Age
6
Country of Residence
Kenya
Founding Story: What was the spark that led you to start your project? What was the "Aha!" moment that led you to get started and see the potential for this to succeed?
My mother is a social worker, the founder of a community organization and also my homeschool teacher. I learn a lot from the things she does and join her in most of the child-friendly activities, like talking to communities about keeping children safe and caring for the environment in Kenya. I love reusing plastic containers in our house to replant the seeds from our own fruits and vegetables after eating and get excited to see them grow. I like spending time with children so much and I connect easily with my age mates, younger, and older ones alike, but some times I feel like they need to try and change or unlearn how they use their behaviors around me and other friends so we can all be comfortable and safe, including children with disabilities. I love gymnastics and reading story books but in the rural part where I live kids don’t have any story books so they like sharing mine. I felt so happy each time, parents say their children learned a better social behavior, or skill from me, they started to love reading books more, and doing cartwheels and headstands after me! I learned about a kids club from my favorite youtube show and I asked my mother if I could have one too and use it to spend a good time with other children as we learn a lot more together and when she agreed to support me, we started the club THRIVE organization to reach many other children.
How do you encourage other people to join your project or learn about the problem you’re working on? If you have a new idea, tell us how you will do this in the future.
The child mobilizer together with all other members, as well as our anchor organization (THRIVE Action CBO) tell friends, family, school mates, as well as well-wishers about the club for possible and they donated some books, cash, toys, some liked our different social pages, and led some new memberships to the club growing from 3 to 10 members. We also use our social media handles and we also launched a community fundraiser on the M-Changa platform where a few community members contributed for us some money on the platform and directly too to kick-start operations.
How many people are on your team?
12
Impact: How has your project created impact / made a difference so far? Or, if at an early stage, what will impact look like?
Our club has grown from 3 starting to now 10 regular child members. Parents are happy that their children are learning and becoming better, even those that didn’t like reading are now asking for story books and those who did not like to walk to places can now take walks after we did a nature walk that involved a 500 meters walk on our very first club activity. Our club members now understand that others can be differently abled and they stopped weird behaviors like laughing or cutting off children with disabilities from their games. All 10 Children, including those that had never shown interest in environmental issues are now replanting seeds and producing seedlings from their own fruits and vegetables at home. Some parents are also now arranging for their children to walk in groups when going to school and back home and 27 children have been taught on how to protect themselves from strangers and avoid lonely places to make sure they are safe. 2 children that always worked in their parents’ businesses, or babysitting smaller siblings, fetching firewood and water, are now given permission by their parents and guardians to join the kids club and participate in the club activities, keeping them safe from hard and dangerous jobs but they still help at home. The community man-made forest now experiencing less cutting down of trees and are planning for a tree planting event.
Project Category
My project is a brand new / emerging idea
Project Stage
Pilot-Stage (We’ve tried an activity or two)
Project Summary: Describe your project in one sentence
CLASI (Climate Action, Social Skills, and Inclusion) Kids Club equips underserved children aged 6–12 with practical skills and confidence to thrive in a changing modern world through creative and fun-filled learning experiences, anchored in disability inclusion, social responsibility, civic participation, and environmental stewardship. Children are supported to learn, lead, teach one another, and make their communities safer, kinder, more inclusive, and healthier.
Project title
CLASI Kids Club
The Problem: What problem are you helping to solve? Why does it matter to you and your community?
Many children in the rural area where I live are very brilliant but do not have enough ability and support to safely learn, play, read, or communicate well. They miss basics like nice storybooks, computers, or fun learning activities. They are not so good with caring for themselves and others, as well as the environment or playing with children with disabilities in safe and fun ways. Some can be rude, selfish, fight, and injure or make others feel uncomfortable. I also fear that children might be in danger when I see them alone on the roadside without care or supervision, or doing too much or hard work in farms or carrying firewood. Some children see bad things in their parents’ phones and continue to tell or teach others when we play. Some kids also have very good talents but people never know about them and nobody supports them to learn or use the talents well. We could also miss out on good nature treats like free and convenient picnic spots with the continuous cutting down of trees in our community man-made forest, where most children find a practical chance to learn about the environment, forestation and safe agro-forestry practices.
Website URL(s) or social media handles.
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/showcase/clasi-kids-club/ Youtube: https://youtube.com/@thriveactioncbo?si=BaaWxppLQzEDyth5 Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/share/1D5RrWjKdK/?mibextid=wwXIfr
What’s Next: What are the next steps you plan to take to grow or strengthen your project over the next year? If your project is still in the idea stage, describe the steps you will take over the next three months to launch or begin developing it.
I would like to partner with schools and a child-centered media oriented organization to launch the Clasi Kids Club in one rural or informal settlement primary school in my region. The school administration can nominate a long-term chaperone that can be trained on the CLASI Kids Club model, and once the school community learns and adopts it, the good work can be a lasting culture in the schools for generations to come, so that many more children will always be reached. The media oriented organization can support in enhancing the digital literacy, story telling, and creativity aspects of the club. We also need to practice our simple economics by improving our urban farming practices, including production of tree nurseries for safe sale to generate some income and dedicate the income to sustainably equip the club for operations like buying enough stationery, crafts, toys, story books, as well as some healthy snacks and refreshments for the activity sessions to keep children happy, healthy, motivated, and strong to participate.
Your Innovation: What is different about your project compared to other programs or solutions already out there? How is your project new or innovative?
We are community-centered and are involving children in leadership, social responsibility, civic participation, and and climate action, building competitive skills, interests, and confidence at an unusually earlier stage so the culture can be an embedded item in our community for generations to come. Underserved children are safely exposed to fun and modern learning experiences that equip them with valuable competencies to thrive in a changing modern world, activities often preserved for the affluent members of the society.
Your Solution: How are you solving this problem? Share your specific solution.
Clasi Kids Club provides underserved children with a fun safe space to learn best behaviors from their peers develop their communication and literacy skills, while exploring their creativity and leadership skills. We are supported to learn, lead, teach one another, and make our communities safer, kinder, more inclusive, and healthier. I personally teach children better ways of behaving through good examples, and encouragement. Our chaperone also help my club members and I to organize and express ourselves respectfully and safely and sensitive community members through fun ways like drawing, games, and performing arts that teach good practices about caring for children and protecting their basic rights. The child members are actively learning from me safe, healthy, and socially better skills like handwashing, turn-taking, polite language, good table manners, resilience, climate change and environmental stewardship, waste management (I have taught my fellow members in the club to separate food waste from other wastes), economics, money matters (good saving skills, separating needs from wants), reading and comprehension, dancing skills, and basic gymnastics. We listen to the good ideas that children are developing and want for themselves and use them to shape how we do our club activities or talk to the community on children’s issues. We also collaborate with other child-centered initiatives to learn and build support.
Your team: What role(s) do your team members play? How do you share leadership with them?
We are 10 children and 2 Chaperones. 5 form the secretariat, 5 others are the general members. Secretariat 1. President (me) - Overall welfare, adherence, welcome new members, provides a weekly “President’s nugget” to advise kids. 2. Secretary-Records, registers and announcements. 3. Mobilizer-Grow the membership. 4. Rapporteur-Documentation l/Media 5. Energizer-Entertainment Members- Participate in all club activities, contribute ideas, popularize the club
