Understanding a child
For kindergarten N188, located in a community of Armenia’s capital Yerevan, it is now common to host mothers and grandmothers for parent training sessions. Sitting in a circle in a small room, mothers and grandmothers are competing with each other in posing questions and sharing their experiences of child-raising. “I don’t know how to make my child clean up his room,” complains a young mother, who is attending regular parent training sessions organized and run by “Step by Step”, an NGO supported by UNICEF. “And when I reprimand him for that, he just smiles it off and says that I do it better.” “After each session, I run home to share what I have just learned with my daughter-in-law and, you know, it works” For many parents these sessions mean a lot as they help them understand their young children better, particularly, in a situation where many families are unable or unwilling to take their children to a pre-school institution. Even in Soviet times, only 47 per cent of young children attended pre-schools in Armenia. But that figure has dropped even further, to 25 per cent, following a Government decision in 1996 to transfer the ownership of kindergartens to local governments and communities. Many pre-school institutions were simply shut down as communities often lacked the necessary financial resources, knowledge and ability to maintain them. In 2002-2003, UNICEF and the Ministry of Education and Sciences carried out a study on early childhood development in Armenia. The study revealed a critical need for the establishment and development of community-based parent education structures. “Our observations showed that some parents believed pre-schools to be just day-care institutions for children and, thus, were unwilling to send their children there, believing that they could provide better care at home,” says Alvard Poghosyan, UNICEF Education Officer. “The core function of pre-schools in ensuring early development and learning for children was simply ignored.” In 2003, based on the results of the study, UNICEF and the Ministry of Education and Sciences established 16 community-based parent resource centres in all provinces of Armenia. Most of the parent resource centres are located in kindergartens with the exception of one, which is functioning in a polyclinic. In 2004, together with the Ministry of Education and Sciences, a set of training materials was developed and trainings organized for parent facilitators. Training sessions for parents are currently going on in all 16 resource centres, where facilitators help mothers and grandparents to improve their knowledge and skills on child care, early development and learning through exercises and group discussions, Poghosyan says. For 56-year-old Ovsanna Azatyan, who raised two sons and now is taking care of a 6-year-old grandson, parent trainings have also been a pleasant surprise. “I am a mother of two young men and I thought that there would be nothing new for me in those trainings,” Ovsanna remarks, adding that the sessions helped her to go beyond traditional approaches in child upbringing. “After each session, I run home to share what I have just learned with my daughter-in-law and, you know, it works,” she says, smiling. Mothers and grandmothers make up the majority of the audience in parent trainings. “Unfortunately, most Armenian men think that child-rearing is the responsibility of women,” says Suzanna Chibukhchyan, a parent facilitator. Yet, according to her, there are clear signs that the situation is changing. “In some places, we have seen grandfathers and young fathers showing a lot of interest in the trainings, which is really encouraging.” For many parents who are unable to send their children to pre-schools, parent resource centres have also become a good alternative that allows them to apply proper child development and learning practices that they learn during sessions at home. “Some parents attending training sessions at our kindergarten cannot afford to send their children to a pre-school due to financial circumstances. However, we thought that their involvement is particularly important as they should understand that young children’s needs are not limited to regular feeding and dressing them warmly in cold weather,” explains Anna Harutyunyan, Head of the N188 kindergarten. Parent education is a mutually beneficial process that ensures that young children are healthy and develop properly and where parents learn to better understand the needs of their children and provide for their proper care and learning.
Resources on education and early childhood EFA Global Monitoring Report 2007 CEE/CIS Resources on Early childhood CEE/CIS Resources on Education United Nations Girls' Education Initiative Consultative Group on Early Childhood Care and Development Related links |
