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Show i 4 DAVIS COUNTY CLIPPER. FEBRUARY 4. 1977 jLi 2. Maren Halberson works through a shopping exercise with trainer Sheila Lund. Sfc 1. Residents of the Bountiful Turn Home Go To work. r 3. Izzie Thompson knits a scarf to go with her coat. 4. Andrea Dehm performs a measuring exercise white house mother Rose McConnell watches. "" By ROSI-.LY- comb her hair in public. Another was reminded to wear her shoes to dinner. Head trainer Gloria Sutton said, One of the biggest problems is getting the public to believe that retarded people can make it on their own. Retarded people can operate as any normal person. Its just a matter of giving them an immense amount of training W'E MUST teach them to blend into the community in appearance. We hope the public will come to accept them as just another person with strong and weak not to KIRK One woman is knitting an afghan, another is making baked chicken for dinner. One is putting in the laundry while another balances her checkbook. ALL OF these are normal activities for women returning home after a days work, but all have required many hours of training for the eight retarded women who are learning to care for themselves in the Project TURN home in Bountiful. The home which opened in May of 1975, is supervised by Project TURN - training Utahs Retarded Normalization - which is -- -- an arm of the Utah Association for tarded Citizens. Re- THE ORGANIZATION also operates a home for retarded men and women in Salt Lake and Weber Counties and a coeduca- tional home for the retarded in St. George. State TURN director is Eric Moon. The goal of the TURN home in Bountiful is to teach the women enough skills so they can move into independent apartment living, Kelly McConnell explained. Kelly and his wife Rose are live-iparents who supervise the activities in the home. n SINCE THE home opened over V2 years ago, one woman has graduated to supporting herself in an apartment, while two others are waiting for job placement before moving into independent apartment living Before the women leave the home, they are taught skills and behaviors they must know before moving into society, trainers Peggy Hawthorn and Sheila Lund say These professionals spend ,12 hours a week in the home teaching skills. Each training program is individualized with the progress of each woman being plotted on a graph points. Three of the same women who lived in the home when it first opened are still there. It takes about 2 y2 years maximum to train the women in the skills needed for apartment living. Mrs Sutton said the cost for this training is about $6,000 per woman per year. SHE POINTED out that this cost is less than the cost to institutionalize the retarded for the same period. After this training period they are placed in a job, can become Mrs. Sutton said the TURN home is owned by the Davis County Housing Authority. The Division of Family Services pays for the service given to each woman per day. Since all the women are over 18, they pay room and board from money they receive from assistance payments. SHE SAID the TURN home neighbors are helpful. Some Cub Scout troops help with the yard work, though the women work in the yard themselves and raise a garden in the summer. Mr. Connell explained that the home is set up so that each woman has a roommate. A is set up in the basement of the home where women, who are most ready to assume apartment liv ing outside the home, participate in a play-lik- e apartment living. THEY DO their own cooking, menu planning and shopping, cleaning and washing. Presently Marin and Marilyn are living apartment in the home, in preparation for moving to an outside apartment. TRAINERS Sheila and Peggy work with the women in a normalization program. The same things are expected of them as are expected of the normal person, Sheila said. We run programs and try to help them to achieve the normal rate of performance as near as possible. Such skills as counting change, calculating the best buys at stores, and learning personal care technqiues are acquired. in the THE RETARDED have the right to be educated to lead as normal a life as possible, Mr. McConnell said. "We used to concentrate on making the retarded happy. Now we concentrate to helping them to be normal. Many of the women are supported by their families. Since their parents wont live forever, they must be taught to be Mr. McConnell said. When the women are ready to move, Project TURNS helps set up an apartment. THREE types of apartments are available - boarding apartments where there is only minimal supervision, shared where the retarded woman lives with a supervisor and independent apartment living where a volunteer advocate checks in with the retarded woman periodically. -- apa-tme- in apartment living prevents the women leaving the TURN Supervision home and moving into an apartment cold turkey," Mr. McConnell said. They must have a pretty stable job so they can meet bills. Otherwise its too expensive for them to make it. ONE FORMER TURN home resident was placed in a job at a soap factory in Salt Lake City. Izzie, who is being trained at the sheltered workshop sponsored by Davis County School District, has been placed as a dishwasher in a drug store in Farmington. The women who live in the Project TURN home in Bountiful are trained in vocational skills at the Davis County Development Center in Farmington. They return to the TURN home in the evening to learn the business of living. MARILYN WAS knitting a scarf and hat to wear with her new red coat. She said it had taken her two years to crochet the afghan on her bed. She lives with LuAnn, who moved into the home in July. LuAnn is 22, younger than Marilyn, but says we get along together well. Mr. McConnell says some of the girls have a long way to go. They come into the home with no skills. Their parents have done everything for them. They have childish behavior and need to change. ON THURSDAY night at dinner, all agreed that it was time to begin a weight watchers program Trainers, were to be included in the project All the women decided while eating Izzies chocolate pudding with whipped cream, that the project would begin next week It will be a good experience," Sheila said later. It will help the women learn to calculate. Calorie counting is as good as balancing a checkbook to teach numbers skills rk Photos By Fred Wright 5. Andrea measures oil for a cooking project. are inquired to learn how to use public transportation, the public telephone and know how to contact police and fire departments and get medical, dental and legal attention In addition they must know how to read, write and compute mathematically on a survival level. Trainer Sheila Lund was working with Izzie who was learning how to balance her checkbook during the visit on Thursday evening learn such home THE WOMEN management services as planning meals, ALL THE women measurement of . ingredients, serving meals and etiquette. On Thursday night Andrea prepared dinner and served baked chicken, asparagus, baked potatoes, with chocolate pudding for dessert. Izzie set the table and made the chocolate pudding Maintenance and (are of the home is another skill required before the women move into a separate apartment They must keep their own rooms and the rest of the house clean, in addition to washing their clothes and keeping them in repair. THEY ARE taught to remain well groomed by community standards and age jppiopme rela'ionships One of the women a is told bv the trainees maintain V 6. A calculator is a useful tool in balancing the checkbook. 7. Marilyn Woodword and Izzie Thompson work with Trainer Sheila Lund in Balancing Checkbooks. I |