Skills of Self-Confidence
March 26 saw the opening of Believe in Yourself Ninth Oblast Festival of Handicapped Children’s Creative Activities. Over 250 handicapped children from all the regions of Kyiv oblast came to the festival. At the Kosmos [Space] Sanitarium in the village of Pukhivka, Brovary district, activities in the fine arts, wood curving, appliquО, etc. went on for a week. The disabled youngsters were also taught to make various handicraft out of glass beads, to create soft toys, and competed in choreography and poetry. The organizers of the festival were hoped to help children to get rid of feeling lonely and inferior.
In the words of Natalia Potiekhina, workshop instructor, most of handicapped children are very talented and have a well-developed creative imagination. Although, due to a lack of specialists able to help them reveal their abilities, many of their works remain unprofessional. Children need guidance by qualified teachers. Unfortunately, conducting such a festival once a year is not enough to develop their creative potential.
During the festival some exhibitions of handicapped young people’s works are conducted, and there was even a calendar published in Lviv based on their paintings. Undoubtedly, the creative work of physically challenged children differs from that of other children of the same age. Psychologist Natalia Miroshnychenko states that such works, especially paintings, are distinguished by the constant presence of fear, lack of self-confidence, and a desire for isolation from the external world. The dominant theme of their works are dreams that did not come true.
The participants themselves see this festival as a chance to meet old friends and to find new ones. “I have come here for the eighth time and can say with certainty that the festival has raised me,” says Iryna, one who took part. “Thanks to it, I have become freer in communicating with people. I have also made a lot of new friends and acquaintances; I have grown stronger morally. When I heard that my friend who has the same physical disabilities as I do entered the university, I understood that I can also achieve something in life.”
Such events often stimulate the disabled to think about their future, acquire skills, and get jobs. Today seventy enterprises in Kyiv hire the handicapped. Unfortunately, not all the parents and children themselves are actively taking care about their own future. In the words of festival organizers, working with such families they quite often encounter parental passivity and apathy. This is why a social service worked at the festival for them, where legal, psychological, and social problems were discussed, while in the studios work was in full swing with the children enthralled with their painting, modeling, and knitting.
