Success story

The centre that we visited last week for the health inspection is one where we have seen some of the most significant and genuine change as a result of the project. The centre was originally set up by the local community and is situated in a beautiful and peaceful setting in the grounds of a temple. More recently, the centre was brought under the control of the local MOI Sub-District Administrative Office who planned to merge it with the other Child Care and Development Centre in the area. However, the local community resisted this merger, and the centre remains very much an active and integral part of the local community and a popular choice for parents.

 

 

The Welcome Committee - my daily arrival on my motorbike used to be a source of great fascination and amusement for the children. Maybe something to do with the outsize motorbike helmet I wear. The novelty has worn off somewhat by now!

One of the key factors in the success of the centre, and of our work there, is the support of the Director. She does not teach a class herself, and she is very proactive in offering support to her staff. She has consistently expressed her appreciation of the practical training we have given, and her positive attitude and the support she has given her teachers has been instrumental in helping them implement changes in practice.

When we first started working with the centre, the children never played outside as the play equipment was broken and dangerous. As part of the project VSO have provided funding to carry out the necessary maintenance work on the outdoor play area. Since the repair works, all the children are given the opportunity to play outside as part of the daily routine – weather permitting! Outdoor play is such a crucial part of childhood physical development and this is a significant change that had been brought about as a result of the project.

In working with the teachers at this centre, we focused our work mainly on the teacher of the oldest children, as these children are within the original target age range of the project. She is a fully trained and highly experienced early childhood teacher. From the start I was very aware of the need to recognise her experience and be very sensitive in my approach when suggesting possible alternative ways of teaching.

In the first year of the project she had a class of 35 children, aged between 3 and 4, with no help. We discussed with the Education Chief the possibility of her having an assistant. This had been previously proposed, but in the end the hiring of an extra teacher to cater for an influx of younger students took priority and she remained on her own with this large class of lively and energetic children.

 

I decided that I could not make any suggestions to her that I would not be prepared to put into practice myself in the same working conditions. I worked closely with her to plan activities that were more developmentally appropriate for the children but still manageable in the teaching context. She was always very polite, but she did not hesitate to tell me when she thought my approaches were mistaken or unrealistic, and I always had the impression that she was very sceptical about my suggestions and quite reluctant to change.

Butterfly Party - as part of the topic on butterflies we set up a creative activity where the children made butterfly hats. We then held a butterfly party, where the children drank "nectar" (orange juice) from "flowers" (paper cups with a flower lid) using their "proboscis" (a plastic drinking straw). A much more effective way of learning how butterflies feed than simply telling the children or showing pictures.

One change that I encouraged her to make was to move away from doing all activities with the whole class to setting up a variety of group activities for the children, including free play. She was initially resistant to this idea, saying that it would not be possible to control the children in such a setting. However, she later attended a workshop in Bangkok (totally separate from our project) where they had clearly been advocating the same idea, and this provided the trigger for her to try the new approach.

She has now modified the structure of the daily routine, and is providing more opportunities for the children to be involved in practical activities and free play, which is one of the key changes we have been trying to support. In a recent conversation she talked enthusiastically about the impact of the changes. Contrary to her original fears, the behaviour of the children has actually improved, as they always have something stimulating and appropriate to do, and she is able to give more focused attention to individual children by working with smaller groups.

The Book Corner

Role play - a budding medic!

 

The Home Corner

She also said that she no longer feels so exhausted, and she thanked me very sincerely for helping her bring about these changes. After so many months of feeling I was getting nowhere, this was a real breakthrough moment and it left me feeling quite emotional! It provides an excellent illustration of the importance and the effectiveness of the long-term approach of VSO placements in bringing about meaningful and lasting change. It took over a year of working closely together and suggesting tiny, gradual changes for this change to occur. But now that it has, I believe it will last, because the teacher has come to an understanding for herself that this is a successful approach to supporting young children's learning and development.

Singing along

Last week we were asked if we could help out at one of the centres today. Our first understanding was that they were taking part in some sort of singing competition and wanted us to do some of our songs with them with the ukulele. When we got there today, it transpired that they were in fact in some sort of contest organised by the Ministry of Public Health. They had already got through the first stages and were now competing at the provincial level.

