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Cine suntem?

Descoperiți cine suntem și ce ne motivează să facem ceea ce facem.

Events for children and families

Summer School 2024

The Charm of Silence Foundation - December 4, 2024

Located in the northern part of Romania, Liceul Tehnologic Special Bivolărie is the first school in Romania dedicated to Deaf children and currently one of the two schools where the majority of students are Deaf . With more than a century of history, the school’s mission is to form educated, independent, autonomous adults in a country where state support is limited.

Marinela Axinte and Ramona Bota, deaf educational psychologists.

Source: The Charm of Silence Foundation

In July 2024, the high school hosted a special event: the first camp in Romania to bring together people who use Romanian Sign Language (RSL) and Romanian as their mother tongue, where all activities were conducted bilingually.

Little campers get ready for a day full of activities and fun!

Source: The Charm of Silence Foundation

The aim of the camp was to create a common space for these two groups (families where children have cochlear implants and use the spoken language as the only/primary mode of communication and families where RSL is the only or dominant language) to:

  • interact and share ideas
  • learn about each other’s approach and mindset
  • debate current problems and seek solutions
  • get new information and answers to questions from doctors and specialized staff
  • and, ultimately, to develop empathy through awareness and realizing that at the end of the day, their children are deaf (no matter how much or little they hear).

Maximum excitement at camp activities! The energy of children and instructors makes the difference!

Source: The Charm of Silence Foundation

The children were divided into 4 groups according to age to ensure that the activities corresponded to their abilities, and in each group, there were girls and boys with both RSL and Romanian as their mother tongue. Over the course of five days, they enjoyed various activities such as:
  • RSL workshops
  • painting on glass
  • pastry
  • traditions of Bucovina
  • horse-drawn carriage ride
  • trip to Putna Monastery
  • Greenhouse gardening
  • indoor competitions
  • hiking at Bursuc Waterfall
  • bonfire

Little bakers in action!

Source: The Charm of Silence Foundation

Speaking about adults, one of our main objectives was to promote equal access to information. This involved not only uncovering information gaps, but also the opportunity to correct potential misinformation that participants had. So, for adults, presentations were organized with the help of invited guests:

  • Marinela Axinte – Educational Psychologist (Deaf & Mother of two Deaf Children)
  • Alice Popa – Speech Therapist, KOALA Association (Hearing & Mother of a Deaf Child with cochlear implant)
  • Anamaria Brasov – President of “Listen to Life” Association (Hearing & Mother of a Deaf Child with cochlear implant)
  • Irina Imbir – Headmistress of the Special Technological High School No. 3, Bucharest (Hearing)
  • Daniel Lolici – President of the National Association of the Deaf in Romania (ANSR) – Youth Branch, President of the European Union of the Deaf Youth (EUDY), founder of the QRSign application, current President of ANSR (Deaf)
  • Alexandru Oltean – Clinical Engineer and Manager at Med-El, Cochlear Implant Company (Hearing)
  • Ramona Bota – Educational Psychologist, German Sign Language Teacher in Germany (Deaf)
  • Oana Bitere Popa – Primary ENT / Audiology (Hearing)
  • Mara Apostol – Speech Therapist, Happy Sounds Association (Hearing)
  • Ekaterine Tortladze – Founder of Aures Foundation, Georgia (Listener)

Ramona Bota – Educational Psychologist, German Sign Language Teacher in Germany (Deaf)

Source: The Charm of Silence Foundation

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