Ba Futuru's Training Materials
Ba Futuru uses many training materials during its implementation of the TAHRE program. Staff distribute journals and drawing books to the children and TAHRE Guides and Positive Discipline Manuals to youth and childcare workers.
Ba Futuru uses guitars, drawing books, notebooks, pencils, crayons, colored pencils, paint, brushes, paper, chart paper, rulers, flip charts, erasers, sharpeners, and TAHRE Guides in its workshops. Participatory seminars and discussions in small groups centering on human rights and conflict resolution are the main methods used in implementation. Art, song, drama, games and physical activities also are utilized in the workshops. Ba Futuru designed t-shirts and ID badges for staff members working in IDP camps, and also printed and distributed t-shirts and banners with peace slogans, such as “Ita Ida Deit,” meaning “We are One.”
A. TAHRE Guide – Children’s Version
The principle component of Ba Futuru’s trainings is the TAHRE Guide, which contains 14 lessons and accompanying psychosocial programming for children. It also gives suggestions for preparation, facilitation, role-playing activities and difficult issues. Lessons I and II are designed to introduce the facilitators to the participants, establish ground rules that will set up a safe environment in which the children may share their experiences and ideas, and engage the participants in activities that teach the value of cooperation and communication. Lessons III, IV and V are an introduction to human rights and the rights of the child. Lesson VI, VII and VIII deal with conflict resolution, while lessons IX and X discuss overcoming the negative affects of conflict. Lessons XI and XII examine the convergence of human rights and conflict resolution. The closing lessons, XIII and XIV, look to the future and discuss peaceful interaction. They also include an assessment survey to gauge the participants’ progress and evaluate what they have learned over the entirety of the TAHRE program.
The TAHRE Guide has proven to be a successful teaching manual. Not only does it detail methodology, curriculum and implementation procedures, but it also explains effective, interactive artistic methods of working with children. The TAHRE Guide has been revised continually, based on lessons learned and feedback from staff and participants. Also, new activities have been added to augment the materials developed for the first and second pilot programs.
The curriculum also includes group problem-solving activities, such as linking hands and working together to “unwind the circle,” which provide a physical, visual way of showing the benefits of a co-operative rather than competitive approach to problem solving. Children also explore different means of conflict resolution through role-playing activities in which they act out common disputes and alternative means of resolving them. Practicing their responses this way in a supportive environment builds the confidence of children to make positive changes in their behavior in everyday real-life situations. Similarly, reading the Universal Declaration on Human Rights and discussing how rights and corresponding responsibilities are relevant to their lives brings new understanding to the children’s visions for themselves and their future.
B. TAHRE Guide – Adult Version
In 2007 Ba Futuru developed a new version of the TAHRE Guide for youth and adults. This manual includes new activities on mediation, decision making, peace education, child abuse, trauma and counseling. It was developed primarily by Co-Founder and Capacity Development Program Manager Sierra James with assistance from Ba Futuru Director Joana dos Santos Camoes, Team Leaders Vidal C. Magno and Lica Marcal, and Facilitator Lulu Martins.
C. Positive Discipline Manual
UNICEF and Plan International’s 2006 joint report on Timor-Leste, entitled “Speak Nicely To Me,” cites that “two-thirds of children (67 percent) reported teachers beating them with a stick and almost four out of every ten children (38.7 percent) reported teachers slapping them in the face.”
In order to help reduce the prevalence of violent discipline practices, Ba Futuru has developed a training curriculum and resource materials on positive discipline. This initiative was undertaken in 2006 after childcare center staff in orphanages expressed a need for more information on non-violent ways to discipline children. The Positive Discipline Manual and corresponding training modules are used to reduce the use of physical discipline as well as to provide positive discipline strategies.
The first edition of the Positive Discipline Manual, published in April 2006, was called “Building Peace with Children: A Guide on Non-Violent Discipline.” A more developed version was published in 2007. Trainings on positive discipline are especially important in Timor-Leste because the use of physical discipline is extremely prevalent. The facilitation of dialogue about healthy interpersonal relationships between children and those who care for children can significantly help to protect children from violence and abuse. The Positive Discipline Manual details many reasons why violence and physical punishment should not be employed with children:
- it teaches children to react with violence;
- it is not productive to create behavioural change;
- it reinforces negative behavior;
- it is an abuse;
- it can cause long-term psychosocial damage;
- it hinders education; and
- it disregards more effective discipline methods.
The ideas from Positive Discipline Manual and the corresponding trainings have been well received. Teachers communicated that the discussions stemming from trainings have given them new ideas and important information to which they had not previously been exposed. As the comments below indicate, teachers have shown remarkable enthusiasm about wanting to stop using physical discipline after realizing that it can have negative impacts on children. During the Positive Discipline Training one of the teachers in a primary school in Tibar, Casimiro, admitted that sometimes he beats children. In his evaluation of Ba Futuru Positive Discipline training he said: “This training can be a good model to minimize physical punishment with the children I work with. I hope we can have more trainings like this.”
Another teacher, Feliciano Santos Reis said: “This training is really beneficial for us because it helps us to realize that physical punishment and violence are not good methods for educators to use in school.”
Januario da Cunha, agreed with his colleagues: “For me this training [on positive discipline] really helped me as it provides good models that I can use in class every day.”
After a separate positive discipline training, this time in Bobonaro District, Graciela do Rosario, stated: “The Positive Discipline Training is very important because through sharing this information we can help to decrease the violence that is happening in our daily lives.” The Positive Discipline Manual also provides a means for Ba Futuru staff to deal with cases of child abuse. While implementing the TAHRE curriculum with children in Dili primary school, Joana dos Santos Camoes noticed that many of the teachers were beating the children in the school as a form of discipline. She took the initiative to organize Positive Discipline Training there with the teachers in order to change attitudes about physical violence and share positive discipline techniques.
Clearly in a country where many people do not yet realize that there are negative impacts of physical punishment, providing parents, teachers, community leaders and other child carers with information about positive discipline is instrumental to stopping the cycle of violence in homes, schools and communities. Hence, the Positive Discipline Training has become an integral way for Ba Futuru to achieve its mission of peace building in Timor-Leste.