Silent Voices

Having completed our first residential, life is very different this week. Now we are busy finalising the reports of the residential ready to send to our donors Deaf Child Worldwide, who make all this work possible, and to our participants for their files.

The evaluation of the residential week was very positive – in particular we learned that participants were very happy not to sit through a week of lectures and try to make lots of notes. Our participatory style of training was really appreciated. But of course we also learnt that there are some aspects that we need to work on before the next residential. Of course there are always some issues when working with people from a different cultural background and I try to be careful not to impose my cultural norms on the sessions.

The parents also really enjoyed coming to the District Office to see the information about Silent Voices and about Deaf Child Worldwide on the internet. For many of them it was the first time to see material over the internet and they loved to see their photographs – I am not sure if they all really appreciated that everyone round the world can also see them.

Now we are also planning for our next Parent Group meetings. I am particularly excited to see how the next week of meetings will go as they are going to be facilitated by the Parent Representatives, with my support where needed. For the Parent Representatives this will be the first time they have facilitated such an activity. We have planned the programme and they have practiced presenting it, but I think it will be more challenging for them when they face their parent groups. I see this as part of their personal development which is an important part of capacity building.

I will let you know how it goes!

Hilary

VSO Volunteer with Silent Voices