Churches Inc in Tanzania: Day 5

Janet, Abi, Katie, and Shaun are working in Tanzania from the 6th to 16th June, delivering and supporting Churches Inc leaders events and workshops. Our Churches Inc. programme equips the church with a Christian perspective on disability, helping them to be fully inclusive so everyone is valued. Here's their report on the second day - Follow this link to the team's day 4 blog.

Day 5
Today is the first of two days of workshops. People arrived from all over Mwanza and from rural areas.

People in Africa are very often have a misconception that white people don't have disabilities. Janet began by explaining that there are people with disabilities everywhere. Katie explained her own disability. About 100 people were expected at today's workshop but it's midday and people are still arriving. We have about 200 in attendance now.

Some of the disabled people that attended today's workshop sitting in front.

This is Isaiah. He has five other siblings. They all became physically disabled around the same time. He is the only one who has pursued his aspirations. He is encouraging other people with disabilities not to become despondent.He is expressing his desire to be independent. To those who are able, he encourages them to accept and love those who are disabled. To those who are disabled, he encourages them to change their self image and to accept themselves.

Michael also spoke, to tell the people of the challenges and fears he faces as a person with albinism. He also encourages everyone to change their views and opinions of people who have albinism.

Churches Inc in Tanzania: Day 4

Janet, Abi, Katie, and Shaun are working in Tanzania from the 6th to 16th June, delivering and supporting Churches Inc leaders events and workshops. Our Churches Inc. programme equips the church with a Christian perspective on disability, helping them to be fully inclusive so everyone is valued. Here's their report on the second day - Follow this link to the team's day 2 blog.

Day 4:
Today we set out at 7.30am to visit people with disabilities in their own environments. As we visited the homes it became more and more aparant just how many barriers disabled people face in this community. Disabled adults have the same responsibilities as able people and this is an indication to what degree they are affected by these barriers.

The first lady we visited was Magdelena. We drove very slowly for a number of miles toward her house. About 300 metres before we reached it we could drive no further because of the rough terrain and large boulders. Mwanza is often called Rock City because large boulders are everywhere.

We walked the last 300 metres. Katy, who is a wheelchair user wanted to accompany the rest of the team as we walked on foot.

Magdalena is a mother of five. They all live in one room about 3 metres by 2.5 metres in sizes. This is their bedroom, kitchen, bathroom and toilet. Magdalena became paralysed from the waist down a few years ago. Her husband and father of her children absconded and they haven't seen him since. Magdelenas oldest child is 12 year old. She cares for Magdalena. Because of her disability her children aren't able to go to school as they have to look after her. Her desire if for at least one of her children to get an education so that the family will eventually be able to be supported.

Janet presented Magdalena with a solar powered audio Bible which she was thrilled to have.

Magdalena has been clamouring over the rocks with crutches to get anywhere. She would like a wheelchair. Our concern is that a wheelchair will need to be carried on someone's head over the boulders.

Although the story is a depiction of this particular family, it is not an isolated case as this is the nature of the terrain here in Mwanza. After having left Magdelenas house we were shown the Centre where the workshop will be held tomorrow and Wednesday.

Ps Shadrack has applied with the UK charity Tools with a Mission for tools and equipment to be used at this Centre to equip disabled adults with the skills to earn an income. The first consignment is due to arrive in August in a container that is being shared with other partners of Tools with a Mission in Tanzania.

After our visit to the disability Centre we visited a number of people with disabilities in their homes. One little boy by the name of Juma has cerebral palsy. He is 16 years old and after two years at school he was so badly discriminated against by the pupils and the teachers that he left. He therefore has no education. He said that he would like to be a DJ. He is pictured below.

We then drove about 45 minutes out of town to a leprosy colony.  One of the men there was Clement Bula. He is seen below trying to wash his bandages. Because he has no fingers he has to do it with his teeth.

