Hello everyone from a beautiful hot and sunny day here in Mzuzu!  As usual I have had a busy couple of weeks - just seems that the more you do the more you get to do!!

Last week I had to go and supervise training at Bandawe with Nicolas so on the way we stopped at Arthur nursery school and found the children very busy playing which was lovely.

After the visit we proceeded to the training where Kamoza and Rodney were training caregivers and committee members of a new Early Childhood Centre which is targeting orphans and vulnerable children.

Break time and caregivers are busy copying notes into their books!

about to begin a new session!

Myself with Kamoza and Rodney who are both from Nkhata bay district
so the training was done in the Tonga language!

For those of you who like creepy crawlies......, the other morning I had a shower and was just about to get out when I realised I was not alone - there was a great big orange cockroach having a shower too!  So I quickly stepped out onto the mat but something crunched below my foot - I lifted the mat to find this little beetle - no idea what it was but at least it was still alive!!

In previous posts, I have been discussing the pilot training in Early Childhood which is being done in four districts in Malawi, one of them being in Nkhata bay district.  Last Monday I was asked to join the group of supervisors to visit some of the centres where the caregivers have been trained.  On the way to Chikwina where we went, we stopped to buy water and found this scenario - a group of young children in the early morning who should have been at school, watching a video - and not a child friendly one either!  So my colleagues chased the children and told them to go to school!!

We arrived at the centre to find many children with 4  caregivers, but very few play materials.  As soon as we arrived the caregivers began songs with the children and we had to explain that they should just carry on so that we could see what they were doing!  It was interesting, not much going on in terms of interaction with the children but lots of enthusiasm.  Unfortunately some of the children screamed when they saw me (am I so scary??) as its a rural location and perhaps they have never seen a white person so close before!!

Andrew my colleague talking with the caregivers

It was great this past week to have two friends who used to work here come for a working holiday.  Before they began work we had an afternoon at the beach which was really nice......

Margaret and Maureen relaxing.....

The frangipani flowers are in bloom at the minute - I love these flowers......

Yesterday we started a series of three seminars with caregivers from the private nursery schools within Mzuzu.  Having visited most of them when doing my research it was clear there was a need to assist them with knowledge on Early Childhood Development.  We had a great day and the feedback was very positive. 

Each time we do the seminars I am going to involve different trainers and to begin with I had Nicolas and Enala who did most of the programme.

In order to help the caregivers we set up a nursery school in the building using locally available materials.  Most caregivers in town believe that we cannot teach children unless we have plastic toys - we proved them wrong as they saw our natural materials and 'rubblish'.  I am hopeful that ECD in Mzuzu will really change as a result of our training!

And finally for this week, this little chap ws sitting on my doorstep a few nights ago when I was coming in......no idea if its a frog or a toad but I think he was pretty scared!!

As I look forward to a new week, I trust you have had a well rested weekend.

Blessings,

Diane.