WE ARE FINALLY STARTING TO SEE ENCOURAGING RESULTS
Here in the city of Mwanza, the period right after Christmas and the New Year feels like September in Canada, because January is when school starts. Two of the girls we took care of at the Center have started first grade! And we gave another community workshop designed to create awareness about children, family and child rearing practices.
Ester, the 9-year-old girl we welcomed on December 3rd 2009, was enrolled right away in a school close to our Centre. She is already a few years behind because of all the moving around and hardships she has been through. School will help build self-esteem and the opportunity to mingle with more kids will enhance her social skills as well. We’ve enrolled her in Grade 1 and we will be working closely with her, so she can soon move up to 2nd grade. She is smart, she loves school and looks great in her school uniform.
Katarina who is almost 7 years-old attended kindergarten five mornings a week during her 11-month stay at the Centre. She learned how to hold a pencil, how to count, the alphabet, and most importantly, she got a chance to practice and develop her social skills because she was in a class with about 30 other children. Katarina is very excited to have started first grade! She is so proud and looks very smart in her school uniform carrying her school bag, brand new crayons and copy books. She has to walk 1.5 km to go to school and again to return home, but she says that it isn’t far because she walks with her new little friends, and she loves her new socks and shoes! (children usually never wear socks because they pretty much walk around bare feet or wearing plastic sandals). She says that the socks and closed shoes help her walk faster…
On January16th the Centre organized a full-day Workshop for Katarina’s new family and all of her surrounding neighbours on the following topics:
Consequences for children when they witness their parents quarrelling
Respect & authority vs abuse and power
General child upbringing – child psychology
Different stages for different ages
Methods of punishment other than corporal punishment
Positive re-enforcement
Quality time vs quantity time
In order to maintain the effectiveness of the workshop, the parents agreed to meet regularly (once a week or once every two weeks) in order to share how things are going with respect to these new methods and ways of doing. We will be meeting with them once a month. They have also all agreed to take a stand if they are made aware that a child is being abused; either by going to see for themselves, calling their Street Leaders, calling the police or calling us at the Centre. The Karibu Foundation’s intention is to create a movement where every citizen who is made aware of the domestic abuse of the children is encouraged to break the silence by deciding for themselves to engage in protecting the children.
That same evening, Katarina and Ngolo stayed behind when the team returned to the Centre. They had been well informed prior to this workshop that they would be staying with their own at the end of the day. The ambiance we left them in certainly helped them bridge their homecoming and Katarina had something to look forward to as she was starting school. They will be returning to the Centre for the weekends to continue a healthy re-integration but then their visits to the Centre will gradually decrease and eventually we will be visiting them in their environment rather than the other way around.
Things are really moving forward now and it’s very encouraging. AND WE NEED YOUR PARTICIPATION TOO! Now that we have six children under our care at the Center, it is so crucial to keep up the momentum, help them heal and recover from the trauma they have suffered. There are so many expenses to cover that are not being subsidized by any government: food, medication, hospital visits, clothing, bedding, transportation and school supplies. Please go to our website www.fondationkaribu.com and give generously. You can take pride in the knowledge that you are contributing to a child’s life and providing her with a chance at having a brighter future.
With your help, one more child can be given a chance to thrive. THANK YOU!
Manon
