Project Report
| Aug 22, 2023
End of Summer 2023
By Rachael Risby Raz | International Relations Manager
![Photo credit: Uriel Nuri]()
Photo credit: Uriel Nuri
A few examples of activities we did this year with our therapeutic groups:
Yael, one of our seasoned therapists,reports about a visit to the peccary exhibit:
“The group was excited to be responsible for feeding this South American animal (which looks a little like a pig but is not related but is also a little smelly). We had to teach them not to throw directly to the animals but to where the animals were not standing.
Also to make sure smaller, slower animals got food thrown near them as well. I had them cut up the fruit and vegetables first as part of the preparation process.
They learnt not to throw too hard, not to throw weakly because then the food can fall in the space between guard rail and electric wire. When this happened, and the food fell into "no man's land," we made an activity of constructing a utensil/ tool to retrieve the wasted fruit and vegetables in order to be able to try and throw them in to the exhibit again.”
In this example we see that the group is learning how to problem solve together as a group in the altruistic act of feeding the peccaries.
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Apr 27, 2023
Summer Update 2023
By Rachael Risby Raz | International Relations Manager
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Twice a year, we run enrichment and further education workshops for our staff and this year we ran a photo-therapy workshop. Two experts in the field came to run a two-hour seminar to teach us techniques that we have since been able to incorporate into our therapy groups.
Eve, one of our other therapists, reports:
“With three out of my five groups, we incorporated photography projects based on what we had learnt at the seminar. Each participant was asked to take a picture of something meaningful to them or a few pictures that depict who they are. Then they made a collage of them, adding other magazine pictures. We found that children may not like speaking openly about themselves but they like showing ‘what they are made of’. It is a less threatening way for them to let others see them and know more about them.”
A new addition to the program this year is a visit to the new Hilary Tisch Biodiversity Exhibit and Butterfly House. While some of our groups did not like visiting the exhibit, because of the high humidity and the fact that there are butterflies flying around freely, other groups really love seeing them and learning about the other insects there and have visited on a number of occasions. The immersion aspect of the exhibit, the fact the butterflies are loose and the children enter into their world, gives some of the children a feeling of freedom and release.
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Jan 19, 2023
Fall Update 2023
By Rachael Risby Raz | International Relations Manager
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One of the special groups we have in the AAT program is the work-readiness (occupational) group, which prepares special needs teenagers with the skills that they will need in order to integrate into an employment scenario. They assist in various ways in the different exhibits at the Zoo and the Aquarium.
For example, in the orangutan exhibit, they helped prepare an enrichment activity for the apes by sewing pockets onto a towel and putting food treats into the pockets. They then brought this to the keepers who gave them to the orangutans. It was gratifying for the teens to see the orangutans wrap themselves in the ‘present’ that they had made and then see them discover the treats. They also learnt from how the apes interacted with each other and shared (or not) their discoveries.
These activities are both educational, teaching them how to deal with work interactions, communication and behavior at work as well as therapeutic by improving their self-esteem and helping expose potentially problematic issues that can then be treated and assisted to overcome.
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