Educa a tu Hijo (Educate Your Child)
Communities can make the difference when public early education services are not available for the entire population. This is the case of the Educa a tu Hijo Program, in which caregivers become home school teachers for children. Child development is promoted through families, which serve as the principal vehicle. However, there is an entire community of promoters, trainers, educators, doctors and health personnel, volunteers, and community groups that sustain the program and ensure its success. One of the innovative elements of this program is the shared responsibility between families and communities with respect to the early development of children. In addition, the program has a multisectoral focus that includes content on maternal-child health, nutrition, sports, and cognitive development in a non-institutional modality that prepares families to stimulate their children through activities in the home. Another innovative element of the program is that it is implemented in the prison system during visits by children with their incarcerated parents, and that it includes activities adapted for children with disabilities and for children who are hospitalized.
Problematic
Social programs in health and/or education, particularly for pregnant women and for children, face the challenges related to operating in areas that are difficult to access. Geographic constraints make it difficult to build health centers and to provide access to personnel trained in delivering care that addresses the needs of this population. It is therefore necessary to design and implement alternatives that are adjusted to these contexts, particularly in terms of promoting child development through pre-school education.
Solution
The absence of daycare centers in mountainous and rural areas of Cuba prompted the establishment of a non-formal alternative mechanism to prepare children prior to their starting school. This program provides non-institutional preschool education for all children who do not attend daycare centers (in urban, rural, and mountainous areas). The program also trains and empowers parents to stimulate their children’s comprehensive development (socio-emotional, intellectual, language, and motor development, development of values, moral qualities, and hygiene habits, healthcare, and the prevention of accidents) based on their own experiences, interests, and needs. This training begins before birth during medical visits with the future parents. During the period when the children are up to 2 years age, the program promotes education in the home and sends trainers once or twice a week to train parents in their homes about the development of their babies through stimulation exercises and techniques. When the children are 2 to 4 years old, the program organizes group meetings of families in community locations once or twice a week. At these meetings, the caregiver and the child meet with other families and with counselors trained in child development and family participation to learn and practice stimulation activities and implement them in the home. For children in rural and remote areas, the program provides education coverage up to 6 years of age.
Evaluation and Impact
The program has been the subject of several evaluations to verify its effects and determine its course of action going forward. During the 1980s, a sample was selected comprised of 94 children up to 1 year old who met certain selection criteria, including not having attended institutional daycare centers. These children were assigned to treatment groups (an application by the family for the pedagogic Educa a tu hijo Program) or to control groups. Children in the treated groups had superior comprehensive development results. In subsequent evaluations (1994 and 1999) that included children up to 6 years of age, positive results were again found in the children’s development, the level of preparation of the families, and the level of community support.