Health is regarded as the presence of physical, mental, environmental and social well-being, not simply the absence of diseases and sicknesses. If children are healthy, their diets nutritious and their environment sanitary, they can take full advantage of every opportunity to learn, work, and enjoy their lives. By integrating health education in the classroom children, during their formative years, can learn and understand the importance of a healthy and hygienic lifestyle. What’s more is that students' health and their ability to learn are closely linked. When students are healthy, they are more capable to succeed in school.

One program that has incorporated the knowledge of health and preservation – both of the body and the environment – in the classrooms is the Community Supported Schools Program (CSSP) of the Sindh Education Foundation (SEF). The Community Supported Schools Program designed and initiated by SEF in 1998, engages communities to establish schools for girls’ education and facilitate a participatory development process. These primary schools mainly cater to the girl child and are opened in defunct school buildings or straw huts provided by the communities. Management of schools resides with community members, who formulate the Village Education Committees (VECs), with SEF providing material and technical support. Currently, 100 Community Schools are operational in 5 districts of Sindh catering to the educational needs of approximately 4,000 children.

In the year 2000, findings of the programmatic mid-term survey highlighted that most of the communities’ income was spent on medicines and health checkups. In order to address health related issues and facilitate families to curtail health expenses through practicing health prevention measures, the CSSP integrated a comprehensive health education program within the schools’ curriculum. The purpose was to raise awareness on critical health issues faced by the local communities and possible preventions through cost effective and participatory approaches. This health education initiative has been made possible and successful with the efforts of the program team, the technical support of the Aga Khan University – Institute for Education Development (AKU-IED) and the sincere participation of all community members, including the teachers, children and their families.

Under this program, trainings, resource material and assistance are provided on an ongoing basis to teachers who are primarily responsible for implementing health education in the classroom. The program is based on the child-to-child methodology, with children being the main bearer of health messages for other children, their households and communities. The program has so far designed and conducted trainings for a prolific 21 issues ranging from ‘A Balanced Diet’, ‘Gutka, Paan & Supari’, to ‘Tuberculosis’, ‘AIDS’, ‘Usage of Indigenous Medicines’ and more. Introduction of these significant issues have resulted in increased enrolment and retention rates of students and enhanced relevance and quality of education amongst communities.

In order to implement health education in the school, the program has designed lesson plans on various health related topics. The lesson plans are constructed in such a way that they motivate and assist students to maintain and improve their health, prevent diseases, and reduce health-related risk behaviors. The lesson plans also allow students to gain knowledge on health-related issues. This knowledge is then transferred through these same students to their siblings and their parents (Child to Child Approach), while the CSSP team-members, the VEC members and the teachers take the responsibility to extend the knowledge to the whole community. This two-pronged approach (focusing on the household and the community) through different mediums has proved to be an immensely successful setup where no one is left behind in the pursuit of a healthier lifestyle.

The lesson plans are simple and can easily be adapted for launching health education campaigns in any community.

Along with offering trainings to teachers and developing contextualized lesson plans, the program also creates tools and builds partnerships with the communities to draw on the best practices in the field of health promotion. The CSSP works with communities to assess and strengthen their infrastructure to address school and community health issues. Close involvement of the community, children and parents has been the impetus behind the success of the health education program.

Currently, the program team is putting together a health manual, which is an interesting guide for both children and teachers. The manual is colorfully designed and entails rich and vibrant illustrations and activities for the whole classroom. The manual will prove instrumental for introducing health and hygiene in the classrooms and making it an enjoyable learning experience.

You can learn more about the CSSP Health Education Programs by contacting:

Mr. Daman Bozdar,
Manager, Community Supported Schools Program
Sindh Education Foundation
Plot 9, Block-7, Kehkashan, Clifton-5
Karachi, Pakistan
Tel No: (92-21) 111 424 111 (Ext: 208)
Fax No: (92-21) 9251652