Nursery and Kindergarten School Updates

One of the main thrusts of RD Foundation’s support to Madang communities is on children’s education. The overall purpose of this program is to provide support facilities to community-base Nursery and Kindergarten School where Papua New Guinea children could access free quality early childhood education thus increasing literacy and preparedness of children before going into elementary education.

The RD Foundation through its program staffs works with the villages by organizing the Project Management Committees (PMC) who are responsible for the nursery and kindergarten schools and other related activities which RD Foundation and the villages are engaged with. The PMC is a village structure whos members are chosen by the parents of the children enrolled at the school. They are responsible in planning for the school development and overseeing projects and activities and coordinate such with the Foundation.

Currently, the RD Foundation is supporting community-base nursery and kindergarten schools in the following villages;

Support Provided

a. Training of Community-Base Teachers

Community-base teachers are volunteers from the host villages who are assigned by the community to teach the children. RD Foundation supports them by giving trainings and seminars to equip them in their teaching job. They are organized into group and meet regularly to discuss issues affecting their job in the community.

In villages where number of children enrollees is high, we assigned our own hired employees to teach the children. In other villages, the Project Management Committees (PMC) assigned a community teacher who will look after the children. PMC is a community structure composed of leaders and parents appointed representatives, acts as the overseer of the community school and other related projects.

b. Provision of School Supplies and Materials

As a support, RD Foundation is also providing school supplies for the children. Items given include the following;

§ Work book, pencils, crayons, rulers, writing pads and other basic materials.
§ Chalk boards, writing table and benches and writing desks.
§ Assistance during school construction includes nails, transportation of bush materials and food for work.

C. Feeding Activities

This month of March 2010, we started feeding activities in response to teacher’s last year’s report that children’s attendance decreases and they could not concentrate on their learning activities due to hunger. We initiated feeding activities every 2 weeks during the weekend to encourage children to continue coming to school. We cooked meal of rice, tuna, egg, green vegetables, sweet potatoes with coconut cream. We also serve milk.

The mothers participated by helping to prepare and cook the food and served the children. They also bring food they cooked from their houses. During the feeding activities, the teacher also took the opportunity to organize a short program where children are giving presentations of their learning and talents.