Shoebox Appeal
“You can make a difference too. Every year, with your help, the Christmas Shoebox Appeal sends thousands of gift-filled shoeboxes to children in Africa and Eastern Europe.
The children who receive your shoeboxes are affected by poverty in different ways. Many come from families with very little income, others live on the margins of society or in areas affected by conflict. Shoeboxes are given based on need alone and bring joy and excitement to children living in often very difficult situations. You can help us do that this year!”
Team Hope’s work has attracted criticism, as well as divided opinions since it started operating in Ireland, and this year marks the 10th edition of its Christmas shoebox appeal. The publicity campaign for 2019 includes posters displayed in Dublin Bus’ fleet.
Irish Times Social Affairs correspondent, Kitty Holland, was the subject of online criticism last year when she wrote that she “had to give in and let son (8) do the Team Hope shoebox at his ... school”.
For the moment, I would like to focus on some specific aspects and issues raised by Team Hope’s activities, in this case, in Africa.
These are the following:
- The contents of the shoebox and the messages that these convey
- How Eco-Friendly are the gifts?
- Materials produced by Team Hope about Africa meant to be used by teachers as learning resources
- What the NCCA Curriculum requires children to be taught about other lands and the inhabitants of those places
- Should children, and Irish children in particular, be expected to solve problems created by adults?
Hygiene Items
Among the
items children are asked to put into the shoebox are hygiene products, namely: soap, toothbrush, toothpaste, etc. Paul in Kenya (below) “can share the soap and other toiletries with his Mum”!
So, how did young Paul and his family maintain their physical and dental hygiene before they received their gifts from Irish children?
Would you like a present of toothpaste for Christmas?
Actually, how would someone in Ireland react to and interpret receiving a present of toothpaste from another person?
What message did Team Hope want to convey to Irish children by asking them to send soap and toothpaste to African children?
Who in Team Hope decided on toiletries as items to send to African children and their families?
Would Team Hope, by chance, be trying to make a statement about the hygiene habits of the African recipients of the shoeboxes?
Soap making in Africa
With regards to the inclusion of soap as one of the items in the shoebox, it might be worth informing Team Hope supporters that soap production has been an economic activity and an industry which goes back generations in West Africa, for example.
Perhaps, a useful contribution to Irish children’s learning about Africa would have been to design lessons on such a topic?
Soap making is also only just one of the many skills and the wealth of knowledge which the communities in the African countries Team Hope has a presence have to cope with their daily lives.
Eco-Friendly Gifts?
Other items children are asked to put into the shoebox are those meant to ‘wow’ the recipient children. What percentage of the suggested gift items under
WOW are eco-friendly? Are the children also reminded of the eco-friendly message?
It should be clarified at this point that this reflection is not a criticism of the concept of ‘help’. Rather, it is about the way we decide to offer our help.
Pupils of African Parentage in Irish Classrooms
Did Team Hope also take into consideration how children of African parentage sitting in the same classrooms as Irish children might feel?
Have the parents of these children or other Africans living in Ireland ever been consulted to get their views on the Christmas shoebox appeal and the other project ideas intended to help Africa which their proponents come up with?
Teaching About Africa: Team Hope’s Approach?
The classroom is where children are expected to be taught about the world and its inhabitants, including those who live in the distant lands in Africa.
So, what contribution does Team Hope make to learning about Africa? Is its presence in the Irish classroom and the ‘teaching materials’ it brings in not merely reinforcing stereotypes about Africa and Africans?
What purpose is being served by telling four and five year-old Irish children that “people live in huts made of mud” in the DR Congo; assuming these pupils can get their little minds to figure out where the DR Congo is in the first place.
The Origins of Stuff
Even if it was decided that pupils needed to know something about the DR Congo, they could have been told that it is the source of that important mineral: ‘coltan’. Over 50% of the world total is supplied by the DR Congo.
It would also have been more useful to their learning if Irish children are taught that the earth under the “huts made of mud” in the DR Congo holds important minerals the rest of the world relies on.
“Africa is giving nothing to anyone” - Kevin Myers
Teaching Irish children that Ireland might just about be dependent on something from Africa would also be appreciated by their fellow classmates of African parentage, who will also feel that their parents’ home continent’s contribution to the rest of the world is acknowledged.
The National Council for Curriculum and Assessment
Over the years, I have researched the contents of the National Council for Curriculum and Assessment (NCCA)’s curriculum for both Primary and Second Levels to find out which units are related to the teaching about Africa.
The result was an NCCA curriculum well-designed to address the learning about other continents, countries and the inhabitants of those places in a very positive and respectful manner.
One example is the SESE Geography Human Environments Strand Unit
People and Other Lands for Senior Primary (Third to Sixth) Classes, while the English subject at all levels would provide opportunities for pupils and students to be introduced to literary works by African writers.
The NCCA also specifies that the study of a
non-European context in the
People and Other Lands unit should start from Third Class, so one is at a loss to understand why Team Hope is producing materials about Africa for Infant Classes!
The unit
Global Interdependence in Leaving Certificate Geography, especially 6.1 and 6.3, also offers students the option to study, discuss, question, debate and critically examine the issues around the concept of ‘development’.
Should Irish Children Be Expected to Solve Problems Created by Adults?
There is also the question of whether children should be asked, or even be expected, to get involved in solving problems which would have been, effectively, created by decisions taken by adults in the first place.
Here is a professional’s advice on the matter:
Problems created by adults require adults to find solutions, not expecting children to do this.
As the man said:
“Yes, I have problems, but not the ones YOU think I have!”
