1. EARLY CHILDHOOD DEVELOPMENT (ECD)
A good start in life

2. Janice asks:
“Children in our community grow up in hard conditions, especially the young ones. Many of them do not
develop well. They get sick. Some even die.
Families don’t access services.
What can I do?”
(read text from the slide)

3. In this presentation you will learn…
…why early childhood development is important. ...in which ways early childhood development can be stimulated. …how to address the needs of young children in your community yourself.
(read text from the slide)

4. Holistic Child Development
We believe in holistic development of children: for a child to grow up well-balanced, there are different aspects of development required:
(Click) Physical Development: for a child to become healthy and strong. This includes growing and development of the body, skills like crawling, walking, running, motoric skills like balancing and coordination between eyes and hands etc.
(click) Cognitive Development: to be educated for life. This is the capacity to learn, remember, develop speech, to symbolize information, reading and writing and problem-solving skills. Children learn in school and outside of the school.
(click) Socially & Emotionally Development, so that children develop well in this area. It is learning to relate to others, dealing with different feelings and behaviour
(click) Spiritual Development to grow into a person with hope & dignity: Learning morals and values, good and bad, ethical development, beliefs and faith development
The importance of stimulating holistic development is widely recognized. Some are using the same division, others see language development as a separate domain of development, and some do not mention spiritual development but instead name it moral development.

5. Early Childhood Development
Early Childhood development, or ECD is, the development of these 4 area’s, starting from conception until the age of 7.
(click) It starts when a woman conceives and the foetus starts growing in the womb.
(click) When the baby is born, it has specific needs in order to develop well. It is fully depending on the people around to feed and comfor the child.
(click) Then it starts to crawl, sit and walk, the toddler stage. Slowly it learns more and more, it learns to talk and to run and
(click) starts learning in preschool and then in primary school.
Early childhood stops at around 7 years, although in some cultures it stops at 6, in others at around 8.

6. What do young children need?
Speech stimulation, storytelling,reading
Bonding = love & care
Stimulation of motorics
Nutritious food
Hygiene & sanitation
Play
Safety & security
Clean water
And so on…
Children do need our support to develop well! They do need:
(click) love and care to be able to develop bonding; (click) they need speech stimulation, like sounds, and stories and reading; (click) they need nutritious food; (click) stimulation of physical movements; (click) they need clean water and (click) clean sanitation; (click) they need to be able to play, alone and with friends to laugh and enjoy; (click) they need to feel safe and secure and protected…
There are so many things children do need to develop well!

7. Why is ECD important? But… Healthy, loving and stimulating environment
Well developed abilities
Good foundation for rest of life
And that makes ECD so important. Since we know, when children (click) grow up in a healthy, loving and stimulating environment, they will develop well (click) and this will be a good foundation (click) for the rest of their lives.
But… (click) if they grow up in hard conditions (click) and they miss essential elements like love, care and protection, they will develop (click) not so well and this might cause problems in the rest of their lives…
Hard conditions
Less developed abilities
Bad foundation for rest of life

8. Effects of ECD services
Good foundation for rest of life.
High return on investment.
Individual, family and society benefit.
So, investing in Early Childhood Development means:
(click) a good foundation for the rest of the life of the child
(click) a child which is able to be somebody, to return something positive, so it is a high return on investment
(click) and it will benefit the child, the family and the society,
Just by investing in good Earl childhood services…

9. What should we do? Step 1. Identify ECD needs in your community
Step 2. Identify interventions:
Existing
Additional needed
Step 3: Choose interventions
A. To be developed by:
You
Other organisation / Govt
B. To be supported by:
Red een Kind
Other organisation / fund / government
We will take you through different steps, the steps you will have to take in your organization if you would like to do something in the area of ECD.
(click) Step 1: Identify the needs in ECD in your community. What is the situation for young children in your community? What are the issues they face?
(click) Step 2: Identify interventions. What is already happening in the field of ECD? Is this working? And what else is needed?
(click) Step 3: Choose the interventions. What needs to be done?
(click) Step 4: Who is doing what?

10. Step 1: What is the problem?
Poor nutrition
Poor hygiene
Poor access and quality of health services.
Lack of love, care and support
Lack of pre-school system
Violence
Step 1: What is the problem? This depends very much on the context, but it is known that in many communities the situation of young children is nog good. They face different problems like:
(click) poor nutrition (not enough food or not balanced diet); (click) poor hygiene, causing sicknesses like diarrhea, malaria and even causing death; (click) poor access of services and if accessed services might not have the right quality. (click) They also can lack love, care and support of their parents or guardians, because they are too busy, or have enough problems of their own. (click) There might be lack of an adequate pre-school system, of early Childhood Education. (click) And children often do grow up in an environment of violence and conflict.

11. Holistic Child Development
What can be done? It is important is to stimulate Early Childhood Development in a holistic way, so focusing on the 4 elements of development. Remember?
(click) physical development
(click) cognitive development
(click) social and emotional development, and
(click) moral and spiritual development

12. Step 2: What can be done? Physical Development Cognitive Development
Maternal Health
Breastfeeding
Vaccinations
Sanitation
Hygiene
Nutrition
Play
Eyes movements
Stimulation of hand-eye coördination
Teaching words and meaning of words
Colors and shapes
Numbers
memory
There are different things you can do to stimulate the physical development of young children. Think of maternal health, breastfeeding, Vaccinations, Sanitation, Hygiene, Nutrition, Play, so they can walk and run.
(click) To stimulate the cognitive development different things: focussing of the eyes, by showing colorfull objects to the child and make it follow the objects with both eyes, Stimulation of eye hand coordination, so that it can bring a spoon with food to the mouth, teaching words and its meaning, colors and shapes, and numbers. And training memory, for instance by memorizing songs.
Many things can be done at home. In a pre-school a child can learn even more.

