Training and consultancy Services 

CESESMA's experienced professional team offers the following services to community groups, governmental and non-governmental organisations, in Nicaragua and abroad:

Professional training in:

• Promoting and defending children and young people's rights through educational and participatory processes
  Defending our rights as a collective process with children and young people.

• Children's participation
  Promoting the participation and organisation of children and young people: Pro-active participation, children's leadership and activism, children as educators, children's involvement in decision-making.

• Alternatives to violence
  Methods and techniques for children, young people and adults to resolve conflicts without violence, and seek solutions to problems in the family and community where everyone wins. 

• Good practice in working with children
  Active and participatory methods for education in and out of the classroom: identity and self-esteem, community health and hygiene, understanding and protecting the environment, children's rights etc. Producing your own teaching materials using the resources available in the environment.

CESESMA's professional team will respond to the needs of your group or organisation, and will design a custom-made training programme for your team.

CESESMA offers training programmes in Spanish, English or both.

Consultancy in:

• Training for work with children and young people.

• Planning, programming and evaluating work with children and young people.

• Developing programmes with a children's rights focus (which also includes focusing on gender-equality issues).

• Increasing the pro-active participation of children and young people in projects and programmes.

CESESMA undertakes consultancy work in Spanish, English or both.

Facilitation of participatory processes

CESESMA can help your organisation in the planning, organisation and facilitation of all kinds of participatory processes with children and young people: child-friendly surveys and consultations, children's councils, processes to enable children and young people to participate in decision-making, processes to enable children and young people to express their opinions openly and confidently, and to demand that adults take account of them.

CESESMA facilitates participatory processes in Spanish, English or both.

Developing training manuals and educational materials

CESESMA can help your organisation with the development, writing, design, illustration, testing and production of educational materials, and training manuals for adults working with children. We use the leading graphic design and editing software to produce high quality materials, from initial design and drafting, to preparation for the printing press.

CESESMA has produced a series of teacher's manuals for use with children, suitable for use both in the primary school classroom and in non-school education settings. There is a Health Education Pack and an Environment Pack.

The manuals are based on two key principals: First, that education must be founded on the real lives of the children so that its contents have sense and validity. These manuals, therefore, have a rural focus, which is reflected in the stories, references, questions ands readings. The second principal is that the methods used must be active and participatory, to arouse interest and facilitate assimilation. This is reflected in a series of learning activities including stories, games, dialogues, songs, poems, individual and group writing tasks, drawing, role-play, practical experiments and field research activities.

Health Education Pack:

My family, my community and me	Health and Hygiene

Environment Pack:

What is the environment?	Plants and animals in the environment	Tackling environmental problems

The manuals are available in Spanish only. There is more detailed information about their contents and methodology on the Spanish page.

To obtain copies of the manuals, contact CESESMA by phone or e-mail.