Safe Learning Environments: Children as Agents of Change in Gambia and Uganda

• In Event: Equity, Inclusion, and Justice in Education

Proposal

To promote safe and enabling learning ecosystems at home and at school, it is imperative to work with a “whole- school” approach to influence school culture and transform harmful gender norms. This includes engaging children to promote safe learning environments for themselves and their peers. Research shows that educating children about their own protection and promoting child agency results in increased knowledge and skills that allow children to avoid being victimized and to feel safer and more in control.
This panel presentation will share implementation of the Education for Protection and Well-being program in rural and semi-urban areas in Gambia and Uganda. Using the school as the entry point to the community, the program uses a holistic approach to foster safe and conducive learning environments for children ages six to twelve through the enhancement of children’s social emotional learning (SEL) and self-protection skills, and a cognitive-behavioral skills training component for teachers and caregivers, developed by clinical psychologists. The presentation will have a particular emphasis on child agency within the self-protection component, delivered through classroom lessons, a comic book (paper and digital), and radio jingles in local languages. We will showcase children’s voices on their experience learning about their own protection and touch on how the program leveraged technology to enhance student’s knowledge on their own protection and reinforce positive teaching and positive parenting practices. The presentation will delve into the benefits and challenges of using technology and highlight learnings from the program on empowering children to protect themselves and others. Lastly, the panelist will highlight evaluation findings on indicators related to violence against children.
By addressing the ecosystem of children, we are seeing a shift in community beliefs around violence against children and gender, contributing to child pro-social behavior, higher school attendance rates, reduced corporal punishment at home and at school, improved classroom management, and increased knowledge on sexual abuse.

Author

• Bakary Seedy Dampha, ChildFund, The Gambia