Empowering the Village to Raise the Child:

As the National Center for Learning Resources program at ICRI Nepal continues to grow, it has received recognition and great interest from educators and child advocates interested in learning more about this innovative approach to increasing access to high quality early childhood education.  ICRI Nepal Country Director Dhirendra Lamsal was recently invited to present a paper on the project at the South Asia Regional Conference on Early Childhood Development.  From ICRI Nepal:

“Mr. Dhirendra Lamsal, the Country Director of International Child Resource Institute-Nepal (ICRI-Nepal) and presented a paper entitled “An Insight into an Innovative Early Care and Education Program Implemented in Public/Private ECD Centers in Nepal” under the theme of Program Transition, Quality, Content, Model and Innovation during the first South Asia Regional Confernce on Early Childhood Development held in Dhaka, Bangladesh on and from December 7-9, 2010. The Conference was jointly organized by the Bangladesh ECD Network (BEN) and the Asia Pacific Regional Network for Early Childhood (ARNEC). Besides seven plenary sessions, a total of 24 papers were presented under the theme of (i) ECD Policy, Advocacy and Networking, (ii) Program Transition, Quality, Content, Model, Innovation (iii) Inclusion, Equity and Resources (iv) Capacity Building and Professional Development including ECD Programs presented by posters (Ref: programs, abstracts presenters).

Mr. Lamsal in his presentation illuminated the effectiveness of early care and educational services delivered by International Child Resource Institute-Nepal in 19 public and private ECD Centers in Nepal. He provided an insight for transformation of dull, un-stimulating, un-interative, rudimentary teaching practices into stimulating, joyful, meaninigful and creative learning environment for the yough children. Mr. Lamsal undrlined on how ECD-pedagogy  could be transformed into daily care and education of young children with concurrent focus on how holistic development of a young child is possible in a resource poor setting. Also, he expained about community driven methods to respond to the program implementation level challenges during the presentation. Likewise, he discussed the process of taking care of young children at home and their further education in school (ECD) set-up by highlighting major gaps to be bridged by the parents at homes and the ECD facilitators at the school environment. The before and after scenario of the ECD program intervention was illustrated with successful case study of a few children served by ICRI-Nepal. Key lessons and learnings documented during this intervention with reflection on major outcomes/outputs and programmatic experiences were broadly shared during this occassion. Furthermore, the overall program goals, objectives, strategies, and activities as well as needs of up scaling the program areas, beneficiaries, stakeholders and key tools for replication of this program in other parts of the country was also discussed.

Finally, he summed up his presentation sharing a range of positive findings such as decreased drop-out rates in the ECD centers, increased understanding of the community about ECD program, and developed sense of ownership, roles and responsibilities of the community including School Management Committee in the areas of program intervention.”

Congratulations Dhirendra on your successful presentation, and on the innovative work you are doing to improve the lives of children and families in Nepal!

One of the newest schools to become involved with ICRI Nepal’s early childhood education program is the Kesh Chandra Primary School.  The school is located in the historic Hanuman Dhoka area of Kathmandu, inside the grounds of a temple.

The school caters to very low income families from the nearby community, and currently offers primary school education from grades one to five.  There is no early childhood classroom.  However, many of the older children bring their younger siblings to school each day, as their parents must work and have no other options for child care.  This means that children as young as 2 spend most of their day sitting silently at desks, and don’t get the developmentally-appropriate learning environment they need.  They also distract the teachers and older siblings from age-appropriate instruction for the primary school students.

Because of ICRI Nepal’s past success in helping other primary schools add early childhood classrooms, the District Education Office reached out to us and asked us to help the teachers and staff at Kesh Chandra.  ICRI Nepal staff has begun visiting the school to complete a needs assessment and to work with the teachers, staff, and parents to develop a vision for the new early childhood program.

There are a number of challenges at this particular site.  The existing classroom space is extremely small and cramped.  All five grades of the primary school are currently packed into a very small area, with makeshift cubicles dividing the grades.  There is little light and poor ventilation.  There are no materials other than outdated textbooks, and no space for the children to move freely.

And yet, there is a dedicated staff, a supportive principal, and many bright young minds eager to learn.  Not to mention the involvement of ICRI Nepal, which is already speaking to the temple leadership about freeing up additional space within the compound for an early childhood classroom.

Visiting Kesh Chandra, it is hard to imagine the school someday containing a vibrant, developmentally-appropriate child development space.  However, as I’ve shared in previous weeks, ICRI Nepal is certainly capable of achieving this kind of transformation.  I’ve already told you about how they turned a closet into a classroom.  How they help teachers to rethink their entire concept of early childhood education.  How they can craft a beautiful learning environment out of found objects and locally-made materials.  And how they even convinced a group of teachers to give up their own office space to make a better learning environment for young children.

So I have no doubt that they will be able to achieve a remarkable transformation for the young children currently sitting silently behind their desks in the dark, cramped classrooms at Kesh Chandra Primary School… but these kinds of transformations are only possible with the support of people like you.  We need to continuously raise funds to pay for the costs of renovating buildings, training teachers, purchasing materials, and hiring staff.  A donation of any amount helps us to make developmentally-appropriate early childhood education a reality for children and families in Nepal.  On behalf of ICRI Nepal, I want to thank you so much for your interest and support, and ask you to please consider making a donation today.

