Getting to Know Your International Contacts—Part 2

This week I listened to a podcast from Maysoun Chehab. She is a regional Early Childhood Care and Development Program Coordinator at the Arab Resource Collective. She works with other professionals to raise awareness of early childhood and working to teachers to teach best practices. One of the most rewarding projects that she has worked with was the July 2006 War on Lebanon. It was a war that lasted for 30 days and effected many children and parents. During the war 126 schools were totally destroyed. When the war stopped she went in and trained parents and teachers about post traumatic situations. They teach many different coping strategies and ways to help the children over come their fears. This is a very interesting position to me because I couldn't imagine  living in an area that was completely destroyed by war. It is hard enough sometimes to teach children just coming from low-income families. I couldn't imagine how difficult it would be to also teach children who have lost everything and have post traumatic stress.

I next took a look at Harvard's Global Children's Initiative. Looking at this website I was kind of taken back that there was such a concern for children's mental health, but I can absolutely see why it is needed. Children need help identifying their problems with the help of a well qualified doctor. Thankfully Harvard is there to help assist in this matter. After taking this course I am more aware that their are children in need. Harvard is taking the initiative to work for children in crisis across the world. Right now they hare focusing a lot of the aftermath of earthquakes in Haiti and Chile. The third thing that I looked at on this website is that Harvard  is trying to incorporate educational trainings into their projects. They want to help build support for their members and the families and countries that they are working with and they want to give more opportunities to provide leadership in these areas all over the world.

Resources:
http://worldforumfoundation.org/wf/wp/current-work/world-forum-radio/
http://developingchild.harvard.edu/index.php/activities/global_initiative/