About Ibdaa's Kindergarten and Nursery

Ibdaa’s kindergarten, the first co-educational kindergarten in Dheisheh refugee camp, provides a safe, nurturing environment for the camp’s preschool-age children. The kindergarten serves as a means of both preparing children for entering school and providing a space other than the camp’s crowded alleys for young children to learn and play. Through regular meetings with parents and close collaboration with Bethlehem University’s Early Childhood Education Department, our kindergarten teachers have developed a unique curriculum that includes lessons in reading, writing, and math as well as arts and crafts, singing, dancing, drama, and monthly field trips.

 

The Ibdaa Kindergarten helps children adapt to the classroom environment prior to entering the overcrowded UN schools, giving them the self-confidence necessary to succeed in school. Ibdaa’s students are consistently at the top of their classes at the UN schools because they begin in a supportive environment where they receive individualized attention from their teachers.

Since its opening in 1997, the demand for our kindergarten program has increased faster than we are able to expand. The program currently serves 140 students with a waitlist of 250 children. In 2005, we completed the first two floors of our new building which will house a larger kindergarten as well as the nursery and children’s library. When all the classrooms in the new kindergarten building are completed we will be able to accommodate 160 boys and girls between the ages of three and five.

The Ibdaa Nursery

The Ibdaa Nursery, a later addition to the kindergarten program, was established by the initiative of Dheisheh’s working mothers. The nursery is open year-round from 8am to 4pm and serves as a safe place for parents to leave their infants and toddlers (less than three years old) under the supervision of early-childhood educators. The nursery is essential for single parents struggling to support their families because it allows them to work fulltime without the burden of arranging childcare on a daily basis or worrying about the safety of their young children. In the new facilities, the nursery will be able to accommodate twenty-five children.

Children's Library

Ibdaa runs the only children's library in Dheisheh. With more than 1,000 books in Arabic and English, the library provides an environment that promotes literacy, nurtures the exploration of knowledge, and raises cultural awareness. The library is an important resource for the Ibdaa kindergarten and nursery teachers and students. Structured activities, such as after-school programs and field trips, are open to children of Dheisheh throughout the year.

Child Sponsorship

Ibdaa's child sponsorship programs don't follow the traditional sponsorship model. Instead, Ibdaa cooperates with international organizations to provide educational, cultural, and social programs for the sponsored children; to help them make personal connections with their sponsors; and learn how to write about their lives.   The children also receive special gifts for Eid and at the beginning and end of the school year.