School for the Deaf presents concert

by Thulasi Muttulingam

The Ratmalana school for the Deaf will hold a concert on Friday, July 2. “Our children are very talented and we are keen to highlight it” said the school’s principal Mrs Wijeratne.

The school has 243 students on roll between the age of five and 19 years. Eighty students between seven and 19 will participate in the concert.

They were quite happily and busily engaged in rehearsals, with their fellow students for an enthusiastic audience, when we visited them last Tuesday.

“This is essentially a fund-raising effort and we find it very hard with the rise in the cost-of-living and inflation to run the school,” said Mrs. Wijeratne. The school along with the affiliated school for the blind offers residential facilities for several students too.

The school, a semi-government institution run by a board of trustees of the Anglican Church will celebrate a century of service and valuable education to hearing impaired and visually impaired children in the country in 2012.

“We don’t have concerts that often and this will serve as a run up and good practice for our centenary celebrations”, said Mrs. Wijeratne.

The concert will have 10 items including a Saraswathie pooja dance, a Mayura dance, several popular ballet performances and Musaladi as well as a hip hop dance.

It will also have a percussion orchestra. “The orchestra plays by seeing a chart, since they can’t hear what they are playing,” said Mrs. Wijeratne. “They can feel the vibrations and have a wonderful sense of timing - they play very well.”

The main drummer of the all girl percussion group, 18-year-old Himanthi Buddhimathi was called to interact with us. She indicated by sign language that she had learnt drumming for the past four years and that she enjoyed it very much and didn’t find it difficult at all - it was in fact very easy, she said.

Another of the young performers, 12-year-old Indika Sandaruwan showed us his traditional dance performance. A charming child with a serene face and bright eyes, he performed a beautifully choreographed dance to his teacher Supun Shanaka’s singing.

The way the teacher moved his head keeping time to the music seemed to be just that but as he explained later, that was what allowed the young dancer to keep in time.

“Since they can’t hear, we have to show them what to do in other ways. When I raise my hand or a shake or nod of my head will communicate something to the boy as to what he should do.”

Shanaka is an English teacher at the school; having been specially trained to teach children with special needs as well as having worked some years at the Sunethra Foundation.

He said that he enjoys teaching children with special needs.

He has also had exposure to drama, theatre and the arts and so is one of the coaches for the concert. All the items are being taught to the students by the teachers themselves. We saw a couple of performances on stage, with costumes, as they would appear on the night of July 2.

The performances are a credit not only to the students but also to the teachers themselves. If you are there on July 2 you will never guess that these are deaf children performing. Some teachers will be in the front rows helping the students to keep time but it will be so subtle that you will not notice it.

In short, if you enjoy music and dance and if you would also like to contribute to a worthy cause while having fun at the same time, be at the Ladies College, Colombo 7 at 6.00 pm on July 2. Remember it’s a concert presented by a school of children with special needs.

Tickets are available at the school office and at the gate.