Anyone who’s seen the look on a child’s face when they’ve just scored a goal, finished a track meet or mastered a dance routine knows: to a kid, physical activity isn’t about burning calories—it’s about having fun.
However, as health and physical education professionals we know that, in the hands of a skilled and caring educator, the benefits of that fun (being part of a team, building confidence, learning healthy behaviours and gaining life skills—just to name a few) can truly transform a child. So, consider this: if high-quality health and physical education programs, like those found in Ontario schools, can have such a profound impact, imagine the kind of effects they might have on children growing up in countries where political strife and personal trauma can make daily life a struggle.
With this in mind, The Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH) and Brock University’s Centre for Healthy Development Through Sport and Physical Activity launched separate programs to help encourage the creation of healthy, active schools in developing countries. Knowing that Ophea already had a host of resources that could fill some unmet needs, they both approached our organization for help. Needless to say, we were only too happy to oblige. Read on and you’ll see why Ophea is exceedingly proud to be playing a part in these admirable initiatives.
Sri Lanka: Bringing Badly Needed Resources to Tsunami-affected Areas
Two decades of civil war followed by the devastation of the 2004 Tsunami have caused deep social scars and widespread trauma in Sri Lanka. Many of the children continue to struggle through personal losses. Schools can play a vital role in providing support but, before that can happen, Sri Lankan teachers—who have been through so much themselves—need training in how to deal with the mental health issues their students are facing.
For more than nine years, CAMH and Ophea have been working together to create and deliver mental health and substance use curriculum for Ontario schools. So when CAMH launched their three-year CIDA-funded mental health initiative in Sri Lanka,to strengthen the capacity of the mental health, gender based violence and education systems, the decision to ask for Ophea’s assistance with the Healthy Schools component was an easy one. “I knew that there were materials in the (Curriculum Implementation Support) binders that could help unmet needs in Sri Lanka be addressed,” says Sharon LaBonté-Jaques, Program Consultant for CAMH. “And, from past experience, I knew Ophea would say ‘yes’.”
As part of the project, nine educators from three Sri Lankan regions met with a team of Canadian trainers in Chennai, India. There, the participants received intensive training around supporting the mental health needs of students and teachers, delivered through a train-the-trainer approach. Ophea resources played a key part in this training; however, even with the tried-and-true resources in hand, it wasn’t as easy as giving a simple set of instructions and suggestions. Aside from translating the resources into Tamil (one of the two languages most commonly spoken in Sri Lanka), there were cultural factors to consider, as well.
“The role of children as partners in their learning is seen differently in Sri Lanka,” comments LaBonté-Jaques. “Teachers tend to be more authoritarian, so not all of Ophea’s approaches were appropriate in that way.” This meant that the nine participants and their Canadian training team had a unique opportunity to approach the resources from a new perspective, modifying and customizing them to better suit the needs of Sri Lankan educators.
Still, as a model and a template, all those in attendance recognized just how valuable the original materials could be to teachers in Sri Lanka. Following the 10-day training, CAMH approached Ophea again, this time with a request for a donation of three full sets of printed Curriculum Implementation Support Documents (Grades 1–10). These resources provide Sri Lanka teachers with the opportunity to access new ideas to assist them in teaching Health and Physical Education. Translation and adaptation of the resources will occur as needed as they are now easily accessible and housed in a newly created Educational Resource Centres in each of the regions involved in the initial training.
The end result is that many educators in Sri Lanka have access to a new set of culturally-appropriate ideas when it comes to teaching Health and Physical Education, and their students have new tools that encourage them to lead healthy lifestyles—something that’s sure to help them as they continue to heal from the emotional trauma they’ve been through.
El Salvador: Using Physical Education to Counteract Youth Violence
Although most school-aged children living in El Salvador today are too young to remember the country’s twelve-year civil war, they’re feeling its effects nonetheless. Urban gang violence, a legacy left over from years of fighting, has caused fear and insecurity to remain a fact of life in this Central American country.
When the Salvadoran government approached the Centre for Healthy Development for ideas on how to address the problem of youth violence through the use of physical education, Salud Escolar Integral was born.
The aim of the Scotiabank-funded project is to help develop an infrastructure that will involve local physical educators in becoming part of the nation building process. Not only have Ophea resources been used frequently to-date in the program, but the philosophies behind the resources have also been adopted. “Because of the high quality of the resources and the underlying principles like gender equality and the idea that everyone should experience success, they transferred really well between the two cultures,” says James Mandingo Ph.D., Co-Director of the Centre. Ophea’s Master Trainer materials have been translated into Spanish and adapted for use in the program, as have the PlaySport materials.
But perhaps Ophea’s most significant contributions toward El Salvador’s ongoing development in physical education were the lessons learned by three Salvadoran delegates who attended the 2006 Ophea conference. Two representatives from Pedagógica University’s faculty and a member of the executive council of the Santa Ana Physical Education Association traveled to Canada for the event.
The representative from Santa Ana took the lessons learned at the conference and went on to become a co-founder of the newly created Santa Ana Physical Education Association. Just this past November, the organization was able to host its own physical and health education conference with close to 100 physical educators from across the country. In turn, this developed local leadership by helping the educators who attended to build the skills needed to pass their knowledge on to others.
Likewise, the two faculty members from Pedagógica University have gone on to apply what they learned by becoming the leads of the first university-degree PE program in the country which focuses on using physical education to foster life skills.
While it’s clear that many teachers and countless students in El Salvador are benefiting from the Salud Escolar Integral program, according to James Mandigo, the Canadian partners have also benefited from the experience in some unforeseen ways. “It’s really opened our eyes to the potential impact our profession can have,” says Mandigo. “If Health and Physical Education programs can have an impact on an issue like youth violence in El Salvador, then we can also have an impact on youth violence here. Take the problem of bullying, for example. We can be a part of that solution too, and not just of the inactivity crisis.”
At Ophea, we couldn’t agree more. Physical and Health Education isn’t a cure-all but, as educators, our members know better than anyone how valuable it can be as a tool for change. After all, it only makes sense: healthier, happier children will be in a better position to build a healthier, happier future—not only for themselves but also for the countries they live in.
