One of the outputs of the WINS project has been the realisation of some activities in the local communities by the project’s participants, which were implemented also thanks to the knowledge and the competencies acquired by the participants during this long-term project.
We chose four examples of the activities which were done, to give an idea of what these personal projects have been like.
Michele, one of the Italian participants, did an activity named “Inclusive rugby”, consisting of a tournament and national match of this sport. The activity involved around 120 people aged 8-74 and took place in the stadium in Florence, Italy, in November 2022. The main aim of the Inclusive rugby event was to spread the concept of rugby as a sport that can be played by everyone, with different skills levels, genders, ages or disabilities, underlining the values of fairness and respect and the ideal of a team on and off the pitch. The rules of the traditional game have been partially modified to adapt to some players’ necessities, because some of them can’t handle strong contact or can have mobility difficulties. In those cases, the ball could be taken from the adversary only by touching their body, without tackling them or using the force.
Another aim was to create a social and inclusive occasion for people of different ages. An interesting and useful particularity of rugby is the third half, during which all the teams have the possibility to spend some time and eat together after the tournament. After the third time, the participants went all together to watch the Italy-Australia match at the Florence’s stadium.
A very similar activity has been realised in Tarragona (Spain) by Pau, a Spanish participant who involved a group of 8-10 teenagers to play “Inclusive basketball”. Even in this case the basketball game was adapted to the needs of the participants, like changing the rules or the duration of the game. The aims of the game were to make participants put themselves in the shoes of people with reduced mobility and to encourage teamwork and cooperation between all the players, as well as to learn to accept both victory and defeat.
Another activity carried on in November by some participants is the training “Bora work”, which has been managed by the two Spanish participants Evelyn and Josep in Badalona. The activity involved 11 participants aged 12-14, which were divided into four teams. Each person of each team competed in four races, like running with just one leg, jumping and running all around the stadium.
Another activity, called “Sports for all”, was held in a school in Amarante (Portugal) by the Portuguese group and it was attended by 20-30 children from 6 to 10 years old, the age range in which bullying starts to develop. The specific sport proposed to the children is named “Couple football”, consisting of playing football by always holding the hand of another kid. The goal was to make children learn to integrate everybody and learn how to play in a team. Even if at the beginning there was some resistance to holding somebody else’s hand, they agreed to do it after explaining the importance of cooperating and working together in real life.
Many other activities have been carried out in Spain, Italy and Portugal by the rest of the participants and many others will be realised in the very near future. The final aim of the WINS project has been to give the participants’ new skills and ideas about the topic of sport and inclusivity and to allow them to be able to implement and replicate some interesting and useful activities in their usual social and / or working environment. In this way, all the participants of the activities, mainly children and adolescents, can benefit from their inclusive approach and can feel – and make others feel – welcome independently from their gender, abilities or diversities.
