June 2010

Day Care Centre & Porridge Club

We reported last year how the day care centre had gone from strength to strength, and this year the growth has continued with about 120 attendees in three classrooms employing six teachers and two cooks.  We have to pinch ourselves to think that six years ago the Porridge Ladies were sitting under a tree with their children.  Now the children are in a programme of learning and being fed.  Many of the Porridge Ladies have been able to find work, either working in the fields or labouring for the many building projects in the main town of Bahir Dar.  As for those who have no work or have very young babies, they continue to receive a bowl of porridge, rudimentary education, and health care.  These number 28 women with 32 young babies. During the rainy season when the work stops the numbers attending the porridge club go up.

The children’s smiles when they are in class in the day care centre are a delight and the even bigger smiles when they stop for tea, biscuits and lunch is heart warming.  The centre is now a victim of its own success and Sister is able to take in some of the more wealthy children and charge a suitable fee.  Your donations are enabling us to sponsor thirty children, whose families are unable to pay, to attend the day care centre for a whole year. This includes tea, biscuits and lunch.  Depending on the age of the children they follow a different learning programme; the very young between three and four learn the basic alphabet in Amharic and English and also learn to count in both languages.  The second class of four to five year olds follow the Montessori method of learning.  The third class are normally older children of five to seven years, and they again follow the traditional methods of teaching that prepare them for state school.

All three classes get together in the afternoons for singing and dancing while the tiny ones sleep.