Building Life-skills for 150,000 children

Greetings from Team Toybank!

The new year brings us immense hope and energy. We take this opportunity to express our gratitude for the faith and backing our supporters have had in our work. With 2022 here and our rejuvenated spirit to continue our efforts towards making play a reality in the lives of our children, we wish you a safe and resilient 2022!

Toybank has been delivering its hybrid Play2Learn program to 60,000+ children across 12 districts in Maharashtra, 4 states and 1 Union Territory in India. The program guides and supports 13,695 caregivers through 581 support groups. (as of 31st December 2021).

We are humbled, yet take immense pride in our team who have ensured that the progress we have made for our children won’t reverse. Throughout 2021, we’ve seen noteworthy resilience in the ways our children tackled hardships and roadblocks to learn and play. 2021 was a testament to the Power of Play in our children’s lives.

As we ring in the new year, here’s a quick update of our work over the last few months:

We Played.

• We disseminated 1009 digital Play2Learn activities where children from various age groups and learning levels learned holistically. They helped children work on their anxieties cause by distressing news and online learning during the pandemic.
   
• Physical Play2Learn Sessions were conducted by partner-teachers while following social distancing rules. Children played board games in groups of two or three under teachers’ supervision to ensure their safety.
  
  
• 85 Digital Play2Learn Sessions were conducted via Zoom by our Program Officers. These sessions encouraged peer learning, boosted children’s curiosity and built life skills and socio-emotional skills among classmates through group activities.
  
  
• 28 student volunteers facilitated 22 buddy sessions as part of The Buddy program. These sessions included building a bond with the child, discussions around aspirations, emotions, strengths, routine and habit building. The sessions provide for social interactions which have been drastically hit due to the pandemic.
  
  
• Across 4 states and 1 Union Territory in India, the digital Toybank Play2Learn Kit has made Play accessible to children. We ensured continuity of learning for children in these disadvantaged neighborhoods who did not have the luxury of online schooling.

We invested.

We are invested in children’s Right to Play. We have been continually tracking on-ground issues that our children have been facing through fortnightly calls with partners, virtual focus group discussions, and in-person meetings and rural visits with education and block officers, headmasters and principals to ensure Play was a part of their virtual learning and back-to-school plans.

• We visited our rural districts of Beed, Latur & Osmanabad in October to give key partner-stakeholders a refresher on our program, plan for teacher training and physical Play2Learn sessions as schools were in the process of reopening. These visits enabled us to strengthen our partnerships, thus ensuring the program’s smooth delivery
  
  “Everything related to education collapsed during the pandemic. But Toybank's continued efforts ensured children had some form of knowledge,” shared Dr. Vinayak, Toybank’s program incharge of our partner in Beed.
  
  
• In December, over a course of 6 days, 500+ teachers were trained in Latur district of Maharashtra. The training was interactive and designed to motivate the teachers to ask questions on Play, and take them through our Play2Learn program (Physical and Digital). The teachers first hand played with the games and understood their objectives and skills they cater to. The training was a platform for the Toybank team to not only re-connect with the teachers, but to also hear first hand some of the challenges they faced in the pandemic. 
  
  “I enjoyed playing Reversi. It's a very interesting game. 6 of us played chinese checkers and we learnt unity and teamwork,” Teacher from Ausa block, Latur, Maharashtra.
  
  “The concepts that you have shared today are very good. This is one of the best trainings that I have attended in a while,” shares Navnath Bharat Mende, Teacher from Renapur block, Latur, Maharashtra

• Parents supported their children's academics as well as mental wellbeing by taking time out to engage with our Play2Learn activities.
  
  “Being at home most of the time during COVID-19, the children needed both, meaningful engagement and academic support, which parents were enabled to provide with the Play2Learn Kit’s easy-to-understand instructions,” shares Mrs. Bhosale, Teacher from Toybank Play2Learn Center in Nanded.
  
  Vasantrao Patil, a parent whose child is part of our Play2Learn Center in Latur district, said to our PO, “I’ve never met anyone from Toybank, but these playsheets are really good for our children. My child completed the Positive Self-Talk Flower playsheet and I displayed it at home so that my child always remembers his positive qualities.”

