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A New Day for Kids (ANDK)
July 2008 to June
2011 * Districts of Kravanh and Veal Veng, Pursat Province
* Primary beneficiaries 3,600 adults,
* Secondary beneficiaries, 1,800 children 0-5 years
* Budget: $513,000
Donor/s: AusAID, ADRA Australia and ADRA Norway
The A New Day for Kids (ANDK) project works with parents and their children who live in the western province of Pursat in Cambodia. This area was known as the Khmer Rouge territory from 1975 up to 1993 where people were confronted with civil war more then 18 years. Life has been hard from the past up to now and this project seeks to help parents to begin a new day for their kids.
ANDK seeks to enhance a supportive community environment for rural children < six with two main objectives 1) to improve parents and caregivers knowledge, skills and practices in and support for child development and 2) to improve accessible quality child development service delivery of community and government partners. The project utilizes the Reflect Methodology approach for both caregiver empowerment and related child learning, strengthening the voices of poor people in life-skills and education decision-making at all levels. Reflect is a structured participatory learning process which facilitates people’s critical analysis of their environment, placing empowerment at the heart of sustainable and equitable development, social change, and action.
The project works in partnership with the Provincial Department of Women’s Affairs to orient local leaders and stakeholders and train community based Adult and Child Reflect Circle Facilitators to work with community members. A thorough community driven process is used to select households who can best benefit both themselves and the broader community. The Reflect Circle (RCs) groups of community members, primarily Parents and Caregivers, meet at least once weekly guided by the facilitator to articulate their views and concerns and share ideas and solutions in a gender disaggregated manner, men and women meeting separately and also jointly at least once a month. These facilitators learn to develop and utilize their own learning materials by constructing maps, calendars, matrices, and diagrams or using drama, story-telling and songs to capture social, economic, cultural and political issues from their own environment and based on their interests and challenges. The RC approach focuses on development of parenting, vocational (including literacy and numeracy), and other
family decision making skills closely linked to the active engagement of people in wider processes of development and social change. Reflect Circle activities include community campaigns and community development initiatives which are, as with all Reflect activities, on relevant topics chosen by community members themselves.
For family and community health agriculture and other livelihood practices raised as high priority issues to quality childcare, the project links with government technical support persons for group and community assistance and facilitates capacity building where interests and opportunities meet including key livelihoods issues. Household water hygiene and sanitation issues are being addressed locally building on expertise of ADRA’s watsan program in well, latrine and water tank installation to promote a better physical environment for children in their homes based on increased understanding and demand.
ANDK utilises a complimentary approach to the caregiver RCs to further stimulate caregiver understanding and participation in the mental development of their children. Informal community-based child learning groups are linked to all caregiver RCs. Facilitators learn a variety of community child-appropriate participatory approaches including; learning by doing, group games and various options of using and creating toys and other activities that stimulate the children’s imagination, creativity, fine motor skills and hand-eye co-ordination. The aim is to make an environment that allows children to better develop to their full potential in a fun and dynamic atmosphere and the child RC activities maintain a close linkage with the adult caregivers as a learning tool for what can be done at home. The continued link of the Reflect Circles with the Department of Education monitoring for both adults and children encourages communities towards continued preschool activities in line with the Ministry of Education, Youth and Sports strategy. This project contributes to the millennium development goal #2 which is that by 2015, children everywhere, boys and girls alike, will be able to complete a full course of primary schooling.
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