Preface

WHO IS THIS MANUAL FOR?

This training manual has been prepared for tutors of primary school teachers in order to prepare them to introduce life skills in the schools themselves. It gives an introduction to and examples of life skills and the kind of methods needed to make the life skills meaningful. It then shows how the skills can be integrated or infused into the Basic Science and Health Education syllabus and examples of activities that can be used with the children.

HOW CAN THIS MANUAL BE USED?

The manual can be used in several ways. Tutors can read through the manual and use it to train themselves in the approach before using it with their students. The students would also benefit from reading through the manual, especially since the last section gives hints and examples on how they could prepare their own activities when they go to work in the schools.

WHY IS THERE A NEED FOR THIS MANUAL?

In the last few years, it has become increasingly clear that knowledge alone does not change behaviour. Doctors continue to smoke even while they tell others of the dangers of smoking. Taxi drivers have seen their colleagues killed or seriously injured because of dangerous driving but they continue to drive in the same manner. People in the village are very familiar with the advantages of latrines, or the importance of cutting the grass around their house, but they continue to live as before.

The dangers of such a gap between knowledge and behaviour have become even more apparent with the onset of HIV/AIDS. All our children are under threat from the disease. As a result, the Ugandan government in conjunction with UNICEF, have seen that there is a need to teach our children the life skills they require to cope with the world in which they live.