13. What can be done? Social and Emotional Development
Spiritual Development
Bonding
Feeling safe
Feeling loved
Learning about self and others
Experiencing different emotions
Positive interactions
Play
Gender roles
Learning about good and wrong
Learning action-reaction
Learning about traditions and values
Learning about God
Being loved and valued
Social and Emotional Development is very important, since it ensures the bonding process of a child. This is needed to be able to connect to other people, to have meaningful relationships with others in life.
(click)This can be stimulated by carrying the little child, showing care and unconditional love. A child can do something wrong, but that does not mean you will not love it anymore. A child also needs to learn about self and others, consequences of actions, learning about different emotions and learn about different roles of men and women. This depends on the culture of course. Through play children learn a lot, so this will need to be stimulated.
(click) In order to stimulate spiritual development the child will need to learn about good and wrong, about actions and its reactions. It will also learn about traditions and values, and about God. Through stories the child will get a lot of information, songs are important, and if a child have questions, make sure you as an adult has time to answer… In this way a child will learn it is loved and valued, by people and by God.

14. Examples of ECD services
Ante natal & post natal care
Counseling on breastfeeding
Nutrition
Immunisations
Advise about hygiene & sanitation
Parenting support in self help group
Some examples of ECD services are: care for the mother through antenatal and post natal care, counseling on breastfeeding and balanced diets, immunisations and information about sanitation and hygiene, the importance of Positive parenting, the importance of healthy relationships, ECE centres, childprotection services etc.
Training about relationship building
ECE centre (kindergarten / preschool)
Child protection services

15. Step 3: Choosing interventions
An effective approach:
Holistic
Integrated
Effective
Let us look now at how to choose good ECD interventions. It is important to remember that it will only be effective, if it is holistic, so focusing on the 4 development areas and it is integrated with other interventions, so including the children itself, the parents and family and the community.

16. The intervention matrix
Problem
What done already?
What is needed?
By whom?
Physical Development
Cognitive Development
Social and Emotional Development
Spiritual and Moral Development
To have a good overview and make the right selection of the right interventions, you can make an intervention matrix. We have identified the problems of young children in the different development areas in step 1. We have seen what is done already and what are the gaps, in step 2. So now you can choose the interventions needed.
The next step is: and who will be able to deliver them?

17. Step 4: Who will do what? Track 2 Interventions you will implement
Interventions you would not implement
Call in other organisation(s) or government
Track 2
Interventions you will implement
Design and implement them yourself
Who will do what?
(click) Track 1: There will be interventions you will not be able to deliver, and others can do well in this. In that case it is important to call in other organization or the government services. For instance, in your area vaccination of children is not really taking place. However, UNICEF has a program for vaccinations and the clinic in your area is willing and able to carryout vaccinations. Then you as NGO will not also do it, of course, but you can work together: you can ensure all the groups you are working with are aware of the vaccination program and the clinic will carry out the vaccinations.
(click) Track 2: there will be interventions your organization can provide, since it is the line of its mission. You are familiar with it or you will ensure you get the expertise, so that you can implement these services yourself.
For instance, you have noticed parents are not well aware of what exactly they can do themselves for their children. Many of them got children when they were young and it seems they have many problems themselves. You can design Parenting sessions with groups of mothers and fathers, supporting them to get more knowledge and hands on skills in raising their children.
Another example can be: in your area there are pre-schools. Together with the community you can set up these early childhood education centres, link with the government and other educational services for training of the community volunteer teachers, link with the churches for support in facilities, and you train the volunteers in dealing with children in a child friendly and age appropriate way.
(click) Sometimes a 3rd track is needed: there are no services but they are needed, you can not do it, others are not there to do it, so you can start lobbying at the government and other bodies to ensure something is being done.
Track 3
No services, but they are needed
Lobby

18. Principles REK Context specific Use existing resources + structures
There are some principles we find important to share with you.
(click) The interventions you implement should be Context specific. For instance parenting might be done in all countries, but the specific content should be adapted to the specific context.
(click) Services should be available for all children, so it should be inclusive. Even if a child is disbabled, or from a different clan or tribe, or faith, it should be allowed to access the ECD services
(click) Existing resources and structures should be used. It will be a waste if things are being done double. And two can do more then one!
(click) and last but not least the interventions should be set up in a participatory way. The community, the parents and the children should feel the services are theirs. This will ensure the continuation of the activities even when you are gone..
Inclusive
Participatory

19. How to do this? 1. Assessment of the problem
2. Assessment of interventions done and gaps
3. Intervention selection
4. Stakeholder analysis and finalize the intervention matrix
Also think of:
Who is able to support you financially?
How do you check if what you do is working? (M&E)
Want to get started? This is what you can do:
(click) Assess the problem. You can do an assessment of the context and the situation of young children. For this you can use data available, or you can check with different groups and stakeholders in the community/
(click) Assess the interventions being done already. How is it done? What is the quality? Any gaps?
(click) Selection of interventions: what should be done for children to grow up in a holistic way? You can use the Intervention matrix for this.
(click) Who is going to do what? You can make a stakeholder analysis and then finalize the intervention matrix.
When this is done, you can write now your project: the goal, the objectives, the interventions…
Also think of who is able to finance this?
And how do you check if what you do is really working? With other words, you will need to think of a monitoring and evaluation system

20. Good luck!
Find extra information on our Early childhood development pages:
Good examples
Ready-to-use tools
Background information
Opportunities to get in touch
Wanting to leave a comment? Yes please! 
Good luck and thank you for your time!
You can check the HowTo website for more information, good examples and tools. And if you want to get in touch with us? Please do so!