Before this I was out in the tsunami affected area with what I have so cleverly named, the WASHE Team. The WASHE Team is a group of Red Cross Volunteers that are going out to the schools in the affected areas and teaching lessons on Water, Sanitation and Hygiene related topics. The "E" stands for education and I have to admit, the WASH acronym is already widely used so I am not as creative as I would like to you think I am. We were out scheduling days and times for our sessions since it has been impossible to track down phone numbers. We are aiming for presenting 5 total lessons. We have already completed the handwashing lesson. Over the next four weeks we are hoping to visit each school once a week with a short 30-45 minute lesson on Vector Control, Water Conservation, Personal Hygiene and Disease Transmission. The lessons all work well together because there is some overlap that allows for review and new information that will be helpful in maintaining their health in the environment they are currently living in. That is the primary driving force behind this program, WASH related issues can have a dramatic impact on health in tsunami affected areas and we are trying to prevent that by educating the students and when possible providing them with tools to use at home and school to practice what they learn (like giving bars of soap after the handwashing lesson).
It has been a fun project to work on so far and very time consuming. Creating class curriculum for grades K thru 12 is no easy task, especially when you are trying to develop one for a large age group range. (we are lumping the kids into the following age groups: K-4, 5-7 and 8-11) Obviously this is not ideal, but we only have so many volunteers to allocate to this project so we are doing the best with what we have. We are working to try and find curriculum that is already developed (like we did for handwashing) but for vector control and water conservation is has been a bit tough. Most the materials I have found so far are very dry and have no hands on activities to get the kids involved (a must) or they are intended for industrialized nations. So telling a samoan kid that they should make sure they put a full load of laundry in the washing machine or cover the swimming pool won't really produce the outcomes you're looking for! We're making due though and I think there will be plenty of materials to model from for personal hygiene and disease transmission.
Other than that i am helping with a few other things at Red Cross. Still keeping the website up to date. Still hating all computers and computer related materials and issues as I have been deemed the unofficial IT support. I am also working a little bit on the psychosocial training, though that has halted for the most part. I believe an international red cross trainer is supposed to come in over the next months to set up that actual program. In the mean time we are working, off and on, modifying some materials to be more culturally appropriate and possible translate some of it into Samoan.
I am really looking forward to the end of the semester at NUS so I can focus entirely on the Red Cross. On and on that note, it looks like the Red Cross will be able to pay for my housing after all. So, there is a huge weight off my shoulders!
Well, there you go, two posts in 4 days, we will see what the weekend brings.
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