Culture & education ·
Report dated 4 February 2010. The original was in Arabic.
Sharjah Museums Department announced that it was taking part in the twentieth Al Amal Camp, held under the slogan "A launch without limits" and organised by the Sharjah City for Humanitarian Services under the patronage of His Highness Sheikh Dr Sultan bin Mohammed Al Qasimi, Member of the Supreme Council and Ruler of Sharjah. The department described its part in the camp as following from its aim of offering an educational social setting to every group in the community, children with disabilities among them.
The department prepared educational and recreational programmes for more than 140 children from centres for people with disabilities across the Gulf Cooperation Council states. Its community and access services section ran two workshops. The first, on Kufic script, was for children aged 9 to 12 and introduced the early Arabic script used in writing copies of the Quran. The second, on green sea turtles, introduced the turtles that live along the Sharjah coast and are kept in the tanks of the Sharjah Aquarium.
Manal Ataya, Director General of Sharjah Museums Department, said the participation signalled the department's aim of reaching an important part of the community, children with disabilities, and that it reflected the Sharjah Government's direction towards including and empowering them and strengthening their place in their surroundings.
The department also organised recreational and educational visits for the children to three of its museums: the Sharjah Discovery Centre, the Sharjah Aquarium and the Sharjah Natural History and Botanical Museum. During the visits the children toured the museums and took part in clay, drawing, coloured-sand and seedling-planting workshops, watched performances by cartoon characters and were given gifts.
Sharjah Museums Department was established in 2006 under the patronage of Sheikh Dr Sultan bin Mohammed Al Qasimi to promote the emirate's heritage in the arts, heritage and culture.