What is the key to gain great momentum in child protection? We believe that in changing the child protection landscape for the better, child protection has to be advanced primarily on family and community level. Therefore, we are so proud of our dedicated Cape Winelands child protection steering group members who implemented brilliant child protection campaigns during child protection month in May. Although the campaigns are too many to mention, we would like to highlight a few initiatives as inspiration of what can be accomplished when organisations unite around a shared vision.
During April, Ezrah Community Training and Development NPC shared a variety of child protection celebration ideas, games, activities and creative tools. During May, we collaborated on training with Inceba Trust and Orchard Africa to raise awareness on the importance of proper screening of employees, volunteers and visitors. In addition, Ezrah CTD continually facilitates BuildSmart parenting workshops as we strongly believe that meaningful parent-child connection is essential in safeguarding children.
During May, we collaborated on training with Inceba Trust and Orchard Africa to raise awareness on the importance of proper screening of employees, volunteers and visitors.
As child protection month gained momentum, many organisations proudly wore green ribbons to share the message that our children are important. Ma’s vir Wellington handed green stop buttons to parents, displayed green ribbons and made child protection arm bands. Each class made their own child protection poster where they had a stop sign in the middle and painted their hands green for the poster. They also had a class discussion where they asked the children what the community and adults should stop doing. Input from the children was written down and displayed to parents during a parent meeting to show the parents what their children are being exposed to. What a great child participation initiative to connect parents with what really matters to children!
Photo courtesy of Little Rascals Day Care
Amazing Brainz NPC kept their ECD practitioners well-informed on child protection themes such as children’s rights, accessing community resources and identifying child abuse. Little Rascals Day Care had a fun day with green balloons to raise awareness on children’s rights. Through creative arts, they collaborated with the Department of Social Development to have a child protection puppet show for the children.
Khula Development Group’s staff and mascots (GoGo & SoSo) went full throttle and collaborated with many other child-focused role-players such as local schools, Stellcare Stellenbosch, FCS (SAPS), the local municipality and the Thuthuzela Care Centre to share important messages on child safety. They also used creative activities to make the message stick and celebrated World Foster Day on the 31st of May 2024, together with many other NPOs.
Watch Khula’s Reel for #WorldFosterDay here
Photo courtesy of Khula Development Group
Community Keepers distributed posters, infographics and green ribbons regarding child cyber safety across South Africa at 89 schools. Another super child participation initiative from Community Keepers was to involve their learner committees in this campaign. They furthermore had a focus on the building of meaningful connections by caregivers in order to safeguard children. Likewise, the Pebbles Project used creative activities to share child protection messages and is in the process of training multiple parent groups on implementing the BuildSmart Play Challenge.
Photo courtesy of Community Keepers
These are just a few of the impactful initiatives that were implemented by our child protection steering group members to highlight children’s safety. We give a huge shoutout to all our committed child protection ambassadors in the Cape Winelands who work tirelessly to create safer communities where children matter. May we be inspired to implemented child protection awareness and practices all year long. For together, through creativity and collaboration, we can empower the next generation as leaders of change.
Note: Images courtesy of participating organisations.
Article written by Mariëtte Jacobs
(MD of Ezrah Community Training and Development NPC)
References:
1. Ezrah Community Training and Development NPC: https://ezrah.co.za/child-protection-resources/
2. Inceba Trust: https://www.incebatrust.co.za/
3. Orchard Africa: https://www.orchardafrica.org/
4. Ma’s vir Wellington: http://masvirwellington.co.za/
5. Amazing Brainz NPC: https://www.amazingbrainz.org/
6. Khula Development Group: https://www.khuladg.com/
7. World Foster Day: https://worldfosterday.org/
8. Community Keepers: https://communitykeepers.org/ and
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z3bw52kqeZk (cyber safety clip).
9. Pebbles Project: https://www.pebblesproject.org/
10. BuildSmart Parent Mentoring Training: https://ezrah.co.za/buildsmart-parent-mentoring-course/
