Piano and folk dance courses help disabled children

Children with disabilities, Down syndrome in particular, enjoy playing the piano and performing folk dance in Erzincan as a part of the "Geleceginiz Parmaklarınızın Ucunda" (The Future at your Fingertips) project.

Sponsored by the Erzincan Metropolitan Municipality, the social support program offers piano and folk dance courses to 20 children with disabilities and Down syndrome at the city's public training center. Every week for two hours over the past nine months, children with Down syndrome have learned different folk dances such as "Harmandalı," specific to Western Anatolia, even dawning the traditional performance costumes. Other disabled children learned to play the piano. Municipal Official Ferruh Erkan announced that the 12-month project has almost come to a close. In addition, 36 adolescents take English courses, while 50 children are taught mental calculation. "Children joyfully participate in the courses and we received positive feedback from parents," Erkan said. He stated the municipality brought something new for disabled children. "If we properly use our fingers, they will lead us to success. Otherwise, we fail. We wanted to show how success is so close to us," he concluded. Disabled trainee Ilknur Kirsiz said she really enjoyed playing the piano and thanked her teacher.

Project Manager Ferruh Erkan said that the main purpose of the project is to eliminate barriers for disabled children through piano and folk dance classes. "We have 106 children in the project, 10 of whom are physically disabled and 10 are mentally disabled.

Other children are generally from relatively poor families. We wanted to develop their social and artistic abilities and provide them with the chance to engage in social life with the opportunities our municipality provides for them. We allocated bus services for their transportation to school and back home. The reason why we chose piano training for physically disabled children is that piano helps them to develop their motor skills and use their hands more effectively. We offer folk dance classes for children with Down syndrome so that their memories can get better as they try to remember rhythms and dance figures. For instance, a child who cannot hear and talk now can play piano. Even though the child cannot hear what he plays, the act of pushing the right keys makes him satisfied and enthusiastic," Erkan said.

Ferruh Erkan further explained that they had another educational project for computer use before this art project. The aim of it was to teach children how to use the Internet for good purposes and the difference between the good and bad ways to use it. After the project ended, they granted the computers to the Erzincan Public Training Center for the benefit of other students. Erkan said that they will also grant the pianos to the center after the piano and folk dance courses finish. "Our main purpose is to share life with disabled children and others from poor families. Our fingers are able to do many things and it is very important to know how to use them in order to reach knowledge and perform arts," Erkan concluded.