AFLATOUN

STORY:Stephen Nana Osei Bonsu

A three-day international workshop to deliberate on a the “Aflatoun” educational programme aimed at providing children with building blocks of life to make positive changes in their lives and communities is underway in Accra.
The workshop which brought together delegates from Netherlands, Ghana, Senegal, Kenya, Rwanda, Namibia, Tanzania, Zambia among others seeks to deliberate on the implementation of the programme in Ghana and other countries school curriculum.
The Aflatoun programme is a movement reaching 700,000 children internationally and seeks to provide children aged six to fourteen years (14) with social and financial education to encourage them to save their resources and start their own innovative enterprises.

The programme which is under the auspices of the SNV Netherlands Development Organisation and Women and Development
Project (WADEP) also addresses social and financial educational problems relating to children.
The ceremony also witnessed the launch of  Ghanaian versions of Aflatoun books, in correlation with the Ghanaian  educational curriculum.
Launching the books, the Director of Teacher Education of Ghana Educational Service (GES), Mr Victor Mantey said, GES was committed to ensuring that programmes that would promote children’s learning and their holistic development was given the necessary recognition and support.
He believed that the programme would  give the children a better understanding of social and financial education.


Aflatoun Regional Representative in Ghana, Patricia Formadi said the programme was constituted with a comprehensive curriculum which balances social education with financial education.

“In order to embed the learning and its future impact, children are encouraged to practice what they have learnt through participating in child-led social and financial activities like setting up savings systems”.
She said the programme was currently been implemented in Volta, Central and Central Regions in Ghana.
The SNV representative, Mrs Fati Seidu explained that SNV aims to partner GES and other organisations to mobilise resources so as to expand Aflatoun to all 18 districts the Ghana Education Thematic area covers.

She further stated that the ability to reach to all children and help them with good understanding of who they are in uniqueness, will help build in them strong characters for strong nation building.