Nsanje Community Based Child Centres mushrooming hidden treasure in children

It has now been proved that pre-primary school learning offered by Community Based Child Centres (CBCCs) in Nsanje district are providing strong educational foundation for children.

Actiond Aid Malawi model CBCC in Nsanje District
One of Action Aid Malawi international model

A visit to some of the CBCCs manned by Action Aid International Malawi, and the primary schools where children have been enrolled after graduating from such centres has shown that they are easily adapting to primary school environment; and, that such children perform very well in primary school compared to those who have not been enrolled in pre-schools.

Dinde Primary School under Nyamadzere Zone is a good example of one of the primary schools in Nsanje which enrolls over 120 children per year from Action Aid International Malawi’s Chiphwembwe and Nthole model CBCCs.

According to the head teacher of Dinde primary school Gregoire Sandalamu, the institution has been impressed by the performance of children from the CBCCs including their ability to communicate and mixing well with teachers and fellows.

“Here at Dinde primary school, every year we enroll over 120 children from the three CBCCs which are within our catchment area and we have a special teacher assigned to coordinates with the CBCCs.

“It has been demonstrated that children who have participated in early childhood education and related programmes are performing outstandingly compared to those that did not pass through the process. For your information, those that went through the CBCCs they get always positions between one and fifteen. They hardly repeat classes and their class performance are much better compared to those who have never attended pre-primary programmes. To us, it is really helping,” explained Sandalamu.

He further revealed that in the context school retention, the early childhood development has created interest in school for children and ensuring that school retention among the school going age children achieved.

“The children who have gone through the CBCCs are remaining in schools here as compared to those that are enrolled direct from their communities without attending pre-school. The ECD services are really helping here,” concluded

Action Aid’s Early Childhood Development Officer Fredson Likhutcha said ECD service delivery has started bearing the needed fruits despite facing a lot of challenges ranging from the commitment of the parents to send their children to CBCCs.

“As Action Aid International Malawi, we are very satisfied with the performance of the children who have passed through our Model CBCCs to primary schools. According to the information we have from primary schools, children are putting up outstanding performance as compared to those who did not attend the ECD services.

“Our goal is to improve the lives and wellbeing of the poor and vulnerable children through promoting access to quality and sustainable ECD services,” said Likhutcha.

He however raised concerns over parents who fail to send their children to such services despite knowing its importance.

“We are trying to engage the parents through an initiative called ‘Parenting and educating support to raise awareness so that they send their children early childhood development,” said Likhutcha.

 

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