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Bangladesh

SCF USA

Organisation: Save the Children USA
Address: House #35A, Road #9A, Dhanmondi R/A, G.P.O. Box 421,
Country: Bangladesh
Postcode/Zip: Dhaka 1209
Tel: +880 2 9114469/9124976/9115291/9117454
Fax: +880 2 813019
E-mail: scusbfo@bangla.net, edu@bangla.net
Website: www.savethechildren.org

About the programme

SCF USA began its Child-to-Child activities with a pilot in 1994 and operates in remote rural areas where the fields are normally flooded for 6-8 months of each year. At present, 360 CtC groups, each containing about 20 children plus two adult facilitators are involved in the programme. The programme therefore reaches approximately 7,000 children. Participating children are aged between 6-12 years. However, 12-18-year-old children act as facilitators. Preference is given to out-of-school children and a gender balance is maintained. Participants are drawn from the poorest families in the community.

The aim of our programme is to promote holistic child development by:

1. enhancing children's leadership capabilities and self-confidence. This is achieved by promoting their active participation in activities designed to identify the problems connected with their families and communities.
2. encouraging children to find effective solutions to identified problems.
3. enabling children to evaluate their own actions.
4. encouraging children to collaborate with other children, and also with family and community members, in order to improve the health and development practices of all.

Activities are introduced through the groups mentioned above. The CtC six-step approach is used by the group facilitators and the other participating children in order to identify problems relevant to the community and to take action based on those identified problems. Facilitators have sometimes found it difficult to use the six-step approach as opposed to more straightforward message delivery. However, it has been found that going through each step slowly has aided the overall process. As a result of their experiences in the CtC groups, it is expected that the children will not only participate more actively in matters of concern to them, but also develop self-confidence, leadership capability and the ability to prioritise and deal with problems relevant to the community.

Links with schools and communities

The activities feed into the health promoting and child friendly school initiatives. Communities are involved and there is contact between Health and Education personnel.

Monitoring and training

A monitoring system is in place. At present, only quantitative information is available. A baseline survey was completed for the CtC programme using Participatory Rural Appraisal (PRA) tools and techniques. A report has been produced. Training of Trainers events are organised for community development workers. Once trained, the latter are responsible for training the adolescent facilitators. Kamal Hossain, the CtC contact person for the programme, organises and facilitates ToT events. Content of trainings is based on the Child-to-Child Training Pack. However, it is condensed to include only those issues of importance in relation to implementation. As well as receiving ToT training, community development workers also receive training in facilitation skills, PRA for conducting children's meetings and leadership skills, etc.

Materials

The CtC resource books are used in addition to the CtC training pack. Some of the worksheets from the resource books have been translated and adapted for the six-step approach.