After-School Program educates Rio’s excluded youth

2044 After-School Program educates Rio’s excluded youth

(This update was translated and edited for clarity by the staff and interns of Dreams Can Be Foundation)

Amigos da Mata association would like to thank Global Giving for the opportunity to include our project in order to receive donations through your website. Our project currently serves 50 children and youth living in this rural area of “Secretário”, in a region of Rio de Janeiro state, Brazil. Due to factors such as extremely low-income, geographic isolation, and the lack of community centers these children do not have access to after school activities, just the activities offered by our project. Two days of the week, we offer free school reinforcement lessons, sports, recreation, arts, reading, environmental education, personal hygiene and health education, and food, materials, transportation and clothes.

The first evidence of the progress of the Project is the social integration of the kids and the team of professionals involved with the benefited families. In the beginning we dealt with constant fighting and frequent negativity from the participants towards the suggested activities. The youth made the excuse that they were not capable of carrying out these activities. Today we observe with joy that the group of children and youth treat each other with great respect and are taking good care of the toys and program materials. They are working well together and are presenting positive attitudes in the accomplishment of activities. The parents of the children as well have become more open and communicative as they participate more in the project and are constantly demonstrating recognition of the positive changes observed in their children; in their behavior and in their school performance. João Vitor is six years old and though he has attended elementary school for three years was still unable to write his name. At the direction of the Project, after talking to his mother, who demonstrated worry with the situation, made a visit to the school where João Vitor is registered and got the information that he was not interested in his lessons. The responsible teacher for the lessons of school reinforcement for our project created specific ludic (playful) activities and verified that João Vitor could read and write, but he was not confident in demonstrating his knowledge. Creating an encouraging environment, after a few days of activities, João Vitor wrote his name on his own. Now, he is an enthusiastic pupil as he attends our reinforcement lessons and each new word learned is celebrated by him. From the experience of this first year of with our project , we can consider as a most important lesson is that inside of an environment directed toward the discovery, the learning and the development of the creativity, anything is possible. With the right dose of stimulation, and praise for the potential of each one of the children we have attained great results. In this spirit, our objective is to amplify the work of our project and to strengthen the already developed work, offering new activities that stimulate the children and youth of our community, stimulating them to seek knowledge, the development of their skills and a belief in their abilities. It became evident the need for a structured program specificlly for the group of adolescents and youth the majority who display a deficiency in their learning, a lack of interest in their continued education and who have a lack of professional opportunities in their future.Our proposal is to implement a project directed specifically for this group with among its objectives we research the local attitudes and approach the problems of the this society with an integrated recognition of need of practical educational solutions directed at talent and aptitude of the group.The second step is the implementayion of professional courses that would appeal to the interests and aptitudes of this group and in synergy with the needs of the local work market. The creation of a specific da for the activities of the children studying at the secondary school level and opening new spaves for children studying at the elementary school level we are already offering. These offerings would be made in conjunction with the school terms and scheduled around school hours. Not necessarily by age group, but by grade level they currently attend. This current proposal was conceived from evaluations of the current needs of the target population.

We are sending the donors of Global Giving advance thanks for their interest in our project and any donations that they might send us in support of our work and our children. Our work, our educational goals, our objectives to keep the children and youth on the right path through activities that develop the skills and capabilities of these kids, from a rural area where the indigenous population suffers from extreme poverty. Our objective is to grow the confidence in their own capacities and their motivation to learn and to motivate them to continue their studies. We believe that with this stimulation they will be able to better use their time and individual promise; creating more promising futures and contributing to the promotion of their social group.

O primeiro fator que evidencia a progresso do Projeto é a integração social alcançada tanto em relação às próprias crianças quanto à da equipe de profissionais envolvidos com as famílias beneficiadas. Se antes convivíamos com brigas constantes e com freqüentes negativas de participação nas atividades apresentadas com a “desculpa” de que não eram capazes, hoje observamos com alegria que esse grupo de crianças e jovens se tratam com respeito, cuidam dos brinquedos e materiais, se ajudam mutuamente e apresentam atitudes mais positivas na realização das atividades. Por sua vez, os familiares, além de estarem mais abertos à comunicação e mais participativos, manifestam constantemente o reconhecimento das mudanças positivas observadas em seus filhos tanto no que diz respeito ao comportamento quanto ao desempenho escolar.