Romania And the winner is... Everybody!

Project : MOVE 3 Nov 2010 | education psychosocial

Bucharest, Romania, October 16, 2010: In order to increase the visibility of the Move Project in Romania, on the 16-th of October 2010, eighty kids from seven schools from Bucharest participated under the guidance of their 16 psychosocial animators, to a great experience of social learning: the tournament of football “fair play” and “ball in five passes”. Key representatives of the public authorities, private sector and mass media attended the event and got acquainted with an alternative model of competition, meant to offer an innovative methodology for the child’s development and well-being. Parents, little brothers, sisters, fans from schools became active supporters transmitting their enthusiasm to the Move teams performing special games with special rules.

Why special? Because…

• “ at the beginning of the game you can bring your own good rules to the discussion within the teams and be creative”, (Henri, 10 years old),
• “… I started after the football fair- play game to have more confidence in girls, something that I didn’t have before…actually we made a strategy in our team to let girls stay close to the marking area and bring the ball close to them. It was funny to play together..” (Dragos, 10 years old).
• “ the game offered the chance to know each other better and meet kids of other schools also… We faulted less then we usually do when playing football and insults were not allowed. My team got the point for fair-play and we are very proud of that” (Armani, 10 years old.)
• “it was an extremely interesting day…my team lost, but after all we had fun and most important of all, …we were together, truly in a team.” (Maria, 10 years old).

The parents, like Maria’s mother, were also very impressed and glad to share the excitement with their kids: “the event touched my soul! It was really special. Besides the games, I appreciated the way of approaching the kids, the fact that they discussed the rules of the game before playing and that they had the opportunity to share their feelings after it. Our kids need this type of socialization….my daughter is usually shy and introvert but this time I was very happy to see her so involved and feeling so well.”

The Move Event in Bucharest also aimed to bring together Romanian and Roma children of age between 10-12 years, ignoring all possible differences and prejudices. Indeed, Terre des hommes’ intervention in the rural areas revealed that the MGS methodology can successfully address the psychosocial development of marginalized Roma and Romanian children, as a part of a broader vision of their social inclusion process.

The tournament created good opportunity for children to experience the value of being together, “to play” about friendship, self-respect, confidence in the others and team building, a treasure they should carry on for their whole life. All the teams were offered UEFA balls, shirts and thermoses, which remind them of this unusual competition. They felt they are all winners, no matter the score they had, and this was a beautiful lesson, considering the focus of the formal education mainly on competition, and less on cooperation.

The positive feedback from all the participants, adults and children, remains as a sign of encouragement for the Move Romania team and its near future plans of a larger impact in this country.

Cristina Mihailescu and Casandra Cristea, Tdh Romania