Seoul's Top Kiwoom Center Operated by Dongjak-gu Children Who Created the 'Children's Declaration'

[Seoul District News] Dongjak-gu Daebang Convergence-type 2022 Our Neighborhood Care Center Operation Best Practice Contest PBL Category Top Excellence ... Gwangjin-gu Provides Seasonal Fruits to Children and Adolescents at Local Childcare Centers

[Asia Economy Reporter Park Jong-il] Dongjak-gu (Mayor Lee Chang-woo) has been awarded first place in the PBL (Project-Based Learning) category of this year’s ‘Our Neighborhood Care Center Operation Best Practices Contest’ for the ‘Children’s Declaration’ created by children.

The ‘Children’s Declaration’ created by children was highly praised as a project proposed by the children themselves at the Daebang Convergence-type Our Neighborhood Care Center, Dongjak Branch No. 10.

This contest was promoted by the Seoul Metropolitan Government to discover and share best practices in the operation of Our Neighborhood Care Centers, aiming to spread operational achievements and apply them to elementary after-school care sites.

A total of 89 Our Neighborhood Care Centers located in Seoul participated in the contest, with four cases selected as best practices in the PBL category and four in the free-topic category.

PBL is a distinctive educational program of Our Neighborhood Care Centers that naturally encourages activities through a process where children propose tasks themselves and collaborate with other friends to solve them.

The ‘Children’s Declaration’ selected as a best practice this time began with the children’s proposal to create their own declaration after watching a video titled ‘Bang Jeong-hwan and the Children’s Declaration’ on Children’s Day and reading the Children’s Declaration from 100 years ago.

As a result, the children actively participated and completed the declaration by reciting it together at the Children’s Day ceremony.

Our Neighborhood Care Centers are after-school care facilities for elementary students, where managers and full-time teachers stay on-site to provide daily life support, play activities, experiential learning, and after-school gap care to ensure that children who might face care gaps can stay safely.

In particular, the Daebang Convergence-type Our Neighborhood Care Center differs from general care centers by additionally providing free meals, weekday night care, and Saturday care services. It also operates a care model that builds connections between care institutions and discovers and utilizes human and material resources in the community.

The district currently operates 11 general centers and 1 convergence-type center, plans to open one more convergence-type center next month, and aims to expand to the 14th branch by the second half of this year.

Kim In-sook, Director of the Child and Youth Division, said, “Our Neighborhood Care Centers actively develop PBL and help children grow into proactive individuals by enhancing their creativity and confidence through sharing best practices. We will continue to support children from dual-income families to use the centers frequently and grow up healthily.”

Gwangjin-gu provides fresh seasonal fruits to eight local children’s centers to promote healthy eating habits among children and adolescents.

“Kids, Let’s Eat Fruit!” is a project that supports seasonal fruits and nutrition education to children and adolescents in their critical growth period, encouraging proper eating habits and balanced growth by ensuring they intake a variety of nutrients.

This year, fresh seasonal fruits are provided twice a week as snacks to 217 children and adolescents at eight local children’s centers, where fruit consumption rates are relatively low, along with monthly nutrition education sessions.

The district has switched nutrition education from non-face-to-face to face-to-face due to COVID-19, plans to visit the children’s centers at least once a month to inspect the fruits for safety, and will monitor children’s consumption status.

This project has been jointly promoted by Gwangjin-gu and Seoul City since 2013. Seoul Agro-Fisheries & Food Corporation, Seoul Cheonggwa, Nonghyup Economic Holdings Garak Market, Joongang Cheonggwa, Donghwa Cheonggwa, Korea Cheonggwa, Dae-a Cheonggwa, and the nonprofit Hope Sharing Market have joined forces to provide fresh fruits through sponsorship.

Last year, the project was conducted for 190 children and adolescents at seven local children’s centers. According to a survey, 69.4% of participants responded that they “like fruit more than before,” and 58.4% said they “try to consume fruit regularly,” the highest rate among the 25 autonomous districts in Seoul.

Additionally, the response rate for “reading nutrition labels when buying or choosing processed foods” increased from 23.9% to 29.2%, indicating the significant effect of the monthly ongoing nutrition education.

A district official said, “We hope this project will help resolve nutritional imbalances among children in the area and contribute to forming healthy eating habits for their healthy growth. We will actively promote various customized health projects in the future.”

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.