The Making of Diverse Schools

Introduction

In recent years, different studies have emerged that show the innumerable advantages of innovating in the field of attention to diversity through new educational practices. Proof of this are the works of Muntaner (2014), Guasp (2014) and Díez Gutiérrez (2014), who affirm that the theatrical resource is an important contribution to the development of innovative practices in the classroom. Thus, as García Velasco (2008, p. 29) points out, “theatrical activities possess educational values” and, at the same time, serve as an asset for the work of curricular contents (Prado Aragonés, 2004). In this sense, theater becomes a powerful resource to implement in the classroom to benefit learning.

The present research was designed to develop actions aimed at responding to the individual needs of people with Down syndrome, adapting the teaching processes - learning to the characteristics, particularities and capabilities of each/a.

Thus, our training proposal is located within a comprehensive and globalized approach focused on competence learning (Alegre, 2006). For this reason, it is a priority to provide the participants with the necessary tools and resources so that they can act more effectively and constructively in the environment in which they live. In this way, through the actions that the Pedagogical Theatre (TP) develops with the theatrical techniques, concrete and real situations of daily life are represented and staged, with the objective that the participants learn and can generalize and apply what they have learned to other contexts. The intervention room becomes, therefore, a virtual space where learning situations are constructed from which the subject can learn; situations, which through theatrical action provide the possibility of reconstructing realities and contexts where the subjects-actors-participants project concepts, ideas, emotions and affections, behaviors and behaviors, susceptible to be redirected (Morín, 1991). In this regard, basic social skills (verbal and non-verbal communication skills) are trained and developed; behaviours are redirected through strategies for resolving interpersonal problems; the management of emotions (skills of self-control, coping, conflict resolution); prosocial behaviour (perspective, empathy, cooperation) is encouraged; and interpersonal relationships are improved. All this, with the purpose of favoring processes of personal improvement or aid to the change in its participants, manifesting the TP as an effective didactic strategy for the development of competence in the classroom. In this way, through the programmed activities, using different theatrical techniques, we will contribute to promote competential aspects related to dimensions of the evolutionary development of the person (cognitive, motor, communicative, emotional and social dimension) and with more specific dimensions, linked to contents related to the performing arts (artistic dimension and productive or scenic dimension).

The theatre, understood as dramatic art, “puts the accent on the performance, on the spectator and the spectator, on the aesthetics of the reception and on the acquisition of some acting skills with a view to making the product as attractive as possible to the spectators” (Baldwin, 2014, p. 20). On the other hand, the PT, instead, places it in action itself, in the process that leads to representation highlighting the scientific character of this discipline and therefore its contribution to the generation of knowledge about education through research.