Dr. Yvon Moren, member of the “Child to Child” programme, Institute of Health and Development, Université Paris VI (France)
Cover of a book produced by Dr. Yvon Moren and Rwanda’s Child to Child programme (Edicef publishers, Paris, 1996).
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In my country, Botswana, there is a serious problem of communication between parents and their children. This is a cry from our hearts: parents, talk to us. Without communication, guidance and dialogue on your part, we are a lost generation. Come to our aid. 14-year-old girl addressing the International Conference on STD/Aids in Africa, Kampala (Uganda), 1995 |
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HIV/Aids in Rwanda Out of a population of 5.8 million, 370,000
live with HIV/Aids. Among adults in the 15-49 age group, 12.75% are HIV-infected,
along with 22,000 children under the age of 15. The epidemic has so far claimed 170,000
lives. Source: UNAIDS, 1998. |
During a
day of role-playing and discussion, Rwandan teachers learn to broach the subject
of Aids in the classroom without shyness or fear
At the school
in Mujina, a couple of hours by road from the Rwandan capital of Kigali, the teachers
have gathered for a day of instruction about Aids organized by the NGO Enfants réfugiés
du monde. They all admit to being confused: what can we do? they ask. Their pupils
start having sex quite early on–around 16 for boys, but much earlier, from about
12 and up for girls, who are often pestered and harassed by adults. The teachers
all agree that the school is ideally situated to reach young people in efforts to
prevent the spread of the disease. But how exactly can they get the message across
to their pupils?
The curriculum officially includes lessons about Aids and sexually transmitted diseases
(STDs), but teachers have not been taught how to tackle these subjects. They don’t
have books or other written material, their own knowledge is limited and mainly obtained
from the radio. Their mother tongue lacks euphemisms for sexual matters. And even
the most energetic teachers shy away from the subject for fear of being accused by
parents of corrupting the minds of their children.
An ‘internal
army’
“As a result,” says
a primary school inspector, “most of them just don’t teach the classes they’re supposed
to.” According to one female teacher, “it’s impossible in Rwanda to talk about sex
with children under 12.”
A team from the Rwandan Child to Child programme gives a one-day crash course on
a teaching method by which children learn to be more concerned about their own health
and that of others. The training aims to equip the teachers with information about
Aids and techniques for tackling the subject.
Right from the start, the team reminds participants that Aids, unlike any other
sexually transmitted disease, is a blood disease, not one directly affecting sexual
organs. From this angle, teachers can handle the matter more calmly, like any other
infection. The problem is that many teachers are unclear about the various functions
of blood. With malaria widespread in the region, they know that red blood cells carry
oxygen, but they are less familiar with white ones or with problems of the immune
system.
Basic information about blood is conveyed with the help of games and very brief
talks. The immune system, for example, is presented as a professionally organized
“internal army” which attracts their attention. They overcome their shyness and join
in acting out how the virus attacks the body and how the various parts of the immune
system fight back. A “Mr. HIV” and a “Mr. Malaria” give talks about the virus and
how it spreads.
Before looking at how the virus enters the human body, the teachers are asked to
draw the male and female genitals. Very few are comfortable doing so. But making
a life-size model of the female genitals, using whatever is at hand (an avocado pear
for the uterus, for example) is met with enthusiasm. A presentation about the different
stages of Aids gives the teachers a chance to talk at length about the disease, which
is so present in their everyday life and yet remains invisible.
After several further scientific points have been made, the question of prevention
is tackled. The Fleet of Hope, a book written by Bernard Joinet, a Catholic missionary
and professor of psychology at Tanzania’s University of Dar es Salaam, is used. Aids
is presented as a kind of Biblical flood and the class “embarks” on one of three
“arks”–abstinence, fidelity or condom–to escape drowning.
An evaluation of the training shows that teachers feel it is vital to improve their
scientific knowledge. But this isn’t enough for them. Students in higher grades are
asking them all sorts of questions about sexuality, which they are at a loss to answer.
