Foot care education program for preschool aged children from the V4 countries
Financing organization:
International Visegrad Fund: www.visegradfund.org
Program:
Visegrad Grants, grant no.: 22510071
Program objective:
Visegrad grants support regional partnerships among NGOs and civil society organizations, public institutions and municipalities, private companies and nonprofit organizations as well as education and research centers that contribute to cooperation in the Visegrad region. The programme aims to educate and build capacity, strengthen the network of professional educational institutions and support the mobility of researchers, teachers and students in sharing best practices.
Project title:
Foot care education program for preschool aged children from the V4 countries.
Project description:
The project involves the development of cross-border cooperation and exchange of partners' experience in raising health awareness of foot care and footwear selection in pre-school children. The idea is to create and implement an educational programme dedicated to children aged 3-6 years, as well as their parents/carers and teachers. The concept is completely innovative, as this type of programme has not been implemented so far with the above-mentioned social groups, especially in the partner countries. This will be the first educational programme to use the issues of proper footwear selection for sensitive, developing children's feet. Drawing attention to the problems of children's feet in each partner country, as well as sensitising their parents/guardians, teachers, and society as a whole to the needs arising from the rate of intensive developmental changes will be an added value of the project.
The educational programme will involve the use of special creative polysensory interaction methods aimed at the youngest children. These methods will engage the proprioceptive system as well as the senses of touch, sight and hearing.The innovation will also include the implementation of new methods and forms of work, taking into account the involvement of parents/guardians in the classes, as well as proposals of new ideas for teachers to stimulate their creativity and modernise their work, which will certainly translate into improvements in the education system.Conducting preventive, educational activities enables rational reduction of expenses on health care and is the basis forthe development of proper relations at the national, regional and local community level between the health care organizer and its recipients. It is also a condition for an effective and efficient improvement of the quality of life of children and, later on, adults. Addressing this problem on a regional level is important because of the very high needs for improving foot health in children in all V4 countries.
Project objective:
The aim of the project is to increase competence of parents/caregivers and teachers of children aged 3-6 years (from Poland, Slovakia and Czechia) in terms of caring for the feet arch, and proper selection of footwear. The idea is also to teach children appropriate exercises to shape their feet.
Project implementation period:
01/09/2025–29/01/2027
Funding amount:
15 000 EUR
Project leader:
Institute of Physiotherapy, Faculty of Health Sciences and Psychology, Medical College, University of Rzeszów
Partners:
- University of Preszov https://www.unipo.sk/en/
- Jan Evangelista Purkyně University in Ústí nad Labem https://www.ujep.cz/en/
Project manager:
Assoc. Prof. PhD Ewa Puszczalowska-Lizis - Institute of Physiotherapy, Faculty of Health Sciences and Psychology, Collegium Medicum, University of Rzeszow
+48 882056555, epuszczalowska@ur.edu.pl
The project is co-financed by the Governments of the Czechia, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia through Visegrad Grants from International Visegrad Fund. The mission of the fund is to advance ideas for sustainable regional cooperation in Central Europe.