1. 15th July 2016 - Circulation 007
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phone technology, it will be prudent to transfer content to a
fashionable mobile phone application – this ensures continued
content and context review, trackable access and referrals, and
supporting for on-line children’s discussions. Also, engaging child
-based programs on national and local radio station to use the
popular version as a guide for community interactive sessions,
will add impetus to drumming the information across masses. ##
Sampled traditional foods displayed at the facility
for demonstration to caregivers
In advancing ASSIST’s work with the Government of Kenya
through the Department of Children Services, the project took
another mileage in ensuring quality dissemination of the Na-
tional Psychosocial Support Guidelines for Orphans and Vulner-
able Children, by developing a ‘popular version of the same’ –
targeting children aged 0 to 18 as primary audience.
As opposed to the national document (highly voluminous with
policy level information), the ‘popular version’ purposes to
present content (easy to read write-up) and context (setting of
stories and situations) in a child friendly version; illustrations,
bigger font, shorter sentences, with highly memorable quotes.
Also, to avoid ‘making another good for shelf document’, the
project engaged children (mobilized by Childfund Kenya) to
solicit feedback on the prototype; thus, informing desired
packaging and presentation ahead of mass production.
Through extensive probing and open–ended questions, chil-
dren provided feedback on vividness of the (i) material in de-
sign, color, text and narrative, (ii) most compelling benefit clari-
fied, (iii) information trust generated by tone, presentation,
and believable images, and (iv) messages appealing to the
heart (or emotion) and head (or reason).
Working with 72 children in groups of 12, the Focus Group Dis-
cussion sessions yielded positive results as they indicated that
the suggested illustrations helps in (i) creating attention by
anchoring distinctiveness that appeals to the sensory capacities
and past reinforcement; (ii) reinforcing retention by including
aspects of symbolic coding, mental images, cognitive organiza-
tion; (iii) offering an opportunity for reproduction by providing
spaces for child practices within the publication; and (iv) trig-
gering motivation by giving children a good reason to imitate
via imagined incentives. The twofold development assignment,
that involved (i) development of dummy images for guiding the
layout of the publication, and (ii) re-touch done as advised by
pre-test results, proved successful.
Generally, the project looked out for comprehension, attrac-
tiveness, acceptance, involvement, inducement to action –
achieving these indices made the ‘popular version’ good for
the target audience. The publication advocates for what we
want the audience to know, think of and act.
In thinking beyond the launch of finalized product, digitizing
the ‘popular version’ is an option. With the advent of mobile
Getting the Quality Right for Improvement: Engaging Children to
Develop the Psychosocial Support Popular Version Guideline
The views in this publication do not necessarily reflect the opinion and position of URC, USAID, or the MoH. For queries, comments and any other form of feedback, kindly communicate directly to bokaka@urc-chs.com
Written by: Bill Okaka (Knowledge Management and Communication
Officer). Contributors: Jemimah Owande (Quality Improvement Advisor- OVC),
and Irene Mutea (Quality Improvement Officer - OVC).
Pupils from Peter Kariuki Primary School (Thika) involved
in FGD to review illustrations (Photo by P. B. Okaka).
Some of the illustrations
undergoing review