Nelius njoroge
Director, The Ark Play School and Daycare
Bold question: What if caregivers ,teachers and learners, were all equal partners in Early Child Development and Learning ?
Path to Metis: Nelius is passionate about all things children and their early year’s development how it affects life-long learning. Research shows that early year’s development is affected by a child’s immediate environment, their early year’s experiences and the interactions the child has with adults around them.
Under the umbrella of The Ark Playschool which she has been running for about 4 years, she aims to develop workshops and programs for parents, teachers, caregivers and her immediate community on how they can create safe and enabling environments for children from inception, promote positive experiences with adults around them, and reduce toxic stress environments that can have adverse effects on a child that could last a lifetime.
Research has proven that by strengthening the capacity of everyone who interacts with children from birth leads to improved learning outcomes in children as they have a sturdy foundation on which learning takes place, improved health benefits and reduces risks that could lead to diseases such as diabetes, obesity and heart disease.
In the long-term this means that children get to finish school, start business/employment, higher incomes, which leads to more tax revenue, reduced crime rates and a healthier society and country. If implemented across the board at policy level the benefits of investing in early years is huge and cost saving even for Kenya as a country!
This may take a lifetime, but in the words of Desmond Tutu “there is only one way to eat an elephant: one bite at a time.”
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