This workbook is for your children and you to enjoy and use.

The workbook can be used by both the individual child and by a group of children. Either way, it is helpful that you are there to help the children to work through the various topics in this workbook.

The purpose of the book is for you and your children to stand back from 'today' and have a thought for 'tomorrow'.

Today, there may not be many options open to your children. Maybe your main concern is to find enough food for the family. But no doubt you hope your children will have a better future.

This workbook is to help your children think through what this future should be, what their wants and needs are, and what kind of future they wish for. Let them do this. Let them dream up their ideas, and encourage them to express them.

Please listen carefully to what they say and think.

If they cannot write down their thoughts and ideas, encourage them to draw instead.

When you reach the end of the workbook, make sure the children's final wishes are clearly recorded. It is this page that needs to be handed back to the person who originally distributed these books.

This final page, stating your children's aims and wishes, will be evaluated along with those of other children. Their common aims will then become the responsibility of the community to implement to the best of its ability.

These people may include yourself, along with other community representatives such as teachers, women's groups, the local council, elders and the Imam. The children's wish lists are to be placed in the safekeeping of a responsible and respected member of your community. You decide.

We suggest that every year on a festive day the wish lists be reviewed, to celebrate what has been achieved and to acknowledge what still needs to be done.

UNICEF wishes to thank you for supporting this important project.

Carol Bellamy,
Executive Director, UNICEF

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