Learning and Life Skills with the local kids of Siyasiya

With only a few weeks left to go, we wanted to share with you the skills that we have learnt, the training sessions that we have received, our thoughts and feelings about our work and our successes so far.

CYECE deliver Life Skills training sessions - Photo: Zilah Atfield

In our recent life skills session we learnt about HIV & AIDs and the choices people can make to lead a healthy life using the interactive “HOPE kit” (developed by USAID and John Hopkins). We came to understand the different activities to help children make positive life choices in order to achieve their goals. We found this training incredibly valuable and will apply the activities that we learnt in facilitating our own lessons; for example the ‘Nditha!’ (I can!) concept which reinforces positivity as you get the children to say ‘Nditha!’ after they understand something or complete and activity.

ICV Felix Banda plays a White Blood Cell battling HIV (played by UK Team Leader Adrian O'Sullivan) - Photo: Zilah Atfield

Using these new skills we have facilitated life skills lessons and child rights clubs focussing on topics from Self-awareness & Self-esteem to Health & Hygiene, Sexual Harassment & Discrimination to Freedom of Expression and Human Rights.

Local children participate in a Life Skills lesson - Photo: Zilah Atfield

This is how the team felt their lessons went:

Zilah: “I really enjoyed teaching the children about self-awareness and self-esteem, especially hearing their goals for the future and what they want to be when they grow up. I think the children really engaged with the lesson and I hope we helped them feel more confident and ready to achieve their goals.”

UKV Zilah Atfield and ICV Davie Chimaliro facilitate Child Rights sessions - Photo: Adrian O'Sullivan

Felix: “The children have been a great audience, attentive and participative. They really made our task easier for both lessons (Self-awareness & Self-esteem and Freedom & Expression of Rights). I have never been happier teaching. It was such a delight.”

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ICV Felix Banda leads a session on Life Skills with UKV Zilah Atfield - Photo: Adrian O'Sullivan

Abbie: “Bertha and I taught a lesson on Health & Hygiene practices. It was really fun to interact with the children and see how many of them volunteered for the activities we had set up. I’m glad we got to teach the children the importance of washing their hands properly, how to look after their bodies and teeth and what they need to do to keep their bodies healthy and active.”

ICV Bertha Chasokera and UKV Abbie Anderson teaching Life Skills - Photo: Felix Banda

Bertha: “The children were able to participate in all the activities we planned, they sung along to a song about good hygiene as well as answer questions after the lesson. We gave the learners clean plastic bottles in order to encourage them to drink two litres of water a day. I enjoyed the session and could see the children were eager to learn more and answer questions when we got to the Q&A session.”

As a team, we have gained so much in the past few weeks with the training that CYECE has provided - from our time in the field conducting household visits, as well as facilitating life skills lessons and child rights club sessions. We learned the specifics of what is what is not hazardous labour or child labour, how to probe for the household income, how to effectively communicate with the children and how to record accurate data. These skills were crucial for our household visits.

UKV Beth Reid leads a Child Rights lesson - Photo: Zilah Atfield

We are delighted to have already surpassed our target of identifying 225 marginalised children, and will continue to go into the field searching for children that have dropped out of school, are engaged in child labour, are in early marriages or have teen pregnancies and are in need of support!

Authors: Alice Chunga and Charlotte Rodrigues