SoFarTEAM is an Erasmus+ Project which addresses a key gap in the teaching and training materials available to date on social farming – how to work effectively with specific target groups. While the core offering of social farming may be the same and people will experience many benefits and outcomes in common, there are clearly differences between the support needs, activities, approach required, challenges, etc. in working with different groups.
SoFarTEAM Project partners have combined interviews with experienced social farmers and health and social care professionals, participant observations on social farms, the latest academic research and learning and their own expertise to develop a range of outputs on working with different target groups on social farms. Some are materials which can be used as teaching materials for health/social care and agricultural programmes at third-level. Others are targeted guides aimed at social farmers and practitioners working on the ground with participants, enabling them to improve their everyday social farming practice. All are now available here on our website and on the Project website (www.sofaredu.eu) as Open Source material.
SoFarTEAM brought together six experienced European partners from: the Netherlands (Wageningen University and Research); Germany (Thüringer Ökoherz e.V & University of Applied Sciences Neubrandenburg); Ireland (Leitrim Development Co,/Social Farming Ireland) and the Czech Republic (Jabok Academy & University of South Bohemia). The Project began in autumn 2020 and concludes in autumn 2023 and is coordinated by Thüringer Ökoherz e.V, an umbrella organisation and support association for organic farming in the Federal State of Thuringia in Germany.
For the purposes of this Project, seven key targets groups were identified:
- People with mental health challenges
- People with physical disabilities
- People with intellectual disabilities
- The elderly
- Youth
- Refugees and other displaced people
- People in recovery from addiction
Click below to see the Project’s fantastic outputs which will continue to be used by lecturers, researchers and social farmers in Ireland and beyond into the future.
Text Book – Target groups and their involvement in social farming.
Provides detailed material on social farming generally and on working with each target group. It can be used as a text book or as a basis for developing teaching materials by lecturers/teachers in areas like health, social care and agriculture.
Research Report
Provides a report and preliminary analysis of the interviews and participatory observations with social farmers and supervisors which were used to develop the SoFarTEAM teaching and training materials.
PowerPoints – Teaching material on target groups and their involvement in social farming.
Provides teachers/lecturers with PowerPoint presentations on each chapter of the textbook which may be used as is or adapted to their needs.
On-line Tool for working with different target groups
An on-line tool for working with different target groups, aimed at a wide audience but especially useful for farmers.
Guides for Farmers for working with different target groups
Concise but very useful Guides for farmers on working with the seven target groups of social farming plus an Introduction to the Guides overall.
