section 11
Community support for early childhood
community topics
69 meeting
Let’s review:
Once the meeting starts, welcome everyone and ask the participants: • Who can help us remember what we talked about in our last meeting? • Who was able to do the activity at home that we asked you to do at the end of the meeting? How did it go? • Does anyone have questions or concerns after doing the activity?
What are we going to learn?
We are going to learn how to encourage the community to support the development and care of preschoolers. LET’S TALK ABOUT IT! We are going to look at some pictures, so we can talk about what we all know about this topic.
How does your community support preschoolers?
What are some other ways that the community can support preschoolers? What would you do to support more initiatives and projects for preschoolers in your community?
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Activity:
“A community that believes” Organize specific activities and play spaces for preschoolers, with the support of local authorities.
What we’ll need: • A flipchart
WHAT WE’LL DO: • Markers Prior to the meeting, invite a few of the community authorities to attend. • At the beginning of the activity thank the community authorities for coming. • Ask the group what needs children under 5 have in the community. Ask participants to share their ideas and opinions about the needs that the young children face. • Ask what community members can do to support these needs. Ask participants, including the authorities, to mention some actions they can take to meet these needs, including the areas of education, safe environment and recreation. • If the health representative from the community is present, ask about the possibility of developing a plan to benefit preschoolers. • Review a calendar and decide on dates to start these actions. Other Suggestions: • On the flipchart write the decisions the group made and the dates for action to help remind you to follow up on them.
Summing Up:
What did we learn today? Now, we’ll review what we discussed today. • How do you feel after this meeting? Why? • What are the two most important things you’ve learned today? • What will you do differently based on what you learned during the meeting? • What did you like the most? Are there things you didn’t like? • Do you have any remaining concerns or questions about what we talked about? To finish, what would you recommend to improve today’s meeting when we do it again with another group. (Explain that answering this question will help the meeting be even better in the future for parents with small children.)
To do at home:
Have a commission of participants visit the office of the community leaders who came to the meeting to remind them of their commitments and help them follow through.
Facilitator’s Manual
71
Basic information for the facilitator: Learning more about community support for early childhood: Community support for ECCD: Communities are made up of families and caregivers. These people play the most significant role in the development of a young child so it is important that the community support ECCD programs. ECCD programs are more sustainable when they have the support of the community the ECCD program serves. For communities to be well equipped to support ECCD programs, community members need to be made aware of how a young child develops and what the holistic needs of young children are. Community members who understand these things will be more supportive of programs designed to nurture young children’s growth and development. There are many ways a community can support ECCD programs: • Families can join the ECD center or preschool committee which helps promote quality and safety in the preschool. • Preschool committee members can: • Organize the caregivers of preschool children to volunteer to support the teacher. This keeps costs down and promotes sustainability. • Organize caregivers of the children to build and maintain the preschool, • Make preschool play equipment from local materials. • Organize caregivers to supply the food for the preschool children. • Delegate and organize cleaning of the preschool. • Conduct fund raising for the maintenance of the preschool. • Do awareness-raising regularly in the community • Advocate at different government levels to encourage increased government funding and support. • Promote the preschool through advertising campaigns. • Organize holistic parent education programs for the caregivers. • Encourage the parents of children who do not attend preschool to send their children and provide some funding or subsidy for those in need. • Provide financial guidance in the running of the preschool.
section 11 / community topics • meeting 69
72 Other Important Groups: The following groups and services also play a key role in the development of children from conception to 5 years old. Just as they do with preschools, communities should be active in making sure these institutions, facilities and groups provide quality services: • Holistic parent education programs for caregivers of children who are too young to attend preschool (under 3 years). These programs are important because this is children’s most critical stage of development. • Health centers: • Maternal health care services for pregnant women that includee weighing, immunization and delivery. • Immunization services for children birth to 5 years. • Promotion of exclusive breastfeeding for babies under 6 months. • Provision of safe play areas in the community for young children. • Home or community-based care for small groups of younger children between 18 months and 3 years who need care. • Sunday school. • Water and sanitation services.
Facilitator’s Manual