BEM: Brincar Ensina A Mudar (Play Teaches Change)
Ties with caregivers are crucial for children’s development and also improve the quality of their interactions at home. Home visits and sessions at health centers have proved to be effective to strengthen these ties, although they are both expensive and logistically demanding. Despite all the technological advances of our time, it is still unclear if virtual training sessions –so important in the 2020 context– are equally effective, particularly in deprived settings. In this sense, BEM seeks to innovate because: i) it uses technology to promote play as a tool to help girls and boys grow up in a healthy environment; ii) it is a low-cost program; and iii) because it was designed to reach out to mothers and caregivers in vulnerable homes.
Problematic
In a world that is considering whether everything could take place in a virtual environment, one pivotal question arises: can virtual training sessions be as effective as in-person solutions to improve the quality and frequency of caregiver-child interactions? Only the creation and evaluation of these initiatives can provide clues to enhance or redesign them.
Solution
BEM leverages the potential of WhatsApp —an app widely used in different contexts— to send text, audio and video messages that teach mothers and caregivers how to use play to improve their interactions with children, foster their healthy development, and fit in games into daily activities using the resources that are available at home. During a pilot of this online course, participants received 17 video classes and 72 text and audio messages.
Evaluation and Impact
A preliminary evaluation of the program determined that both the material and the way it is delivered are adequate for their intended purposes. These encouraging results have paved the way for the program’s expansion and for a more thorough evaluation in the future.