As discussed in our last post, ICRI Nepal– like all of ICRI’s offices around the world–has a comprehensive approach to child advocacy.  We believe that children don’t exist in isolation.  We work to help the whole child—and that means supporting the child’s family, the child’s school, and the child’s community, however we can.  This is why our programs encompass HIV/AIDS prevention, community economic development, maternal/child health, and a range of other subjects.  It’s all part of our effort to empower the village to raise the child.

At the same time, early childhood education is at the heart of ICRI’s international programs, and ICRI Nepal is no exception.  I want to feature just a few more of the early childhood classrooms that have been impacted by ICRI Nepal’s National Center for Learning Resources.

ICRI Nepal has been working with the Pragati School since 2005.  The school serves a very large number of children from mixed caste/mixed income backgrounds.  However, like many schools in Nepal, there is simply not enough space to accommodate all of the children easily.

Since the school staff was eager to add an early childhood classroom, ICRI Nepal brought in several volunteers to renovate and paint an unused room off the school’s courtyard.  The classroom was soon filled with children, and the teachers, staff, and parents were very proud of the new addition to their school community.

At the same time, there were serious structural problems with the early childhood space, including a lack of windows, which caused problems with light and ventilation.  ICRI Nepal worked hard to engage the school community in a series of meetings and visioning workshops, so that everyone could have input into a strategic plan for improving the early childhood classroom and the school as a whole.

(old early childhood classroom)

And what was the result?  The teachers volunteered to give up their office space, two rooms adjacent to the main courtyard.  The rooms were small, but lined with windows and full of light.  Although the teachers had enjoyed this space for many years, they decided that it was more important to utilize it as a learning environment for young children.

The entire school community pitched in to craft the new early childhood rooms.  ICRI Nepal commissioned and designed new furniture and materials for the space.  Teachers from the school began attending National Center for Learning Resources trainings.  And ICRI Nepal staff worked side by side in the classrooms with the teachers, parents, and the very supportive school administration.

What’s resulted is a beautiful early childhood learning environment.  The children are engaged.  The teachers are caring.  The principal is supportive.  The parents are delighted.  And working together as a team, they’ve achieved something remarkable.

Another early childhood center that has seen a total transformation after working with ICRI Nepal is the Balmandir Thecho ECD Center.  The Centre is run by the National Children’s Organization, Balmandir.  Most of the children’s parents are day laborers, and as such there is high turnover and a high level of poverty amongst the student population.

When ICRI Nepal was first invited to work at this school, children as young as 2 years old were sitting behind desks all day, working out of textbooks.  It took many months of meetings, tranings, and conversations to convince the administration to allow the children to have greater freedom of movement.  In the end a compromise was reached—low round tables in the 2 to 3 year old room and colorful, stackable, movable tables and chairs in the 3 to 4 year old room.  Staff and parents are very proud of the new tables and chairs, which can be easily moved aside to allow the children to roam the small classrooms freely.

Although the Centre has little to no resources for materials, the teachers are very dedicated and have worked with ICRI Nepal staff to create activity centers full of found objects and locally-made materials.  The teachers have also transformed the curriculum based on what they’ve learned at the National Center for Learning Resources trainings hosted by ICRI Nepal.

On the day I visited the school, the youngest children was enthralled with a pile of homemade blocks that had been painted with Nepali and English characters.  The older children were ecstatically singing songs written by their teacher while they drew pictures on bits of recycled paper and cardboard.

I was invited to sit in a circle with the children to play a “special Nepali game” called Luka Mari.  Everyone closed their eyes, waiting for the “tapper” to choose them—and when they did, chased that person back around the circle to their empty spot.  It took me a few rounds to catch on, but I soon realized that this was the same game of Duck, Duck Goose I’d enjoyed in my own classrooms as a child!

One of ICRI Nepal’s most exciting projects is the National Center on Learning Resouces.  Housed in ICRI’s office in Kathmandu, the project provides innovative education training programs for pre-primary and primary school educators.

NCLR’s mission is “To transform the dull, rote memorization-focused, un-stimulating and teacher-centric Nepali school education system into learning environments that are joyful, meaningful, creative, and child-friendly.”

How does NCLR take on this admittedly huge task?  Through providing off-site trainings to teachers, led by the country’s best and brightest early childhood educators, as well as going on-site to work intensively with teachers and school administrators to literally transform their classrooms.  In later posts I’ll show some of the results of these amazing on-site transformations.  But for now I want to focus on the off-site training that is critical to NCLR’s success.

During my trip to Nepal, I had the opportunity to participate in a half-day training session led by three esteemed early childhood experts.  This training was one of just many attended by a core group of nearly 50 early childhood educators from Kathmandu, the majority of whom work in extremely resource-challenged schools serving low-income children and families.

As one participant shared during the session, “We come here to these trainings because we get something we haven’t gotten anywhere else- the message that learning should be joyful!  Teaching should be joyful!  Before, I thought my students learned best when they were quiet, passive.  Now I realize that their excitement and activity is a sign that they are actually learning and developing.”

Although side-by-side on-site training in the teachers’ own classrooms is a critical part of NCLR, in Kathmandu I realized just how important these off-site trainings are to achieving the project’s mission.  Even after a classroom has been transformed into a child-friendly learning environment, in that space a teacher must still be a teacher: the leader who is responsible for the wellbeing of her students.  But by taking teachers out of their classrooms, by allowing them to be students themselves, to have an opportunity to personally experience the joy of creative learning, an even deeper level of transformation starts to occur.