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Early Childhood Development

Happy 1st Birthday to Early Childhood Development!!!

Congratulations! Rays of Hope’s Early Childhood Development (ECD) programme is one-year-old! And what a year it has been. Christy Bennet, ECD’s project leader, is amazed by the progress made in such a short time. “From just five crèches in our first month, we now have a working relationship with fifteen. That’s a tripling of our reach in just a year! We are very excited about how well we have been received.” Research confirms that the first five years in a child’s life are crucial for the development of the brain. These early years provide the foundation that shapes children’s future health, happiness, growth, development and learning achievement at school, in the family and community and in life in general. In Alexandra, there are many crèches that look after young children who fall outside the government-managed system for child care. These crèches are run by care-givers who range from qualified teachers to women who just want to help the community. ECD assists by equipping caregivers with the skills and knowledge to nurture very young children to grow, develop and thrive. Teaching and support is offered by a skilled multidisciplinary team of volunteers guided by an Alex-based “Super Mama”. Christy explains, “The goal of our programme is to support and instruct the teacher-caregivers to offer a healthy, stimulating environment to nurture 0 – 6 year olds in the crèches. The assistance is practical and permanent: each crèche has safety checklists posted in the kitchen and central room of the crèche. There are menus posted in the kitchen with healthy snacks and meal options. The caregivers also have a schedule with teaching ideas and activities.” ECD also holds workshops facilitated by a multidisciplinary team of teachers, nutritionists, nurses and volunteers. “These are excellent opportunities for caregivers to learn and network. At the second workshop they received a binder with lesson ideas and teaching aids. We will continue to add ideas and lesson plans to these binders over time,” says Christy. Reading is also an essential part of a child’s development. “With donated books we have created reading corners for each crèche. We continue to build on the reading corner theme to encourage teachers to read to the children and the children to read age-appropriate books by themselves and to take care of the books. Volunteers have made pillows and soft toys for the reading corners so the children can enjoy a soft, comfortable environment in which to read. We have also introduced mobile activity boxes that we rotate among the crèches. These provide a variety of learning opportunities for the children.” Some of the children attending crèche on a daily basis are still babies. “We have set up baby rooms with music and baby activities. Our Super Mama has been teaching the importance of creating a stimulating environment for the little ones to promote brain development and growth. The babies have a daily routine that supports adequate sleep, nutrition and activity.” Christy concludes her review of the first year, “The caregivers have appreciated the support that ECD has provided. It’s been a very busy but highly rewarding year for us. We know that there is still a great need out there and look forward to another year of outstanding growth.” We can’t wait to see what Christy and the ECD team report back this time next year.

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