SITE VISIT - Consultative Group on Early Childhood Care and ...

each script in detail and share suggestions. This process was lengthier, perhaps, than a less
participatory process, but the resulting scripts were far superior due to the process.
The participating caregivers contributed significantly to the process because they saw it as
beneficial to the children in their pidis and to their own professional growth. Specifically, they
learned,
1) To value the games and give them the importance they have during work with children.
2) To promote active learning among the children through simple and developmentally diverse
activities.
3) To feel like professionals and not simply childminders, that is, to re-evaluate their own work
as women contributing to the development of the community.
Finally, the programs work because they were tested, retested and retested. Fifty-five caregivers
and 285 children listened to the tapes, used the posters and sometimes used the guidebooks over
six months. Feedback was solicited from caregivers, parents, regional teams, the national team,
and external evaluators. Within the design team, we brainstormed, we assessed, we complained
and we negotiated. When we had to, we threw away our adult ideas of what interests children
and we went back to the centers to observe.
Today, the experimental IRI programs have been translated and adapted in Quechua, an
indigenous Indian language, with the help of UNICEF and a team of specialists. It will soon be
adapted in Aymara with help from Plan Internacional for similar purposes. The Spanish version
has also become part of the national curriculum for early child development through the division
of PIDI (Programa Integrado de Desarrollo Infantil) at the government level.
All of these programs rely heavily on formative evaluation in the communities and with the
learners.
VII. THE CHANGING FACE OF THE MEDIA FOR ECD IN SOUTH
AFRICA
One goal of educational media is to bring education to people, young and old who might not
otherwise get it due to the inaccessibility of conventional classroom education. In some
instances, educational through both print and broadcasting such as correspondence courses,
radio, television, video or audio tapes is combined with classroom, training at educare centers or
other face-to-face instruction.
In some countries, the media is used as a tool of basic education--teaching the fundamentals of
reading, writing and arithmetic. In other places it is used more creatively to teach language skills,
basic health care or cultural information. Here in South Africa it can be used to do both.
In either method, educational media is an essential element in bringing education to poor
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