BY JOHN HOUANIHAU
THE SINU Early Childhood Education (ECE) class at Panatina Campus in East Honiara on Friday 22 October had staged its first-ever fundraising drive since its establishment.
Hellen Bitalau, SINU ECE supervisor on Friday said the school are looking to raise funds to build the school’s children playground.
“Today we organized fundraising in aid of the school’s Pikinini-playground. This include swings, seesaws, slides and other things the kids can play with.
“Early childhood education is a play-based program so both indoor and outdoor activities must be provided in terms of equipping the kids with proper outdoor and indoor playing equipment.
“These activities enhance their learning and develop critical thinking,” she said when interviewed by isles Media on Friday.
She said in order to build a stronger foundation for early childhood education, ECE schools/classes need to have that for the kids to experience both indoor and outdoor environments.
“Early childhood education is the foundation, thus our aim is to build these resources properly,” said Mrs Bitalau.
The fundraising activities include selling cooked food, card games for assorted goods items and household staff, and many other fun games.
The fund raised according to Mrs Bitalau will go towards the Project labour cost with the support of AusAID support.
“Due to shortage of the required budget, the school had to raise funds to meet its labour cost. We did enroll 158 students and a total of s together,” she said.
According to Mrs. Bitalau, AusAID has supported them with a total of $53 thousand dollars worth of materials where out of the total, $20.000 will be allocated for the labour cost.
She said the school is anticipating another fundraising drive in two or three weeks time which she said will be staged at the Chief’s house to meet the labour cost demand.
She then called on parents to go forward and show support for their kids in forthcoming fundraising drives of the school.
“Early childhood education build your kids to a primary level. If your child can’t write or read how can she/ do it at the primary level? My appeal is for parents to be consistent and faithful.
“This is where we will teach the kids how they should behave, how to treat people, how to do things sustainably, how to keep the environment clean, it all started at an early age,” she said.
