innovation
What is your signature innovation, your new idea, in one sentence?
Karate for better mental health; Lets make inclusion easier.
Describe your innovation. What makes your idea unique and different than others doing work in the field?
Along with Karate, Games, Meditation, Drawing sessions – for eye-hand coordination and dance where carried out to see the exact impact of karate training. Training sessions last for 1-1.30 hour, basic warm up of the upper and lower body is carried out. The neck, shoulders, wrist, knee, feet and fingers are focused. Hips and lower back exercise are done to relax them. After 2 months of training, the schedule was changed. Time of rest was reduced and more sets of different exercise were included. Lot of hand and leg coordination exercise is introduced to them.. These residents are fast learners and performance is good. After observing changes in body posture and control, different combinations of leg exercise were introduced, putting body pressure on one leg and different sets of upper body exercise. To maintain motivation and for change, I used to involve them in different activities like drawing, passing the ball, ball catch, and dance. The change seen makes me different from others.
What are the existing barriers, the biggest problem, your innovation is hoping to address/change?
Finance is the biggest problem, along with it proper space and mode of travel for these children. The organizations who work with children with disability are not so open with the idea of karate teaching, hence making things more difficult.
Delivery Model: How do you implement your innovation and apply it to the challenge/problem you are addressing?
With proper training and being focused these are the changes that were observed;
• Sense of responsibility (they now understand that they have to complete the task as per the instruction)
• Developed eye-hand coordination (filling the color’s in the shape itself )
• Controlled motor skill (control of fingers while filling the color, the pressure applied while drawing)
• Sense of achievements
• Developed cognitive skill
• Developed eye-hand coordination skill
• Developed motor skill
• Developed discrimination skill (which color to fill in which shape)
• Discipline (sit in a place and complete the task. without making noise)
With the set of observation the children can perform on many different activities with utmost ease; a stage to demonstrate their new skills makes inclusion easy and it will help spread this innovation and replicate else where too. Its this hidden power of this sport. But for this to happen organizations need to partner so that I can train them.
How do you plan to grow your innovation?
The children under training needs to be on stage to be role models for others. The plan to grow is very slow as along with teaching proper funding is also required. This module of course needs time to reflect change and its not necessary that the same replica of set exercise will work in another place. Proper understanding for the physical and mental condition of the child is necessary to start any set of given task with him/her. Also these children should have the interest to join the class. We can only spend 45 mins of effective learning time that will help them grasp the exercises.
With proper funding; multiple classes of different batches are possible making the change grow at faster level. Training couple of more people to carry the set modules will help expansion easier.
Impact
Provide one sentence describing your impact/intended impact.
The joy to see a cerebral palsy girl balancing herself on her toes for couple seconds
What impact has your innovation had to date/or what is your intended impact? Exactly who are the beneficiaries?
Children with different types of disabilities are under martial art training. These children suffer from; mild, moderate, profound mental retardation, cerebral palsy, depression, Attention deficit disorder, Behavioral problems, multiple disabilities and downs syndrome. Children, care takers and parent have benefited with this.
With proper training and being focused these are the changes that were observed; this is the change observed;
• Sense of responsibility (they now understand that they have to complete the task as per the instruction)
• Developed eye-hand coordination (filling the color’s in the shape itself )
• Controlled motor skill (control of fingers while filling the color, the pressure applied while drawing)
• Sense of achievements
• Developed cognitive skill
• Developed eye-hand coordination skill
• Developed motor skill
• Developed discrimination skill (which color to fill in which shape)
• Discipline
How many people have you served directly?
30 . This was when I was training them directly in the year 2005. Now I have almost 10 children whom I train they are deaf and dumb. This training is being carried out in a deaf and dumb school and along with my teacher I have specially carried out some special module for them.
How many people have you served indirectly?
don't know
Please list any other measures reflective of the impact of your innovation?
These are the other changes that can be seen and observed. It was a hard work of 5-6 months to achieve this.
• Improved body control
• Flexibility
• Trust (seating position of the residents who don’t get along are placed in such a manner that they pass the ball to each other, henceforth developing trust)
• Cooperation
• Stamina
• Improved breathing
• Muscle control
• Low aggression
• Togetherness
What are the main barriers to creating or achieving your impact?
Change is slow process and change comes with resistance attached with it. Proper opportunities given to these children to demonstrate their skills will help in creating more new psychological and physiological improvements. Its very diffcult to convince the organization about what you are looking forward to give, there is lot of resistance in the management for new things. If they happen to have the knowledge of the sport then they would like to consider else no no no no.
This Entry is about (Issues)
Sustainability
How is your initiative financed (or how do you expect your initiative will be financed)?
Self funded; now with no funds I rarely take classes. With proper funding more classes can be taken and with proper demonstration performed by these children, change can be seen for real. The changes are slow but prominent and it takes time as it needs lot of patience.
If known, provide information on your finances and organization.
