The project will be an Erasmus Plus Sport Small Collaborative partnerships, according to Erasmus Plus Programme rules. This project aims to boost the inclusion of visual impaired children in blended teams of life foosball through the promotion of this sport among schools hosting students from5 to 15 years old with sight loss. Life foosball is still unprecedented in para-Olympic activities, however it has many potentialities that make it strongly suitable to ensure the same opportunities to access and compete to paired and impaired athletes in blended teams. Its spatial bounding and the demarcation of players positions, in fact, reset risks and problems of spatial orientation and physical encounters, eighter empowering blind athletes to highlight their alternative abilities and allowing paired athletes to play the game in sight loss conditions with no risks and deeply understand their impaired peers and appreciate their full potential. Blended teams of life foosball can really offer a positive context where barriers and stigma collapse and children with disabilities acquire vital social skills, develop independence, and become empowered to act as agents of change.
This project addresses to another target as well, coaches and teachers that will train blended teams of life foosball in the schools included in the project training programme and in the expected future. Their capability to understand athletes’ impairments and needs, to highlight their alternative abilities, to communicate with them are of paramount importance. One of the objectives of this project is, therefore, to provide an online training programme open to any coach that wants to improve skills and acquire techniques to successfully communicate with visual impaired athletes, give spatial orientation tips, adopt the correct psychomotor behaviour, and manage a blended team of paired and impaired athletes to stimulate a fair cooperation and fellowship. The online training programme will also offer guidelines about the games rules, and how to equip a foosball field to encourage the diffusion of this activity.
GUIDELINES ON HUMAN FOOSBALL
GUIDELINES AND MOOC ON LIFE FOOSBALL
In the context of the Lif4all Foosball project, the partnership actively engaged in the implementation of a MOOC (Massive Open Online Course) that can be found on our YouTube channel. This MOOC aimed to promote inclusion and empathy towards visually impaired young athletes.
Project’s Website: https://www.piattaformaprogetti.eu/lif4all-foosball/