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When I was in college, during my teaching program I had a 90-hour practicum placement in a classroom for the emotionally and behaviorally challenged. The children in the classroom ranged from grades Kindergarten through fourth grade. There was a first grade boy in the class that had, on numerous occasions, gone without shelter and food for days on end when he was a toddler. He lived with his father, often in a car, and his mother had run off. Because he experienced the trauma of starving almost to death, and suffered from severe neglect, he was unable to regulate emotion, and was constantly caught stealing and hoarding food. Though for the couple of years he had been in school he experienced a sense of stability and received food from government programs, he was emotionally scarred. The boy would hardly eat his breakfast or lunch, but would go into a panic and tantrum if the food was taken off his desk. For years he struggled to maintain relationships with peers and adults, experience academic success, and be healthy (since he refused to eat regularly). In his mind, he was always prepared to be abandoned and without food. . Through the help of the EBD classroom teacher, a therapist, and the food program, stability was brought back to him. Even though I now work in the school district he attended, he has moved on, and through the high turnover rate the EBD program has, there is not a staff member left that would have known him.
Bangladesh has a population of 150 million people, almost half (49%) of the population living below the poverty line. There are programs that help countries like Bangladesh in many ways. The Hunger Project teaches people how to be leaders and grow sustainable crops to help end their hunger. Through youth leadership, education is brought to children in rural areas whose families are too poor to afford books and uniforms required by Bangladesh’s free education. Through outreach groups and programs, children and adults are learning the importance of education, as well as how to be self-reliant and sustainable. They are being empowered to better the lives of themselves and their children. This is important work, because in Bangladesh the majority of the population lives in rural areas, where floods and droughts affect the seasonal farming they must make a living from. Women, who are still discriminated against, often suffer the worst if they become widowed or their husbands leave to find employment. They are unable to provide for their children, who often go without education, medical care, and thus continue the cycle of chronic poverty.
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It is so sad to hear that children in this day and age are going hungry. We seem to have plenty of food in the stores, it's just having access to the food that is difficult on people. I believe that it is important to teach people other ways of getting their food. My sister works in rural community at a rural health clinic that helps support the community by teaching them different ways of growing their own food. She has helped to write a grant to help start a community garden and have speakers come out and teach the community about gardening. They are going to start a new program that will teach people how to use aquaponics to garden. This is where the plants are grown above water and water from a fish tank is cycled through to fertilize the plants. this way if they do not have a plot for soil they can use containers of water. It is very interesting and it is a project that I would like to introduce to the preschool class.
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