Joyful early childhood learning in classrooms of Laos

Children reading from 'My Village' storybooks in Ban Nadou pre-school

Three stops, three classrooms. Arriving at the gate of Ban Doub School, our first stop, in Ta Oi district of Saravan province, we hear a clamour from within. The children are laughing, clapping and singing, “My village! My Village is beautiful! My village is fun! My village has a lot of colourful flowers!” We are surprised how quick children remember and learn to sing this song. The Early Childhood Education (ECD) TV team and the ‘My Village’ Claymation series from which the song comes from is from visited this school months earlier in December 2015.

The art of storytelling brings learning to life for Lao pre-school children

Mr Savansay Kyong (25) practices storytelling to a group of pre-children in Ban Nalek Kindergarten.

He holds a colourful book in front of a group of expectant children in a classroom at Ban Nalek Kindergarten. The young man from a rural village of Saravan province looks nervous. Around him young children – mostly 6 or under – look at him, curiously waiting for the man’s next move. With a big smile, he raises his hands and says “Sabaidee” or hello and the room responds in kind with a warm welcome in friendly, eager voices, “Sabaidee teacher!”

UNICEF partnership with Lao animator flourishes as pioneering early learning clay-mation series enters third season

Animator Souliya Phoumivong sets up a new scene in season 3 of “My Village”

Picture a small road sidling along the Mekong River just outside Vientiane. Thailand visible just across the water. On both sides line row after row of family homes with motorbikes and pick-up trucks clustered outside. Most offer some kind of homemade business opportunity – a shop, food stall, a mechanic. Behind one of the houses, tucked away almost out of sight, sits an unassuming building. The faintly turquoise, washed exterior walls, pretty potted plants and ordinary appearance disguise the hive of creative activity within. Meet the world’s most unlikely Claymation studio.

Coconut Creativity and ECD TV

Saysomboun is a newly established province in the north of Lao PDR. It is an area rich in ethnic groups who still speak their own language and also the Lao language. One of the new provincial authority's priorities is to work to improve the education of children in the area with limited funding and human resources. But the impact of UNICEF’s ECD TV “My Village” project is being seen in unexpected ways with children of the region...