Tears of excitement in a child care centre for farmworkers

Today we have been warmly welcomed by excited, laughing and singing kids of child center in Paud Bungur. When Mulyanah, the head of the ECD (early childhood development) centre started to talk about the kindergarten, she started crying straight away and it has been tears of excitement for the whole topic of “learning and development”.

It will be hard to find humans with more passion for what they do. The classes performed many songs both as a group and individually. Finally we also got a chance to surprise them with a German kindergarten song. Whilst most of us played silently and concentrated with the kids, one of us, whose name may not be mentioned, showed the boys how to paint your own hand (Tim, UNICEF).

The ECD has been founded in 2006, parents are paying 25.000 IRP (1,75 €) per month, which allows them to have their kids in the ECD from Wednesday to Friday. The reason for that is that most families are not able to pay for the whole week, most of them are farmworkers.

The kids are split into two groups (4-5 years old and 5-6 years old), the little ones stay for two hours, the older ones for three hours a day. Parents can count on highly motivated and excited teachers who do what they do with a lot of love and enthusiasm. In a fun and playful way they are introduced to local geography, letters, numbers and religion.

It was more than obvious today, that enthusiasm and spirit are a fantastic foundation for early child development. UNICEF together with the IKEA Foundation are helping this ECD Centre by training supervisors and also later the teachers.

When saying goodbye, there were a lot of high-fives and pictures being taken. A great visit with lots of fun and emotion.