Young Voices Have their Say at Sharjah Child Safety Campaign

In a bid to increase the impact of Sharjah’s Child Safety Campaign (CSC), a number of children have taken part in a brainstorming workshop to help create new characters and mascots to represent the campaign. A total of seven youngsters aged between 8-12 years from Halwan Children’s Centre were given the chance to voice their opinions about how the characters should look and be portrayed.

An initiative of the Supreme Council for Family Affairs (SCFA) that was launched under the directives of Her Highness Sheikha Jawaher bint Mohammed Al Qasimi, CSC wanted to involve the children in order for the campaign to become more personal and more relevant to them.

Hanadi Saleh Al Yafei, Department Director at SCFA and Head of the CSC Organising Committee, believes participation may play a key part in the campaign’s effectiveness: “When we involve children in any consultation process, it is very much a two-way relationship. The youngsters feel that they have been understood and have contributed to the outcome which brings them much closer to the campaign message and leads them to share their experiences with their friends, peers, and families.

“Equally for us, it is vital that we don’t second-guess what the children are feeling. It is invaluable to hear from them directly – we need to appreciate their emotions and understand how that can affect our direction.”

The children were given the task of creating two characters, one male and one female and were asked their thoughts on names, styles, clothes, looks and other features in order to take their opinions into account.

After the workshop was concluded, the children expressed their enthusiasm to see the final versions of the characters before their launch in the upcoming third phase of the Child Safety Campaign, which will focus on cyber security for children. The second phase, which recently concluded, was aimed at raising children’s awareness of the concept of child abuse.

“It was extremely useful to see the children in a face-to-face, one-on-one situation,” added Al Yafei. “There seemed to be a real sense of responsibility among them and an understanding that their involvement was not only constructive and creative, but also part of something very important.”
As an additional benefit, many independent sources show that introducing decision making and participation to young children is an important life skill in its own right, leading to increased self-confidence and a willingness to explore new concepts.