Children learning better together in Cambodia
More than 3.2 million children are out of school in south-east Asia, a third of whom are estimated to be children with disabilities.[1] Barriers to education include gender and racial discrimination, geographical distance, inadequate support for children with disabilities, school costs, languages differences, migration and emergency situations caused by conflict or natural disaster. These challenges are often intertwined, making the situation more complex to address.
In Cambodia, there is no official data on the numbers of children with disabilities who go to school, and there is also limited information on the numbers of people with disabilities in general. Although Cambodia’s Ministry of Education, Youth and Sports (MoEYS) has made vast improvements in the education system in recent years, children with disabilities are still highly likely to be out of school. Even if these children go to school, they often do not receive the support they need to succeed and are far more likely to drop out.
To help address this issue, the MoEYS has produced “inclusive education guidelines” to help teachers and school administrators identify children with disabilities, along with general guidance to help teachers make their teaching methods more inclusive. However, until recently, there was no specific guidance on how to teach children with intellectual impairments.
With funding support from the IKEA Foundation, Save the Children in Cambodia has produced a practical Manual on Teaching Children with Intellectual Disabilities, Learning Disabilities and Autism Spectrum Disorder. The manual—the first of its kind in Cambodia—includes practical advice for teachers on how they can make their own teaching materials to respond to students’ individual learning needs. It also includes guidance on classroom management, lesson planning and how to create individual education plans for children with special learning needs. Setting up these guidelines is one of the key objectives of the project. The manual is currently being translated into Khmer so that it can be adopted and rolled out nationally by MoEYS.
A neighbour girl who is about 10 years old did not go to school. She stayed at a rental house with her mother to sell food and cake. I passed her house every day and saw her helping her mother to sell cakes. I explained to her about the importance of going to school and I also talked to her mother to send her to school in order to give her a bright future. Her mother agreed to send her to school and now she regularly goes to school, and is never absent unless she is sick.
Save the Children is working with teachers in 147 schools to implement child-friendly teaching and learning methodologies and to promote childrens active participation in learning through Childrens Councils and Child Clubs. The project is expected to benefit 55,400 children, including ethnic minority children, children with disabilities and those from very poor families.
Our work on the IKEA project has shown that when teachers have the necessary materials and teaching methods, students learn so much more. We have observed how happy children with disabilities are to participate in class and learn alongside their peers with appropriate materials. Having these materials makes a real difference in motivating and encouraging them to come to school, because they can see their teachers recognizing and responding to their needs. The other children in the class also benefit—we can see how much they enjoy learning with these teaching aids!
My friends called me Akot (person who lost an arm). I was very angry and always beat them back. I told my teacher about this. He asked my friends not to call me that. Now they call me by my correct name. I am happy.
Save the Children is working with teachers in 147 schools to implement child-friendly teaching and learning methodologies and to promote childrens active participation in learning through Childrens Councils and Child Clubs. The project is expected to benefit 55,400 children, including ethnic minority children, children with disabilities and those from very poor families.
About the IKEA: Inclusive Education for All project
In Cambodia, Save the Children, with funding from IKEA Foundation, has developed and promoted inclusive education, targeting marginalised children including girls, children with disabilities and children from highly deprived families.
The project responds to the rural realities of high drop-out, repetition and non-enrolment rates. Children with disabilities are an important group of children previously not reached and their enrolment rates have steadily increased as a direct result of this project[2]. The experience has demonstrated that the interventions teachers make for learners with disabilities benefit all students through improved, student-centred teaching methods and materials.
My friend, who is the same age as me, has difficulty in learning. My teacher asks him to sit on the first table and always asks him to read, write and answer her questions. My teacher also requests me and my friends who are good in learning to sit with him and teach him. We teach him during break time, in class and even at his home. He is now improving and has passed to grade 6.
Save the Children is working with teachers in 147 schools to implement child-friendly teaching and learning methodologies and to promote childrens active participation in learning through Childrens Councils and Child Clubs. The project is expected to benefit 55,400 children, including ethnic minority children, children with disabilities and those from very poor families.
Through this project, Save the Children is demonstrating how deprived children can be reached and welcomed to school, by supporting their cognitive, social and emotional learning. The project helps children develop to their full potential by addressing their individual learning needs.
[1] Oslo Summit for Education for Development (2015) Towards a disability inclusive education
[2] Project Baseline Study – Final Report (Aug. 2016)
