Learn Without Fear: Bullying

Bullying is common across the world. Surveys found that between one fifth (China) and two-thirds (Zambia) of children reported being verbally or physically bullied within 30 days of being questioned.

Boys are more likely than girls to be both victims and perpetrators of bullying. They are also more likely to use physical intimidation and violence, while girls tend towards verbal and social bullying.

Although the problem is widespread, only 5 of the 66 countries examined in Plan's research - Korea, Norway, Sri Lanka, the UK and the US - have laws prohibiting bullying in schools.

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Plan Provides Educational Toolkits to Pre-School Teachers in Sri Lanka

Hemawathie Manike, a pre-school teacher with 13 years of teaching experience, might be forgiven for thinking that she’s seen everything when it comes to Early Childhood Care and Development (ECCD). Manike earned her diploma in ECCD at a teacher training center in Sri Lanka’s western Kurunegala district and promptly created the Dimuthu Early Childhood Development Center.

In the beginning, she worked with the most minimal facilities and had only one assistant. Now she registers between 35 and 45 children at her ECCD Center each year. She accepts that her formal training lacks the techniques that are necessary in identifying the different stages of child development, or delayed development in children.

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Child marriage is too big a problem to ignore

How long has it taken you to read these words? A few seconds, most likely. A moment in your day. Yet in that moment, another girl under the age of 18 has been married. She's had to drop out of school and focus on housework and on trying to get pregnant, long before her mind and body are ready.

This is the story of 10 million girls around the world who are married before they are 18. Regionally, South Asia has the highest percentage of child marriage in the world. In Bangladesh, India and Nepal, more than half of all women aged 20–24 are married before they are 18; many are younger than 15. Rarely do these girls give their free and full consent and yet they’re expected to grow up within the constraints of traditional gender roles, playing the part of little women with big responsibilities.

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Ensuring disasters don't hold children back

The developmental damage that young children can experience without support during emergencies may never be fully reversed. Young children are vulnerable to multiple risks in disasters – and many will suffer the consequences for the rest of their lives.

When disasters strike, children can be separated from their family, lose their support structures, and suffer abuse and neglect. They may not get sufficient  nutrition, health and learning opportunities.

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World water day: Plan is helping communities meet their needs

On World Water Day 2013, 783 million people in the world do not have access to clean water – representing roughly one in ten of the world’s population. Around 700,000 children die every year from diarrhoea caused by unsafe water and poor sanitation. That's almost 2,000 children a day.

Plan is playing its part in helping families around the world to ensure this basic need is met. Last year we supported over 400,000 families to improve their sanitation facilities and provided over 3,500 new or upgraded water points or community water systems. Much of this work was carried out in Africa.

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Water, water - but it's not everywhere...

Plan's International Media Officer Jane Labous writes about the importance of World Water Day.

Last time I was in Dakar, Senegal, my apartment only had cold water. When I first arrived, I considered this a hardship, and I’d diligently warm a pan of water on the stove every morning for my shower. Transferring the pan to a bucket, I quickly learnt the local technique of scooping the hot water over myself with a stripy plastic kettle (they’re always stripy, always plastic...). Suddenly hot water was a luxury, not a given, and suddenly that handkerchief-sized splash of hot water felt as good as a power shower.

After a few weeks the water went off altogether, a regular occurrence in Dakar where random water cuts can last for days. 

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Learn Without Fear voices

"Our teachers should be there to teach us and not to touch us where we don't want or to solicit love favours from us girls. We are irritated by love advances from teachers. I feel like disappearing from the world if a person who is supposed to protect me instead destroys me."Girl, 15 years old, UgandaGirl, 15 years old, Uganda.

"Our school principal punishes us very hard. She makes us go down on our knees over small stones or bottle screw tops for over 20 minutes and also she often pulls our ears" Girl, 8 years old, Paraguay.

"When the school year started, my father refused to provide my school dues. Since I did not have textbooks, I was beaten in front of others and driven away from school for one week. I was very ashamed and thought of leaving school." Girl, 10 years old, Cameroon.