Churches Inc Tanzania: Day 2

Janet, Abi, Katie, and Shaun are working in Tanzania from the 6th to 16th June, delivering and supporting Churches Inc leaders events and workshops. Our Churches Inc. programme equips the church with a Christian perspective on disability, helping them to be fully inclusive so everyone is valued. Here's their report on the second day - Follow this link to the team's day 1 blog

Day 2

Today's group sessions after the teaching on 'Made in the image of God.' During this time the delegates discussed the barriers to inclusion within the Church and also the challenges that they face in their communities to combat the cultural barriers to drawing disabled people in.
Katie, one of our team members who is disabled and uses a wheelchair shared about her own challenges and testified about the goodness of God in her life as she serves Him in her one weakness and how her disability beings glory to God.

Day 2 went very well. The group was smaller because the government officials weren't there, and with a different group of leaders. We met at the same venue as yesterday.

We were informed that the idea of group discussions are something that is completely new to the Church, not just in Mwanza but in the whole of Tanzania. When the people understood the concept some really intense debates began to ensue and we were requested today to shorten out teaching so that we could have longer group discussions.

We were requested to return to do a follow up Churches Inc. trip, but specifically to help the communities to change their attitudes towards people with albinism. One man by the name of Emmanuel who has albinism arrived at the Leaders Event today. Ps Shadrack said that the man lives in fear of his life because of the demand on his body parts and doesn't venture out much from his home especially around the time of governmental elections as this is when the demand is greatest for those with Albinism. Those who are of the opposition parties often promote this practice even though the practice is outlawed by law.

 

Churches Inc in Tanzania: Day 1

Janet, Abi, Katie, and Shaun are working in Tanzania from the 6th to 16th June, delivering and supporting Churches Inc leaders events and workshops. Our Churches Inc. programme equips the church with a Christian perspective on disability, helping them to be fully inclusive so everyone is valued. Here's their report on the first day - we'll keep you up to date on everything they're doing as regularly as possible.

Day 1 blog by Shaun Burrows:
Today was the first Leaders Event day. People began to arrive at about 12.20pm. By 2.30pm the room was almost full and we started with introductions. About 20 government and community leaders arrived and joined the pastors and church leaders. Altogether there were about 100 people.

Ps Shadrack had invited the head of the local Muslim mosque. He informed Pastor Shadrack at the end of the day that he was blessed by the teachings and the group discussions and that he was included.

It became apparent during a few of the group discussions that people with Albinism are are very common in Tanzania and are badly mistreated by people in their communities. It is very common for people to call them by the nickname 'dil'. This word means 'an opportunity to make money'. This refers to the cutting off and selling of body parts of these people as a means of earning an income.

Tomorrow's Leaders Event will be at a venue on the other side of the city and with a different group of delegates.

Churches Inc in Tanzania: 6th to 16th June

Janet, Abi, Katie, and Shaun are travelling to Tanzania to deliver and support Churches Inc leaders events and workshops. Our Churches Inc. programme equips the church with a Christian perspective on disability, helping them to be fully inclusive so everyone is valued. We'll keep you up to date on what they're doing as often as the team are able to send any details back to us. Please do pray for a safe trip, for a receptive audience, and for a real change to the lives of people in Tanzania.

(Photo shows part of a training event from the Churches Inc trip to Kenya early in 2018 - we'll update with a Tanzania pic as soon as we get one).

Additional Needs Friendly Children's Ministry

There is a growing range of resources available to help you tailor your children’s ministry for full inclusion of children with additional needs. Feel free to share this article with your children’s workers to encourage them with ideas to include all children.

St Saviour’s Church, Guildford has produced a website of resources, lesson plans, craft ideas and everything you need to run a successful children’s ministry that includes those with additional needs. Follow this link to their 'All Belong' website.

Tonbridge Baptist Church has done similar work - follow this link to find their resources website.  

Trish Hahn, Messy Church SEND co-ordinator and wife of one of our trustees has put together a 'Maximising the Mess' guide for welcoming people with additional needs. You can read about it and download the PDF file by following this link.

Boys Brigade have resources which you can find by following this link and have also launched a free app which you can read about at this link.

Girls Brigade has also produced a resource in PDF format, which can be downloaded at this link.

The Church of England’s Going for Growth website has a section on special and additional needs available by following this link.

The Methodist Church has a resource on supporting children with additional needs which can be downloaded by following this link.

Urban Saints has advice and resources, including details of how you can book one of their All Inclusive or All Inclusive 2U workshops by following this link.

The Bible Reading Fellowship also provides a leaflet of suggested ways to make your children’s ministry more inclusive, follow this link to download the leaflet.

