The Atena Foundation, in its work to promote artistic resources for people with intellectual disabilities, has launched a project that provides users with an interactive system with which they can “create and experience music”. In this way, their motivation is stimulated, their autonomy is fostered and their self-perception is improved.
It has been revealed in the presentation this Monday of the project “Your body, your instrument”. It is aimed at improving people’s interactions and connecting with their environment. It is supported by a technological tool, the “Motion Composer”, which captures the movement of people and translates it into sounds and music.
“Through the transformation of the movement of people into music, the body becomes an instrument. Thus, art is brought closer to all people regardless of their abilities and musical studies”, the Atena Foundation has presented.
Facilitates the expression of people with intellectual disabilities
This tool “facilitates creative expression, allowing anyone not only to create music but also to benefit from possible body changes at a postural level. These can be expanding your own movement pattern, gestures, and improving expression. These changes allow and give the opportunity to promote and improve the connection with the environment”.
Atena recalls that in its 22-year history, all its programs have been aligned with the mission of “promoting and fostering the comprehensive development of people with intellectual and developmental disabilities through art, improving their quality of life and accompanying them in their project vital”. Also with SDG 4 of “Ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all”.
Can improve interactive ability
In this trajectory they have detected that “in the enjoyment, practice and musical creation some people experience barriers due to the lack of self-expression attached to their own diagnosis. It is in this field that they consider that the “Motion Composer” can improve the interactive and relational capacity of people with communication difficulties and great support needs. And it is done by incorporating the technological tool that “favors creative empowerment and accessibility in musical art.”
Thus, the Motion Composer captures the movement of people and translates it into sounds and music. In this way, the body becomes an instrument, which “brings art closer to all people regardless of their abilities and musical studies.”
Atena also explains that through inclusive creative activities, an environment is generated in which the participating people create music without having to play instruments. This allows a certain degree of control in the responses related to the sound and encourages its expressiveness.
Regarding the methodology, the first phase consists of a more individual work that starts from a sensory assessment of each person. In it, the sensory responses to different types of stimulation will be measured. After this, a sensory profile will be established that will be the starting point to analyze, in the long term, the impact of the tool at a corporal and relational level.
Satisfaction in people with intellectual disabilities and communication difficulties
The impact is measured through direct observation of emotional well-being, facial and body expressions, given the difficulty to empirically measure satisfaction in people with communication difficulties.
Knowing their movement patterns, the project monitors will pay attention to body language, cognitive, behavioral responses, among others. This will allow, through quantitative data, to establish a comparison and assess whether they are extrapolated to their interactions.
“This interactive system represents a change in the way in which people with intellectual disabilities are going to create and experience music, stimulating their motivation, fostering their autonomy and improving their self-perception”, with the generation of new learning contexts that favor interaction between people with and without disabilities, which contributes to improving their relationships and bonds.
“All of this in turn, has a positive impact on their self-esteem, recognition and personal empowerment,” they say from Atena. The tool has been acquired thanks to the support of the Once Foundation, which has allowed it to be the only entity at the national level that has it.