• 34 Virtual Focus Group Discussions with 330 teachers and decision-makers gauged the effect of lockdown on our children. They shared feedback and suggestions on our Digital Toybank Play2Learn Program helping us to strengthen and support our partners effectively.
  
  Few snippets from the FGDs by our partners
  
  Deepak Kubde, Teacher from Subhedar Ramji Ambedkar Vidyalaya Play2Learn Center in Mumbai said, “As the lockdown started and Toybank asked to be added to school groups, I was delighted as online classes were dull and managing things was new to us. Activities are shared on a daily basis without any hurdles. Kids enjoyed the activities and we also learnt new things every day. Hope we’ll have Toybank Play2Learn Program from day one of the school reopening.”
  
  Leena Kamble, teacher from ZPPS Lokhandisawargaon, Play2Learn Center in Beed district shared what she benefited from the program, “It has helped me bond with them, overcome language difficulties, teach them despite their restlessness, inattentiveness or disinterest in studies. Children may not do something from textbooks but if I ask them to do the same thing through an activity, they readily do it.”
  
  

We’re rebuilding childhoods.

Story of Resilience: Bridging learning gaps with the game Abacus

“Sameer was in Class 2 and at the end of the academic year when schools closed down due to COVID-19. He could recognise single to two-digit numbers easily. By the time he was in Class 3 in June 2020, his school had just begun remote learning. This not only negatively impacted what he had learnt but we also failed to track how much our students were grasping. 

Sameer was in Class 4 by June 2021, with schools yet to reopen. With the introduction of three-digit and bigger numbers, he was off his learning track once again. When children could attend school physically, I noticed that Sameer struggled with number recognition. Toybank had restocked Abacus, so I decided to creatively bring him up to speed with digits. I visually associated the colorful beads with units, tens and hundreds, which made counting easy and quick for Sameer. This excited him to keep coming and learning more. With this realistic learning experience, he eventually took his notebook along and started writing down all the numbers he learned.”

- Story of Resilience shared by Shubhangi Kulkarni, teacher from ZPPS Bansorala, Play2Learn Center in Beed district of Maharashtra.       

Invest to rebuild childhoods through Play

Investing in Play to make mental well-being and learning accessible is the need of the hour. We must come together as a society to rebuild children’s childhoods and their future outcomes. Your support will ensure 60,000+ children continue to Play, learn and become resilient!

Thank you and Happy Toybanking!

Children’s spirits are set free in play spaces and imaginations come alive through Play. However, inequities limit these for at-risk children along with access to quality play experiences, and thus mental and emotional well-being. 

To address that, we need to act now, act big and resolutely, as four-time award-winning project Toybank—Development through Play has been since its inception in 2004. So, when Bhausaheb Wavikar, Secretary of SAPREM’s Bring A Smile MR School for children with intellectual disabilities shares after our games distribution, “Our children with special needs found online learning uninspiring and boring but are now playing without stress,”. Not only were they relieved of their worries but we took another step in providing access to quality Play even for children with different abilities. As Wavikar added, “Our children are so happy to get the games and toys. The joy on their faces is beyond words.”

Though our greatest reward is impacting 57,925 children across 7 states and 1 Union Territoryin India every day during COVID-19 (as of 31st August 2021), we are honored and inspired to be one of the finalists of one of the prestigious global forums 2021 Global Good Awards—COVID Crisis Champions. We are ever grateful for the solid support of Toybankers like you who support us in building a better, stronger and kinder generation.

Starting at the bottom, we’re now playing digital

‘Interrupted learning’ is among the top adversities of COVID-19 on children (UNESCO). Educationists and experts urged to resend children to physical classrooms in December 2020, barely six months into the lockdown. But now, more than 300 million students in India have been learning virtually for more than a year-and-a-half—the seventh-longest school closure in the world. It has rightly been said that if children do not go back to school soon, we will have a lost generation of kids. 