And of course, Through the Roof is ready and willing to come and do a workshop with your youth and children’s team, which we can tailor to the particular needs of your own young people. Follow this link for more details. We also have publications to help with your youth and children’s work, Parachute Bible Stories and A Welcoming Place which are £5 each. You can buy them through our online shop: follow this link to buy a copy of Parachute Bible Stories and follow this link to buy a copy of a Welcoming Place. 

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Last Updated Sept 18.

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• If a page on this website does not validate it is almost always because a third-party ‘plug-in’ has needed to be employed.
• Although we try to use only accessible third-parties and we alert designers to accessibility issues, rectifying them is beyond our control
• We reserve the right to use the web standards CSS and XHML buttons on this website as all elements within our control validate correctly.

Please Note: although this website was designed and built by a company specialising in accessible websites, it is run by us. We are not experts on web accessibility ourselves and sometimes mistakes can happen. If you find an accessibility error, please alert us as soon as possible, using the contact email address on this website, telling us the nature of the problem so that we can fix it.

Further Help

You may wish to download “Browsealoud”. This is a FREE speech reader that enables you to listen rather than read our website. Browsealoud may be helpful to people with dyslexia, those who find reading difficult, those who have a mild visual impairment or those who just like to do more than one thing at a time!

• Please follow this link to download Browsealoud onto your computer or select the image above.

WC3 WAI Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 1.0 and W.A.G 2.0

To be considered to be Priority 1 (A) standard a website should meet all of the following points.

• This website provides a text equivalent for every non-text element (e.g., via “alt”, “longdesc”, or in element content). This includes: images, graphical representations of text (including symbols), image map regions, animations (e.g., animated GIFs), applets and programmatic objects, ascii art, frames, scripts, images used as list bullets, spacers, graphical buttons, sounds (played with or without user interaction), stand-alone audio files, audio tracks of video, and video. (1.0)
• This website provides text alternatives for any non-text content so that it can be changed into other forms people need, such as large print, braille, speech, symbols or simpler language.
• This website ensures that all information conveyed with colour is also available without colour, for example from context or markup. (1.0)
• This website clearly identifies changes in the natural language of a document’s text and any text equivalents (e.g., captions). (1.0)
• This website may be read without style sheets; when an HTML document is rendered without associated style sheets, it is still be possible to read the document. (1.0)
• This website ensures that equivalents for dynamic content are updated when the dynamic content changes. (1.0)
• This website avoids causing the screen to flicker. (1.0)
• This website uses the clearest and simplest language appropriate for its content.
• This website does not use image maps(1.0)
• This website does not use tables(1.0)
• This website does not use frames(1.0)
• This websitedoes not use multimedia(1.0)
  • This website has 1 area that is sadly, still inaccessible to some users. (1.0)
    • After our best efforts, we have not been able to create an accessible page for the Social Networking buttons. Please see the bottom of this page for alternatives.
    • Pages on this website are still usable when scripts, applets, or other programmatic objects are turned off or not supported. If this is not possible, this website provides equivalent information on an alternative accessible page. (1.0)
    • Programmatic elements such as scripts are directly accessible and compatible with assistive technologies (1.0)

This website passes Priority 1 (A) Accessibility.

Priority 2 checkpoints

To be considered to be Priority 2 (AA) standard, a website should meet all of the following points;

• This website ensures that the foreground and background colour combinations in images provide sufficient contrast when viewed by someone having colour deficits or when viewed on a black and white screen. (1.0)
• When an appropriate markup language exists, this website uses usesmarkup rather than images to convey information. (1.0)
• This website documents validate to published formal grammars. (1.0)
• This website uses style sheets to control layout and presentation. (1.0)
• This website uses relative rather than absolute units in markup language attribute values and style sheet property values. (1.0)
• This website uses header elements to convey document structure and uses them according to specification. (1.0)
• This website marks up lists and list items properly. (1.0)
• This website marks up quotations and does not use quotation markup for formatting effects such as indentation. (1.0)
  This website ensures that dynamic content is accessible (or provides an alternative presentation or page only when no other option is possible). (1.0)
• Until user agents allow users to control blinking, this website avoids causing content to blink (i.e., change presentation at a regular rate, such as turning on and off). (1.0)
• Until user agents provide the ability to stop the refresh, this website does not use periodically auto-refreshing pages. (1.0)
• Until user agents provide the ability to stop auto-redirect, this website does not use markup to redirect pages automatically. (If redirects are needed they are configures via the server) (1.0)
• Until user agents allow users to turn off spawned windows, this website does not cause pop-ups or other windows to appear and does not change the current window without informing the user. (1.0)

