Fjölmennt adult education center – life-long learning for learning disabled people

Fjölmennt is an adult course - and resource center for learning disabled people,  20 years and older.

Fjölmennt provides a broad variation of courses in adult education for people with different kind of learning disabilities, but mostly for people with moderate to severe and profound disabilities in area of cognitive learning disabilities, multiply disabilities and autism.

Courses can be focused on perception, communication, social participation, experience, leisure, knowledge or skills in different areas. Important aims in all our education is self-esteem, empowerment and quality of life. We have courses on health and lifestyle, technology and basic communication, computers as leisure activities, cooking and household, music, arts and crafts, social relations, personal growth and more.

Most of our courses shall be accessible to people with a broad specter and different levels of ability, perception and experience. Most courses shall be adapted to any attendant, regardless of challenges caused by severe to profound impairment.

The courses are usually once a week, for one semester at a time, but people can apply for most courses again as long as they wish. There is no upper limit in age, nor lower limit in function for attendants. Each semester around 400 persons attend to Fjölmennt's courses.

Fjölmennt partly finances adult educational courses for additional 400 persons in the local or regional adult education centers around Iceland. Fjölmennt also provides special educational consultation for adult education centers national wide in order to enable them to develop educational opportunities for people with moderate to profound learning disabilities, support them to meet individual needs of the learners, and guide their teachers.
Fjölmennt is a non-profit institution, and is financed through a service-contract with the Ministry of Education and low course-fee from learners.

Website: http://www.fjolmennt.is/reykjavik/namskeid/ it is only is in Icelandic, but it may give an idea of our work.

More about Fjölmennt

Courses change from year to year. Here are examples:

Household and cooking: Cooking healthy and good, Invite to party, Green and good, Food from foreign parts of the world, Cooking and tablets, Pasta, soups and salads, Sensory experiences in the kitchen

Physical health and fitness: Ball games, Dance (ballroom, country, freestyle), wheelchair gymnastics and games, Yoga, Bowling, Gym.

Communication and society: Augmentative communication and switch- or eye control in communication. Augmentative communication and tablets. Switches, computers and tablets in activity and interaction. Switches in work and leisure. English. Storytelling. Music and arts in the history.

Arts and crafts: Forming in clay and papmaché. Colors and tones. Painting and decoration. Mosaic. Visual arts – painting. Visual arts – mixed technics. Visual arts in computer. Visual arts and perception. Knitting. “Sewing club”. Textile and design.

Self-esteem and empowerment: Home economy. Remember the old days, Pleasure in communication and interaction (for elderly people with memory loss and communication problems). Leader course. My opinion, my life – a course about rights and services. Storytelling- my stories. Self-esteem and empowerment. First aid. Relaxation and perception of nature. Discussion groups, what about my life and rights. In or out of the autism spectrum.

Music and theater: Solo singing. Choir. Orchestra. Piano/Keyboard. Singing and chatting. Communication and music. Music in computer or tablets. Music and video. Music and activity. Drama. Shadow theater. Theater club.

Computer and information-technology: Technical aids to computers – switches and eye gaze. Digital photography. Tablets for systematization in everyday life. Computers and tablets in leisure activities. Safe internet.

Most of our courses shall be accessible to people with a broad specter and different levels of ability, perception and experience. There is no upper limit in age, nor lower limit in function for attendants. Most courses shall be adapted to any attendant, regardless of challenges caused by impairment.

The courses are usually once a week, for one semester at a time, but people can apply for most courses again as often as they wish.

Special projects in Fjölmennts regi: Fjölmennt has supported different projects in variety of ways.

Ambassadours of the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities: people – started as a project of peer information about human rights in cooperation with Þroskahjálp, later financied by ministery of welfare

User committee of review and consultancy of Reykjavík municipality’s rules and regulations in service of disabled people;  assisted by Fjölmennt.