Learning without Fear

May 8-14, 2009

Having two grade school kids is mainly the reason why I am so engrossed with the PLAN project on Learning without Fear. I know that my kids also fall prey to bullying, thanks a lot my girl knows how to handle it. But my son could not and simply cries in the corner. I frequently visited their school especially when they were in lower grades to update myself on the situation of my kids. Often times, I saw some kids, particularly big boys harassing little girls and boys until they cry. I discussed my observations to some teachers but they dismissed it as normal process of growing up. In my heart, I knew it was wrong. I had been a survivor of bullying and teasing when I was in grade school not only of some classmates but also of teachers. Again, I thanked myself for squarely facing those bullies because I knew it was wrong. And most importantly, I thanked my grandmother for defending me to those bullies; a teacher or a child.

I started reading the manual on May 8. Although it is not thick, it needs re-reading and a feminist lens to be able to come up with suggestions that might help in improving the manual. According to PLAN, the final draft of the manual will be released sometime in July 2009.

The manual came out as an advocacy to end violence in school. From February to June 2008, Plan International from the countries of Germany, Tanzania, Uganda,

Colombia, Ecuador, India and Philippines worked with the children to share their experiences of violence in school. These experiences were collated and later become a manual in which their experiences were documented and given solutions. The manual encourages all to participate in the movement to end violence in school in order to “Learn without Fear.”

Learn without fear manual (youth in action against violence in schools) is commended because it explains well the types of abuses happening to the children in school which resulted to many consequences and often times lead to the deprivation of a child in terms of his or her right to education. Violence in school also leads to intellectual, moral and even physical disintegration of a child, which may or may not be reversible.

The manual is still in the revision period. Thus, I hope that my inputs can be also considered and so as the other inputs which are really from the children's perspectives.

Below are the same comments I sent to Amor, my agency field work supervisor based on the checklist she gave concerning the evaluation on the Manual.

1. Feedback on the content:
1.1. Some texts in the manual are easy to read. But those within the activity parts and case study (see Carlos from Ecuador) are too small. In my opinion, the font Arial Narrow is not applicable since most of those who will use the manual are kids. Please use other fonts with bigger size.

1.2 Some parts of the manual are easy to understand, yet some activities need to be simplified.

1.3 The language used is perfect for the manual.
1.4. There should be a glossary of terms in the last page of the manual, so the users can easily understand the definitions of some terms like discrimination, exploitation etc.

2. Feedback on the structure and layout
I like the present arrangement and layout. But the pictures are too big and show almost similar expressions throughout the pages. I suggest that you use pictures of real boys and girls.

3. Feedback on the format

The manual is handy. I recommend that pictures of real boys and girls be on the cover.

4. Open Feedback

The manual may look perfect even in a gender perspective. However, during my analysis of the content, I found out that the basic on gender sensitivity is not included. When discussing gender, it is important to also differentiate it from sex. Thus, the users can also understand that some violence are not gender-specific but also has relations to sex. There could be a tendency to interchange gender and sex.

In one activity on Session 2, the Gender Quiz, i found it problematic to use immediately the term "gender" in the statement : How do girls and boys express their gender? I suggest that it should read like: How do girls and boys express themselves? By using the term "gender" in this activity, the user already assumed that the participants have already an idea on gender. Hence, I would like to recommend the title on Session 2 as Understanding Gender and Sex. With such new title, the user can easily discuss the differences between the two and explore the gender roles.

I assume that the participants during the draft of this manual came from different countries and ethnicity and gender orientation. It is noticeable however, that many case studies are focused in African countries. The experiences of the indigenous children studying in the mainstream schools are not given space. I suggest that at least one case of indigenous child be included because they suffer not only gender violence but also discrimination.

Since gender is fluid, and now it is also evident that many children especially on the puberty stages are showing openly their gender orientation, I suggest that this matter should be also given importance. If we stick only to our gender definition of the degree of femininity and masculinity, or the maleness and femaleness, kids who do not belong to these category will suffer more violence in school, in society and at home because their issue is not discussed.

I just hope that my comments and suggestions will make it before the deadline on the last week of May. If that happens, I hope my children will also read the Manual and say proudly that they too are advocates to stop violence in school and to proudly say “Learn without Fear!”