Self funded
What is the potential demand for your innovation?
I don't know what demand is out there ! But believe me this sports is amazing tool for inclusion and for better mental health for people with disability.
What are the main barriers to financial sustainability?
This is the main barrier as I have not asked for any funds and had been doing this with my own zeal for the betterment for children. Now I have to look for sustainability only then I can advance to higher levels. As of now due to financial problem I am not teaching them. And getting finance for this cause; its difficult too.
The Story
What is the origin of this innovation? Tell us your story.
When first I had to work with children with disability, it was really difficult to get started with them. It was a government orphanage. For few days it seemed as if nothing is working as per plan. Being trained in karate (Black Belt 2nd Dan) I decided to start with some discipline course module, as without discipline nothing can be achieved. Surprisingly it turned out to be sooo well, the progress that was registered was amazing. Changes were observed (positive changes) that gave me a new eye for development and altogether new area of sports for development of these gifted children.
Please provide a personal bio. Note this may be used in Changemakers marketing material.
Anand Koti is a graduate in Industrial Psychology (H), PG in Industrial Relations and Personnel Management, PG in Hospital and Health Management (H) and has done his foundation course in Education with special needs children (Rehabilitation Council of India). He is a 2nd Dan Black Belt in Karate. He has an expertise in vocational training, and has worked with patients who have chemical dependencies, HIV/AIDS and who are terminally ill. He is presently writing a couple of articles on mental health and a book on mental health and martial arts. He is based in India.
How did you hear about this contest and what is your main incentive to participate? (this is confidential)
Ashoka website
Affiliation (please list all that apply)
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Comments
Hi Anand,
just a few quick questions: Are these children you´re working with still the ones from the orphanage? What is your framework exactly? How do you and these children get together in the first place? Do you have any explicit paedagogical approach/method? And could you elaborate a little more on your idea of mental health and how karate training contributes to it?
Best,
Jasper Nicolaisen
Free University Berlin
Hello Jasper,
Right now am working with children who are not from the orphanage. I have got my karate classes and one of the classes is for special need children they are great when they perform. After doing a need assessment I start my training; main focus is the development to be seen not teaching him karate.
Martial Arts is a discipline involving the whole body as it concentrates the mind as well as conditioning the physique. It is a form of escapism as you focus on the moves you are making. When the physical and mental state are as one and they control the same movement, the bodies muscles will be in their entirety and the mental state will benefit. Learning how to control your movement into a fluid and adaptable motion will also benefit other areas of your life, such as the ability to understand one's own mind better. It has also been proven from studies that "exercise appears to be associated with positive changes in mood states and reductions in anxiety and depression". (Weinberg & Gould, 1999).
It's not surprising, of course: martial arts -- even mild forms like Tai Chi -- have long been known to confer tremendous anti-aging health benefits to their followers. Throughout Asia, it's not uncommon to see large groups of elderly (people in their 60's, 70's and 80's) practicing Tai Chi at sunrise in the community parks. Despire their age, these people have better aerobic conditioning, balance, strength, flexibility and coordination than many typical Americans in their 30's who are already suffering from chronic diseases like diabetes, obesity and cancer. People who practice Tai Chi simply don't experience those diseases with anywhere near the frequency. As a result, they live longer, healthier, happier lives.
Thanking you,
Regards,
Anand
Hi Anand:
I wanted to draw your attention to a few other projects on the changemakers site also working with children with a disability:
- paralympic school day
- zambian paralympic sports
- mysa inclusive sports initiative
- and others...
I am a boxing coach. I do not work with children with intellectual disabilities but with children and young women using wheelchairs or other mobility devices. Please take a look at my entry (Boxgirls roadwork) and lets start a discussion around how to define what fighting sports bring to youth. You could also look at the Fight for Peace entry. Luke has an exceptional programme based in Brazil but expanding all over.
All the best from Berlin
Heather Cameron
Heather Cameron
Free University Berlin
University Challenge
Thank you so much with the references. I like what you are doing ? Yes, and am sure you tooo would be able to see many psychological changes in the longer run while you are imparting boxing training program.
I will write more,
Regards,
Anand
Dear Anand,
We are impressed by the karate lessons you are giving to such a divers group and we would love to join the training once to see how you are working. It is great that you include children with all kind of disabilities, but we were wondering if you also plan to include people without disabilities or to make your children joining able-bodied clubs. Because in your entry you speak about the power of sport in inclusion, but it is not clear to us what you mean by inclusion. Besides, we would like to know if you work together with the national Paralympic Committee or Special Olympics, since they might be able to help you with the growing of the project.
We wish you all the luck.
Pierre and Steffi
University of Paris
Dear Pierre and Steffi,
Thank you so much for your comments, yes I do have classes for people without disabilities where inclusion is being made. Also we do have tournaments where able - disable participate with no special rules. And this has been amazing.
Thank you for your advice, I would look into those.
Thanking You,
Regards,
Anand
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