Methodological Manual

The project also foresees the implementation of a manual for trainers called “The autobiographical experience: the Manual” which will allow the creation of repeatable training courses.

It will be a manual for trainers designed for structures and associations that deal with assistance to the elderly at various levels, from the simple nursing home to the assistance center for Alzheimer’s and senile dementia patients, from the recreational center to shelters for non self-sufficient elderly. The idea of ​​implementing a second intellectual output to the IO1 game stems from the awareness that the realization of the game would have required a great deal not only of research, but also of training the staff employed in the structures that have so far made available to collaborate during the test phase called Step3. A work we understood would have been lost if it hadn’t been aimed at a larger project.

Hence the idea of ​​channelling all this work into the creation of a manual capable of stimulating not only individual training but also and above all the training of operators capable of implementing and conducting real training courses thus creating that multiplier effect that is expected of any intellectual product funded by the European Community.

The manual for trainers will contain all the instructions for carrying out a training course dedicated to the introduction of autobiographical writing in therapeutic and recreational paths intended for the elderly with different and non-different pathologies. The methodologies to be used based on the type of structure in which the activity will be introduced will be divided into dedicated chapters, highlighting, for each case, the benefits and measures to be used.

The research and drafting of the manual are coordinated by the Polish partner CEBS within which works a team of researchers specializing in education and methodology from the University of Wrocławed Academy of Special Pedagogy in Warsaw.

The needs analysis was shared by Nkey, candidate partner, with LUA with whom he conceived and wrote this project.

LUA has been involved for over twenty years in the promotion of the culture of memory, in the creation of training courses for personnel specialized in the introduction of autobiographical writing at different levels and is convinced that an innovative digital tool such as the web app will open new horizons at work. which he has been doing for years in the field of training.

Another huge contribution to IO2 will be given by the experience that ASPHI has acquired over the years in the organization of training courses for health and social workers for the inclusion of new tools and methodologies in daycare facilities and centers for the elderly and disabled. adults and that only in the last editions have involved about 400 operators. The first requirement is in fact to allow the greatest number of elderly patients / guests to access the universally recognized benefits as a consequence of using this tool. The handbook for trainers is therefore identified as the tool capable of spreading the use of play and therefore of the therapeutic use of the autobiographical method as much as possible.