Please note: this website uses ‘highslide’, a JavaScript technique to give the appearance of a pop-up window to preview links or content. However, highslide is NOT a pop-up, the JavaScript can be disabled (and the link will still work) and is for graphic purposes only.

• The website uses W3C technologies when they are available and appropriate for a task and uses the latest versions when supported. (1.0)
• This website avoids deprecated features of W3C technologies. (1.0)
• This website divides large blocks of information into more manageable groups where natural and appropriate. (1.0)
• This website does not identify the target of each link because it is written in XHTML 1.0 Strict
• This website provides metadata to add semantic information to pages and sites. (1.0)
• This website provides information about the general layout of a site (e.g., a site map). (1.0)
• This website uses navigation mechanisms in a consistent manner. (1.0)
• Tables are not used for layout. (1.0)
• Until user agents support explicit associations between labels and form controls, all form controls are combined with implicitly associated labels and the label is properly positioned. (1.0)
• Form labels are explicitly associated with their controls. (1.0)
• Event handlers used in scripts are input device-independent. (1.0)
• Until user agents allow users to freeze moving content, this website avoids movement in pages. If movement is present it can be instantly and easily stopped or blocked. (1.0)
• Programmatic elements such as scripts are directly accessible and compatible with assistive technologies (1.0)
• Any element that has its own interface can be operated in a device-independent manner. (1.0)
• When using scripts, this website specifies logical event handlers rather than device-dependent event handlers. (1.0)

This website passes Priority 2 (AA) Accessibility.

Priority 3 checkpoints

• This website ensures that the foreground and background colour combinations in text provide sufficient contrast when viewed by someone having colour deficits or when viewed on a black and white screen. (1.0)
• This website specifies the expansion of each abbreviation or acronym in a document where it first occurs. (1.0)
• This website identifies the primary natural language of a document. (1.0)
• This website provides keyboard shortcuts (such as jump menus) to important links (including those in client-side image maps), form controls, and groups of form controls. (1.0)
• Until user agents (including assistive technologies) render adjacent links distinctly, this website includes non-link, printable characters (surrounded by spaces) between adjacent links. (1.0)
• This website provides information so that users may receive documents according to their preferences (e.g., language, content type, etc.) (1.0)
• This website provides navigation bars to highlight and give access to the navigation mechanism
• This website groups related links, identifies the group (for user agents), and, until user agents do so, provides a way to bypass the group. (1.0)
• This site enables different types of searches for different skill levels and preferences. These might include a search box, site maps and content ‘tagging’(1.0)
• This website places distinguishing information at the beginning of headings, paragraphs, lists, etc. (1.0)
• This website does not use ASCII ART
• This website supplements text with graphic or auditory presentations where they will facilitate comprehension of the page. (1.0)
• This website uses a style of presentation that is consistent across pages. (1.0)
• This website now refers to the new WC WCAG 2.0 guidelines and does NOT include default, place-holding characters in edit boxes and text areas in forms as user agents ARE now able to handle empty controls correctly. (1.0)

This website passes Priority 3 (AAA) Accessibility.

Accessibility Problems?

This website may have the following minor access problems/issues. These are explained here and alternatives given.

• This site does not use meta access keys (sometimes called ‘hot keys’). Our research suggest that these are actually detrimental to most keyboard-users as they already have their own keys set up which are then overwritten or confused by websites (who do not use a consistent approach). We will review this decision periodically and if research proves otherwise (or technology improves) we will resume these techniques.
• This site may fail validation on third-party technologies. This is because we have little or no ability to recode these to meet our high accessibly standards. However, we always aim to use plug-ins that are either accessible, increase the accessibility or have simple accessible alternatives. If forced to choose between accessibility features and validation, we have taken the difficult decision to always choose accessibility.