The 15th edition of Virada Inclusiva, an initiative of the São Paulo State Secretariat for the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, began this Monday (1). It promotes awareness-raising actions to empower people with disabilities in building a more accessible world. The event encourages the participation of people with and without disabilities in the activities, which, this year, for the first time, will also take place at Unicamp. Until Thursday (December 4), 11 activities will be held on the University's campuses, with the aim of stimulating the inclusion of people with disabilities in the academic world and promoting Unicamp's work directed at this public.
The Inclusive Turnaround at Unicamp is open to all interested parties. Some activities require prior registration. Check the list of activities and the links for... register on the event page on the DeDH website.
“We are very happy with the invitation to be part of the Virada Inclusiva program. We have all the conditions to carry out activities here at Unicamp, especially since we have several groups, laboratories, and institutes that work with inclusion,” comments Erika Zambrano, professor at the Faculty of Nursing (Fenf) and coordinator of the Accessibility Advisory Committee of the Executive Directorate of Human Rights (DeDH). Zambrano highlights that the University has recorded progress in guaranteeing access and permanence for people with disabilities, from the adaptation of physical spaces to the adaptation of materials for Braille and sign language. According to her, the Virada activities contribute to making these actions known to the community. “A student with a disability who knows all these resources feels more comfortable taking the entrance exam,” she analyzes.
At Unicamp, the Virada Cultural (Cultural Turnaround) began with a Game Prototyping Workshop, promoted by researchers from the Center for Science for the Development of Assistive Technology for Bilingual Education of the Deaf (CCD Taebs), a unit that integrates Unicamp and the Universities of São Paulo (USP), Federal University of São Carlos (Ufscar), and Federal University of ABC (UFABC), and is supported by Fapesp. The activity was led by a group of students under the guidance of André Brandão, a professor at UFABC and associate researcher at CCD-Taebs, and introduced participants – both deaf and hearing – to the concepts and procedures involved in creating a game, inviting them to propose ideas on the subject.
A professor in the Computer Science area, Brandão explains that games, whether analog or digital, can help systematize content in the classroom. In the case of the research carried out with CCD-Taebs, the objective is also to promote bilingual Portuguese-Brazilian Sign Language (Libras) interaction. “By bringing together people of diverse profiles, there will be an exchange of experiences in which a social awareness emerges. One understands the other, which makes it possible to create a game prototype.”
“The CCD will enhance the work we have been developing since 1973 by enabling us to create educational materials,” says Ivani Rodrigues Silva, professor at the Faculty of Medical Sciences (FCM), coordinator of the Center for Studies and Research in Rehabilitation (Cepre) and of the CCD-Taebs. She explains that the group focuses on identifying the needs of basic education schools for the education of deaf students and, based on these needs, developing educational materials and technologies. “Schools use materials for hearing students, but that doesn't work. There is a demand for specific educational materials for deaf students,” describes the professor, warning that simply reproducing conventional materials for the deaf public is not adequate. “It's complex, but with the partnership of universities and schools in the network, we will succeed.”
Importance of interaction
Lerrandro Alves Manoel, an eighth-grade student in Jaguariúna and a user of Cepre, finds in games a way to create bonds with other teenagers like him. “I like playing Roblox [an online gaming platform] the most. During the game, I can talk to my friends. I also like the game's visuals, the characters' clothes, which have meanings,” he says. He was one of the participants in the workshop, and his group proposed creating a computer game that simulated a classroom. As players completed tasks, they would accumulate points to eventually pass the year. This aligns with his own experience at school and in his daily life with the world of games. “For me, playing Roblox is like a math class.”
The mother confirms her son's affinity for games and attributes his ability to communicate and interact with other young people to his experience at Cepre. “When he was little, he had a lot of difficulty interacting. It was great when he started interacting with other children at Cepre and with his school friends,” recalls Márcia Alves Silva. According to her, this is fundamental for young people like Lerrandro. “Without knowing other deaf people, they don't interact,” she states.
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