The project titled “Early Intervention Services for Families with Children with Vision Impairment and Additional Disabilities“, which also includes the Faculties of Health Sciences and Educational Sciences of our University has been completed.
Within the scope of early intervention services, the consortium which consists of ten organizations and six countries had been gathered. The project manager from Turkey is a member of Istanbul Medeniyet University Faculty of Educational Sciences, Assist.Prof. Emine AYYILDIZ and project researchers from our different faculties Prof.Dr. Yeşim GÜLEÇ ASLAN, Dr. Hande ARSLAN ÇİFTÇİ, Assist.Prof. Cem MALAKÇIOĞLU, and Assist.Prof. Gökçe LEBLEBİCİ and Ayşe Nurtaç SÖZBİR contributed to the ErISFaVIA (Early Intervention Services for Families with Children with Vision Impairment and Additional Disabilities-2019-1-EL01-KA201-062886) project, as well as Günebakan Association for Supporting the Blind Children and Their Families (ÇEGDER). The project had been approved by Erasmus + Program (Key Action 2). The main goal of the project, led by the University of Thessaly from Greece, was to reach children aged 0-6 with very impaired visuals.
Early childhood education plays an important role in the development of many children with disabilities, especially those who need special education services. With the early special education services offered in a qualified way, the quality of life of individuals with special needs and their families increases and many final goals of special education can be achieved. Within the scope of this project, since September 2019, face-to-face and online training and services have been provided to the early intervention expert teams of 6 different countries who have been serving infants/children between 0-6 years of age who have special educational needs and their parents but do not have educational access. In addition, various scientific publications were prepared with this project, thus contributing to the scientific literature.
On 28 and 29 April 2022, Istanbul Medeniyet University and representatives of other project partner countries came together at our university and discussed the studies in a multi-faceted manner. On May 21, 2022, a conference with international participation was held under the roof of our university. At the conference, national and international experts made presentations in the context of early childhood education and children with disabilities. In line with the questions of families, educators, and members of different professions who are the participants of the conference, related issues were discussed in detail.
The closing activities of the project, which has been going on since 2019, ended as of August 2022, and it is planned to establish an early intervention service center within our university within the scope of good practices.
