Antenatal and Postnatal
A strong start begins in the womb. Yet, all too often, parents do not receive adequate support and information when pregnant or whilst their baby is very young, needed to give their children the best start in life.
Sikunye, in partnership with Flourish, offers antenatal and postnatal training to equip churches to run antenatal and postnatal classes for expecting and new moms and their babies, empowering them to establish a foundation for their children’s academic success, health and general well-being.
"When you pay attention to the beginning of the story, you can change the whole story"
Raffi Cavoukian
Flourish
The human brain develops faster from conception until two years than at any other time in life – growing as much as 80% of its total size during this period. Since healthy brain development starts in the womb and impacts learning and behaviour into adulthood, we should make the most of this time, as it offers a vital opportunity to equip parents with the valuable information and skills to build the foundations for the best start to life for their children.
To do this, Sikunye has partnered with Flourish, a national social franchise, supported by the Grow Great Campaign – helping babies and young children grow to their full potential – to train and equip local churches to run antenatal and postnatal classes in their community for pregnant moms, and moms and babies, empowering them to support their baby’s development right from the time of conception.
Potential hosts undergo a test and interview period, following which they attend an intensive boot camp training for one week, learning how to take moms on a journey of compassion, belonging and acceptance for 10 weeks where moms learn about self-care, forging their child’s future, bonding with their baby, and how to love, play and talk to their baby in a developmentally-supportive way.
The visit changed my life, not only the pregnancy part of it but also emotionally, relationship, financially. The coordinators are full of love, they are passionate about everything they do and they are full of love and caring. Honestly, I felt at home, loved and part of the family. I looked forward to each visit and I will gladly advise anyone to attend this programme and I will definitely attend the postnatal one.
The National Integrated Early Childhood Development Plan (NIECDP) asserts that parenting support programmes, are “a proven intervention for building constructive parental-child relationships and effective parenting practices” and that they “are critical for parents who are raising children in the context of high levels of poverty; chronic illness and disability; violence; and other social risk factors.”
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