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Ecuador

The Child to Child Programme in Ecuador
Address: Fondación Niño a Niño, Thomas Ordonez 9-11, Cuenca, Ecuador
Tel: 593-7-814449
Fax: 593-7-841865
E-mail: aquizhpe@yahoo.com

INCLUSIVE EDUCATION, CHILD RIGHTS

Child-to-Child was initiated in Cuenca, Ecuador in 1985. Since then the programme has been involved in the following activities:

• Translation and adaptation of the Child-to-Child methods and materials in imaginative ways.
• The production of new materials based on identified needs and interests in the community (books, health stories, tapes, compact disk, slides, posters.
• Educative and communicative activities such as media reports, videos, radio programmes, song groups, literature and language workshops.
• Training courses, lectures and workshops with a varied group of participants (teachers, medical students, journalists and students of education). Each year one or two international workshops and lectures related to specific topics are held.
• Workshops for child promoters in health education who had maintained a radio programme for 10 years, and as a result had produced their own songs and stories.
• Action-research projects concerned with specific and relevant health topics (e.g. smoking, alcoholism and children's rights).

Jugando a Vivir (Playing to Live)

Since 1998, Child-to-Child ideas and methods have been used to develop a programme called Jugando a Vivir (Playing to Live). The programme places special emphasis on raising children's self-esteem, strengthening the relations between members of the peer groups, and developing in children the life skills they need for learning and development.

Playing to Live has been developed by Child-to-Child, in conjunction with two local institutions: the Faculty of Medical Sciences of the University of Cuenca, and the Institute of Education and Teacher Training. It has also been supported by the Morel and Gibbs Trusts, as well as the Ayuda en Acción and Rickcharina Foundations.

The aims of Playing to Live are as follows:

• To identify the attitudes, skills and behaviour of parents, their children, teachers and the elderly in relation to the traditional games associated with their social and cultural backgrounds.
• To investigate and describe our most important traditional and low-cost games.
• To promote the health of our children through encouraging and stimulating the practice of using traditional and low-cost games as a method for recreation and learning.
• To investigate the influence of older siblings on younger siblings in relation to the practice and teaching of traditional and low-cost games.
• To study and determine the relationship between the practice of some traditional low-cost games and child development.
• To research the possible influence of practising some traditional low-cost games on the psychomotor development of normal and disabled children.

Date: 2004

Extract: Paper presented by Dr. Arturo Quizhipe Professor of Paediatrics at the University of Cuenca at a Child -to-Child international Consultation in Cambridge, England in 2002. (The report goes on to describe in detail the special programme Juganda a Vivir).

The full text describing the programme is available in the Child-to-Child and Bernard Van Leer Foundation publication Early Years Children Promote Health, London: Child-to-Child 2004.