Young with intellectual disability: the experts’ competences

A new sports season also begins for young people with intellectual disabilities. It is good to remember that too few still have access to sports programs. In relation to having them participate in team games there is still a conception that individual sports are preferable to them.

Personally I am not convinced of this idea. Since for 7 years as the Academy of Integrated Football we have been carrying out a project with AS Roma precisely aimed at teaching soccer and we have documented in several scientific papers the positive effects of this project. It seems to me, however, that a gap present in many sports programs for young people with intellectual disabilities is the reduced specific professional competences of those who work with these young people and that they may lack the skills necessary to plan and implement effective programs. Therefore, I want to report what we at the Academy of Integrated Soccer believe should be the profile of the professional involved in these activities.

1. Specific scientific and professional skills: degree in exercise science, sports psychology, or speech therapy.
2. Be convinced that sport is a fundamental activity for improving the psychological and social condition of children and adolescents with intellectual disabilities.
3. Be predisposed to interaction on the field with young people, building on one’s own sports skills and/or experience gained through a sports career or movement studies.
4. Accepting the frustrations derived from the slow improvements of these young people, always showing belief in the possibilities that they can still improve while respecting their time and problems.
5. Being enthusiastic and dynamic are two essential psychological characteristics to be accepted by these young people and to convey the conviction that one can learn despite their limitations.
6. To love sports since the activity in the field is quite demanding and tiring, so certainly those who play sports have more opportunities to fit in this area where the activity is for everyone organized with specific educational units for the young people to follow.
7. Be patient and tenacious to have the willingness to repeat and then again repeat the teachings as many times as necessary without interacting in a negative, angry or disappointed way with young people, who are more than others sensitive to the emotional changes of their teachers.