Benefits and Risks

The centres that we work with follow a national curriculum of weekly topics with the children. (The topics themselves are not inappropriate, but the idea that 3 year old children learn in weekly chunks according to a set schedule strikes me as bizarre, to say the least. But that's an aside.)
At the beginning of the project I asked my coordinator to translate the summary topic webs for each topic so we could have an idea what they were studying and help them find more appropriate ways of exploring the ideas and concepts involved. A recurring theme throughout the topics seems to be "Benefits and risks" - e.g. benefits of fruit and vegetables - they are very good for you and have lots of vitamins; risks of fruit and vegetables - if you eat too many you'll end up spending too much time in the toilet!
When it came to translating the topic about the seasons, each season had its particular benefits - hot season: you can dry your clothes quickly; rainy season: you can grow crops etc., but when it came to risks it didn't seem to matter which season it was, the main risk was that you might get ill.
When I lived in Italy, I fought long and hard against the idea that illness was caused by changes in the weather. But here I am finding myself surrounded by the same ideas, and I am slowly beginning to cave in. So it was that when I started getting a sore throat at the weekend I mused "Ah, that's probably because it's rainy season. It'll be the fluctuation between rain and sunshine." (Though thinking about it, that can't be right, or in the UK everyone would be permanently ill!)
I spent the entire weekend waiting for the sore throat to materialise into a full-blown cold, but it didn't. Neither did it get any better, and by this morning I was in considerable pain with it. Peering into the back of my throat with a torch I discovered that my tonsils were very swollen and a peculiar shade of pinky-yellow.
I reluctantly threw on my poncho and set off on my motorbike in the rain to the hospital. They went through the usual routine of weighing, taking blood pressure and temperature. (The scales announced that I am now a mere 49.1kg, clothed. Anyone wishing to lose weight, I can recommend the following approach:

1. Go to live in a country where you don't get on with the food - too spicy and meat-based for a delicate-stomached pescatarian such as myself
2. Discover you have IBS and cut out a whole load more things from your diet in a desperate bid to identify the trigger foods
3. Settle on a completely bland, innocuous and utterly boring but relatively "safe" diet, and take in all your trousers for the nth time.

Here endeth the digression)

The doctor spoke fairly good English. He asked about my symptoms - how long had I had the sore throat? Did I have a runny nose? No. Any congestion? No. Any cough? No. Just this horribly painful sore throat. He then peered in with torch and lolly-stick and announced what I had suspected, that I had tonsillitis. I came away with a week's supply of antibiotics plus two different medicines for relief of cough and congestion, despite the absence of any such symptoms. They do like to prescribe generously here!
I have spent a quiet day at home and will probably do the same tomorrow, just to knock it on the head. I don't want to go spreading germs to the little kiddies, even though they probably gave it to me in the first place! Benefits and risks of working with young children....

Where there's a will...

Over the last few months I have been working together with a small local community-based organisation on a pilot program aimed at enabling more migrant children of pre-school age to enrol in the Thai education system. Most of the organisations working to support migrant education here on the border concentrate on the older students, and there has been very little attention paid to the early years of schooling. This is why VSO decided to carry out the Early Childhood Development project in the first place, as they recognised this gap in provision for the youngest children.

For migrant children whose families are likely to be here in Thailand long term, the best hope for future integration in society is through successful schooling in the Thai education system. Many migrant children begin their education in migrant learning centres and later attempt to transfer into  Thai schools. One of the biggest challenges for them is attaining the required level of Thai language.

The organisation that I have been collaborating with over the last few months - Migrant Education - supports a number of migrant learning centres in and around Mae Sot. They place particular emphasis on helping the migrant learning centres to prepare students for successful transition into Thai schools.
The pilot program aims to get more migrant children into the Thai system right at the beginning of their schooling. We have been working together with the local Ministry of Interior education department in one of the sub-district areas where I am doing my project to explore ways to increase the capacity of the two child-care and development centres to enrol more migrant children over the next few years.

As is to be expected when working with government departments, the whole process is taking rather longer than we anticipated, and we are still ironing out the final details of the working agreement. We are also very conscious of the great uncertainty surrounding the future for migrants due to the recent political changes here in Thailand. It is far from clear whether migrant children will continue to be permitted the level of access to education in the Thai system that they were granted under the Education for All policy.

Nevertheless, we are persisting, driven by a firm belief in the power of education to bring about lasting and positive change. This is a belief that has been echoed by many voices in recent weeks. As the Millennium Development Goals are drawing to a close, there seems to be a flurry of attention given to goals not yet reached. Currently, 58 million children worldwide remain out of school, and Unesco recently gave a very pessimistic prediction about the possibility of achieving the key MD goal of universal primary education by 2015.

However, despite this bleak outlook, there are many examples of countries, each facing their own particular challenges, that have shown the political will to bring about change. In Ghana, the number of children enrolled in school increased from 2.4 million in 1999 to 4.1 million last year, as a result of a doubling in spending on education. Other actions taken by governments around the world to increase enrolment levels include a drive in Morocco to support ethnic and linguistic minorities by introducing the teaching of the local language in primary schools; the abolition of school fees in Burundi; and the introduction of a new curriculum in Vietnam focused on disadvantaged pupils. (See The Guardian - Global Development- Thursday 26 June 2014).
Of course, just getting children into school is only a first step. Measures also need to be taken to ensure that they are able to continue their schooling, and that the education that is provided is of a quality that will provide them with the skills and knowledge that they need to succeed in life.

I am very conscious that the work that I am involved with is the tiniest of tiny drops in the ocean of the problem to be tackled. However, the examples of the countries above illustrate what can be achieved when the political will is there. Unesco's director general, Irina Bokova, called on others to learn from the experiences of countries like Burundi and Ghana: "Real progress is possible and we owe it to children to pursue it."

School Trip

This weekend is the Buddhist Lent festival, and today the children at the centre we are working with this week went to the temple to celebrate, together with the local school and many other members of the community.

All dressed up and ready to go!

We set off at 9.00 and walked the few yards down the road to the temple. No one else had arrived, as the rest of the gathering were first processing around the village with music and floats, so we sat down to wait... and wait.... and wait. The children amused themselves by running around the open space of the temple and climbing on the furniture, as 3-year old children will.

Arriving at the temple

They sat down quietly for a few minutes at least!

 

These chairs were great for climbing on

 

Around 10.00 the teacher in me began to think "These children are all going to start needing the toilet soon. I hope we don't get lots of little puddles on the temple floor..." By 10.30 there was still no sign of anything happening, so a decision was made to take the children back to the centre and give them an early lunch and then return when the procession arrived.

The children duly had their lunch, we sang our entire repertoire of songs with the ukulele and they sat down to watch TV while the teachers had some lunch, before the procession finally appeared at mid-day going down the road past the centre.

We all trooped back to the temple to join the ceremony, which is one of bringing gifts of money and food to the temple. It also seems to involve spectacularly large candles.

 

 Something happening at last!

 

 The arrival of the giant candle

 

The leaves of these decorative "trees" are bank notes.  Visually creative giving!

It was not an especially long ceremony, but one little girl did fall asleep, and who can blame her - that is their usual routine after lunch!