Workshop in therapeutic riding at secondary school Marta Mata (Barcelona)

Abstract

Students with varying degrees of mental and physical disabilities tend to have a low level of self-sufficiency. In the secondary school system, without explicit help or assistance, they can experience many difficulties during their learning and integration process. The high school environment requires them to develop efficient strategies and basic skills so that they may have a thoroughly positive relationship with the other students. If the school system does not consider their specific educational needs, it may oblige them to cover the same contents over and over again, even to the point of having separate classrooms or other types of disintegration. The Marta Mata High School in Montornès del Vallès (Institut Marta Mata de Montornès del Vallès), has a Special Education Support Unit (SESU). The desire to provide inclusion and improved learning opportunities for special needs students gave rise to the idea of helping them in a different way: by working more cross-categorically (or transversely) through centres of interest and with real-life experiences that might help them acquire greater sensorial integration. Within the framework of this strategy and the centre’s educational project, a therapeutic riding course was included in these students’ curriculum.