Hipoterapia » Specialized VET Training on Hippotherapy for Professionals Working with Intellectual, Emotional, Physical and Psychomotor Disabilities

The aim of the project is to offer to professionals working with disabled children (cognitive, motor, emotional delayed development) the opportunity to learn this type of therapy and to offer it to a larger number of children across the selected countries. Following this, it will be offered to therapists in: Turkey, Bulgaria, Romania.

The learning program is according to the ECVET regulations and consist of a theoretical part and a practical part (specific movies).

The main task of this project is to build a standardised course in the European Union for persons that want to specialise in hippotherapy and horse assisted therapy and to ease the access to good practices among participating countries.

Part of the project is this e-learning course, Hippotherapy, is available in Romanian (but also in English, Bulgarian and Turkish). It is available online on the dedicated platform and on the app (downloaded from appstore and android).

Content of the Pilot Report:

Piloting period and participants number
Profile of the Romanian participants in Piloting
Involvement of participants
Introduction and midterm sessions held
Use of mobile application
Encountered problems & their troubleshooting
Frequency of required support
Content improvements (if any)

Piloting period and participants number

In the time frame January to April 2022, 30 Romanian participants were invited to take the initial (Piloting) course. 25 of them have successfully finished the Piloting.

Profile of the Romanian participants in Piloting:

Clasification according to their profession was the following:

- Psychologist – 8, 32% of the total participants number

- Students – 7, 28% of the total participants number

- Manager ONG (Non - profit organizations) – 2,8% of the total participants number

- Hippotherapy specialists – 1, 4% of the total participants number

- Physical therapist – 4, 16% of the total participants number

- Riding instructor – 2, 8% of the total participants number

- Speach and Language Therapist – 1, 4% of the total participants number

Out of 25 participants, 18 have filled out the questionary sent via email and 7 have answered via phone.

Involvement of participants

For 5 of the participants taking part in this Initial Training it was the first time they were attending such a workshop. 20 persons had already heard some of the information.

Participants needed between 6 and 10 hours to go through the modules.

All the participants were interested in the content and the numbers look the following:

- IO1 – curricula, training modules and website evaluation have been read by 16 participants
- IO2 – training modules and evaluation in the mobile app have been chosen by 10 participants
- IO3 – the videos, website/app have been read by 22 participants.

Introduction and midterm sessions held

In order to announce the Pilot Report we have communicated constantly during the entire period of the project (01.11.2019 – 30.04.2022). Between January - February 2022 we sent emails to 30 persons to take part in the Piloting activity of the Project.

On the 11th of March we organized an online meeting via ZOOM in order to present how the e-learning platform works, the curricula, the modules and the video recordings. Also, the participants choose what they will use (mobile app or website). The online meeting (attended by 14 participants + 2 members of the project = 16 participants) was followed by the questionnaire sent on emails, together with the details for filling it out. The time frame 14.03-04.04.2022 was decided for the participants to go through the Pilot activity. This time frame was extended till 11.04.2022, in order to finalize the questionnaire over the phone.

In order to solve any technical problems during this period, the participants had the opportunity to contact the project manager via phone or email.

Use of mobile application

10 participants (4%) used the mobile application
16 participants (64%) used the website
22 participants (88%) watched the youtube movies and used the mobile app or the website.

Encountered problems & their troubleshooting

The most frequent problems were:

The links can not be open directly from the app (the problem has been solved with the IT partner in this project).
The bibliography can not be copied so that it can be more easily searched afterwards (the problem will be solved at a later date).
Some information are repetitive (the problem has been addressed and solved with the other partners in this project).
The lack of case studies, the lack of the method to establish therapeutic objectives and live therapy sessions (these subjects can be addressed in face to face meetings and we are taking into account to organize such workshops in Romania).

Frequency of required support

Extra technical support was required by 7 participants that answered the questionnaire via phone. These participants did not take part in the online meeting and needed extra-support via phone. The rest of the participants did not need any technical support.

Content improvements (if any)

Out of the 25 completed questionnaires:

o 11 participants (44%) said they were very satisfied

o 9 participants (36%) said they would suggest minor modifications of the content

o 5 participants (20%) said they cannot offer an answer right now. They had no previous information about hippotherapy.

As a conclusion, after analyzing the questionnaires, the content of the modules is a valuable one and the IT support (website and mobile app) have a good quality. They can both serve to qualify Romanian specialists as hippotherapists, in the benefits of the families with disabled children in Romania.

Participating in this project was a challenge, which I took part in with interest and responsibility. We wanted to offer those interested in this method of approach, a base of accurate, valid information from the experience of specialists in the field of medicine, psychology and physical therapy. Collaborating with an interdisciplinary, international team was a quality professional experience.