It seemed a bit like a mini, health-focused OFSTED, with various inspectors present, meeting with the teachers and members of the parents' committee, and observing what was going on at the school. Children were selected at random from the different classes and taken off to the bathroom to demonstrate that they knew how to wash their hands and brush their teeth! I noticed that the children were given copious quantities of fruit for mid-morning snack, with no sign of the ubiquitous crisps and snacks that the children usually bring to school and munch away on at will.

Our contribution was to sing the "Washing Hands Song" that we have taught them. We stayed the entire morning, waiting for our moment, which finally came just before lunch. The children were not quite as lively as normal when we sing, which is possibly just as well, but they sang along and did the actions beautifully. The inspectors listened for a while, and then got up and wandered away - typical school inspector behaviour! We don't know the outcome yet, but I doubt our singing is likely to have swung it either way!

We don't have any footage of today's efforts, but last week we did video the children at another centre singing along with the ukulele. They are possibly our most enthusiastic singers, and can be viewed here.
In case you are having difficulty identifying Old McDonald's animals, on this occasion they were:

• dog
• buffalo
• pig
• elephant
• kangaroo
• tiger

We have also known him to have a monkey; snake; frog; snail; turtle; rabbit; butterfly; dinosaur - as well as the more usual chicken, cow, horse, cat and duck.
Whatever else we may have achieved, we have certainly brought a great deal of fun and enjoyment to the children with the singing!

Celebrating motherhood

August 12^th is mothers’ day in Thailand. This date is chosen because it is the queen’s birthday, and it is a nationally celebrated public holiday. This year Monday 11^th has been given as a national holiday as well – part of the new military government’s drive to boost the economy and bring “happiness to the people” - so the country is enjoying a four day weekend.

On Friday we attended the mothers’ day celebrations at one of the centres. It was a real family occasion with mums and dads and lots of cute baby brothers and sisters.

 

Some of the girls did a delightful dance that they had been diligently practising all week, all dressed up in bright blue, the colour of the queen.  

Sadly, one of the dancers was overcome by the occasion and spent most of the morning sobbing in her mother’s arms. This meant the dancing troupe was one performer short, so the teacher grabbed a little boy at the last minute to stand in for her so her partner would not be alone. He rose to the occasion without a murmur and did a great job, but his partner did not look best pleased with the new arrangement!

After the dancing, the children took turns to pay respect to their mums, kneeling in front of them and presenting them with ceremonial flowers before being given a big hug and cuddle. All very moving!

 

As with any such event here, the morning ended with everyone sitting down to eat together, before the families all headed home.  It was a delightful occasion, a real celebration of family relationships and the role of mothers.

That evening, I came across a story from the BBC about a woman in India who swam a kilometre across a monsoon-swollen river in her ninth month of pregnancy so that she could have the chance to give birth in a hospital rather than at her isolated rural home. After a morning celebrating motherhood, I began thinking about the millions of women worldwide for whom simply becoming a mother is a life-threatening prospect.
 

Every day, roughly 800 women die from preventable causes relating to pregnancy and childbirth, with 99% of these deaths occurring in developing countries. The 2014 Millennium Development Goals Report indicates that Goal 5, which addresses reduction in maternal mortality and the achievement of universal access to reproductive health by 2015, is the furthest of all the goals from being reached.

Most maternal deaths are preventable. A crucial part of the strategy to reduce maternal mortality is ensuring that every baby is delivered with the assistance of a skilled health attendant - doctor, midwife or nurse - who has the skills and training to prevent or treat potentially life-threatening complications. Despite progress made in recent decades, in 2012 40 million births in developing regions were not attended by skilled health personnel, with over 32 million of these births occurring in rural areas.

VSO are making a significant contribution to improving these statistics by their programmes to train midwives in developing countries. In this short film, Lilian - a midwife in a small village in Malawi - talks about the training she received from a VSO volunteer midwife, and her tremendous sense of satisfaction and fulfilment at being able to save the lives of mothers and babies in her community.

Lilian with VSO volunteer Beth and a happy mother and baby