Bhubaneswar: The first 1,000 days of a child are a time of tremendous potential and enormous vulnerability as it has a profound impact on a child’s ability to grow, learn, and thrive. This is because the first 1,000 days are when a child’s brain begins to grow and develop and when the foundations for their lifelong health are built.
On this Children’s Day, Odisha Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik in his message wished the children and said that children are the source of strength and progress of the country. If children are provided with the right education, healthcare, and environment from infancy, they can become great citizens.
Following the direction of the Chief Minister, the Women and Child Development Department officially launched the “Aam Kunipila” programme on Tuesday on the occasion of Children’s Day. Aama Kunipila” is a campaign to institutionalise home-based care and stimulation of children less than three years of age through concrete intervention on home-based parent-led early stimulation programme for their brain development through men-streaming caregivers capacity building, low-cost toy making by parents.
The major components of this programme are sensitizing the parents and caregivers on the importance of early years, involvement of father and male caregivers through men-streaming, engaging young children with low-cost contextual and child-friendly toys by the parents and caregivers, facilitating love, talk, touch and play through toys, stories, and interactive talk and activity with children less than three by the Anganwadi workers and campaign grounding and effective implementation facilitate through appropriate parent and caregiver-friendly social behavior communication programme (SBCC).
The “Ama Kunipila” activity is envisaged to promote parent-led home-based joyful child-friendly learning by creating an early stimulating environment. Various IEC materials including Mo Bikash Patra, Kuni CalendarAama Kunipila Flip Book, Sukhada Lalana Palana handbook, and Aama Kunipila toy kit are developed to support and strengthen the Aama Kuni Pilaa programme activities.