Toybank has continually recognized these losses even before the outbreak of the pandemic. From providing games to a couple of thousands of street kids to setting up Play2Learn Centers impacting 57K+ kids, we have consistently responded to our children’s evolving needs, even during COVID-19 as our program went digital. 

A Harvard report, ‘Persevering through the Pandemic,’ states that 58 percent of parents have witnessed COVID-19 harm their children’s academic development. Just over half of the parents saw a negative impact on their child’s social-emotional development, which can affect the ability to learn, build relationships and manage emotions. It is, therefore, crucial for children to be connected to their learning during the pandemic.

Being mindful of the digital fatigue, too

Throughout the pandemic, we have stayed connected with our partners, teachers, children and their parents through telephonic surveys, virtual focus group discussions, and whenever restrictions were lifted we had in-person meetings with block officers, headmasters and principals to ensure Play is part of their back-to-school plans. We are continually tracking the problems children are facing—school dropout, child labor, social distress due to the virus, digital fatigue, learning loss, etc—and curate every batch of our Play2Learn Kit to address these and bridge gaps. 

To further balance the digital fatigue, we had a blend of various play activities, sessions and offline activities such as:

• Around 150 Physical Play2Learn Sessions in areas with minimal to zero COVID cases
• Distribution of 1,492 games and toys to approx. 800 children in remote areas of Mulshi and Matheran villages in Maharashtra, where the tribal kids have no access to learning materials or schools.
• Replenishing over 3000 games at our Play2Learn Centers in Ahmednagar, Beed, Latur & Mumbai districts of Maharashtra
• 43 Virtual Play2Learn Sessions conducted by Program Officers and 58 Virtual Play2Learn Sessions conducted by corporate volunteers
• 70 Buddy sessions as part of the Buddy Program focused on reducing feelings of isolation, building self-confidence, team work, building healthy routines and habits, and avenues for fun and recreation through ice-breakers, action songs and arts and crafts activities.

“The Toybank Play2Learn Kit provides quality activities that meet various learning levels of children and skills that will make them resilient to get ahead in life,” said Miss Anju, Teacher, partner-school Rani Sati English School, Mumbai.

“Alphabet Jumping supported children’s learning of the alphabet in an engaging and entertaining way. They got to move, hop and read out aloud one letter after another, thus increasing their learning retention. At the end of the hopping, they reached their favorite belonging as a reward. Caregivers also learned how to encourage their children and make their learning journey fun”, shares Toybank Program Officer, Rashmin Shaikh.

Story of Resilience:

Our partner Prerana (an anti-human trafficking nonprofit) shares an inspiring Story Of Resilience on how Toybank’s Play2Learn activities are supporting their children during the pandemic.To read it click here.                             

Benefits of Toybank Play2Learn Program

• Meaningful engagement at home
• Accessible and self-directed learning
• Safe spaces at home
• Stimulating learning environment
• Opportunity for normal development, building autonomy and exploration
• Reducing the severity of potential trauma caused by fear and uncertainty
• Enabling caregivers to focus on their responsibilities
• Promoting opportunities for early learning and responsive caregiving

Our work across India

The digital and translations feature of Toybank Play2Learn Kit has made it adaptable in different rural and urban communities of Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Manipur, Ladakh and Madhya Pradesh. We have and continue to ensure that language is the last barrier preventing children from playing.

We have witnessed the power of play adopted within different contexts and backgrounds and our activities include resources that are easily obtainable locally. For instance, Little Vikas, from the tribal region of Madhya Pradesh, made a Pinwheel from leaves and Santosh from rural Maharashtra completed the Manmade Flower game by including natural and man-made things from his surroundings, including soil and trees. We supported our partner facilitators, teachers and caregivers to fit the Play2Learn sheets into their local lexicon.

Supporting Toybank in making quality play more accessible

As we continue to work on-ground, we look forward to Right To Play becoming an undeniable reality soon. Now, with 17 years of on-ground experience, hundreds of impact stories, a big Toybank family of supporters, teachers, government officials, volunteers and children look forward to more avenues that will give children their right—to happy and healthy childhoods through Play.

Thank you and Happy Toybanking!