Sunday, December 21, 2008 Kidswatch! By Ariel Hans C. Sebellino Philippine Press Institute
ACROSS the roomy pavilion was a delicate-looking boy, lithe of frame yet bursting with energy and excitement, tinkering with raw colored papers, pens and strings -- eagerly wanting to piece together some cutouts.
Sitting in a corner near the stage, dwarfed by other kids in frenzy, an adult watched in amusement, overzealous of an art-in-the-making.
Fourteen-year-old Jade Bulalla, a third year high school student of the Mt. Province General Comprehensive High School traveled almost forty-eight hours to get to Cebu City. Along with his adviser, Jade left his place early dawn of Friday and arrived at the Ecotech in Lahug late evening of Saturday.
On the adviser's permission, I disrupted a bit of his time to ask how he handled the long trip.
"It doesn't matter. I am here to learn and develop my skills," he said. Before I could even ask another question, he confidently resumed, "Each kid like me is entitled to participate... my opinion should matter." He plans to take up nursing in college.
Jade was among the one hundred high school student-broadcasters and writers who attended the TV Kidswatch!, the First National Youth Festival on Media from December 6 to 9 in Cebu City.
Organized by the National Council for Children's Television (NCCT), Kidswatch! came at the heels of the pilot program called Kidspeak! in 2007 whose participants at that time gave their opinion on various programs they liked and disliked on television. As a result, these kids produced their own short videos - shot and edited the scenes, wrote the scripts, and starred in them. From Luzon, Visayas and Mindanao, select-high school students were sent this time to assess and validate what they have learned from the previous activity and watched their video productions.
Ecotech sits in the unkempt lush enclave of Lahug whose foliage came to life even more with the heavy downpour. Slowly but surely, half of the venue was being adorned with banderitas, Christmas lights, and illustrative posters identifying the unique characteristics of each region in the country, both the kids and their advisers created out of atypical things. Voila, the whole pavilion was transformed into a fiesta that undermined the stormy weather.
The bundle of joy that was the kids were now impervious to the soaking outdoors. Their deafening yells and cheers that echo their thoughts were enough to dilute the occasional thunders.
The National Council for Children's Television (NCCT) was a product of Republic Act No. 8370, otherwise known as the Children's Television Act of 1997 whose main functions are: to promote and encourage the production and broadcasting of appropriate programs for children and to monitor the implementation of the Act. Its mandate underscores regulation, enforcement and sanction.
Dr. Alice A. Pañares, NCCT project director and a staunch advocate of child participation herself said, "Ang bida dito ang mga estudyante. What they have to say about television and what they want to see are very important."
She said that interactive learning on different literacies in both print and broadcast media is essential for kids to maximize their talents and skills. Her ultimate dream is for NNCT to become a watchdog of children's television. True to its objective of making it interactive, the Kidswatch! made the student-delegates participate in every activity that elicited from them various opinions on programs they see on television, without their advisers coaching them. At one point, during an informal survey, it turned out that the kids would want to see more of educational game shows and newsmagazines. They were one in saying that they like informative but entertaining shows.
An advocate of English literacy and author of Check Your English Language Using Tagalog Language, Erlinda Curro, observed during the discussion that kids criticize not to hurt but to give their sincere reaction. "Children are very honest. They speak from the heart. At an early age, their communication and writing skills should already be honed outside the limits of the classroom," she said. During the video presentations, Assistant Secretary Jonathan Malaya of the Department of Education lauded the kids for their impressive productions.
"What with the limited resources, these kids were able to produce videos whose topics are closest to them and how they made them with the limited time," he said.
At the end of the second, still gloomy day of the festival, the kids were still combusting with gusto and raring to face the next challenge. Each region-group was assigned to open each segment through group dynamics (GDs) and a re-cap of activities of the previous day in a creative manner they knew best. The last day was reserved for a tour of the city.
Merry Jade, along with the other ninety-nine merry kids would travel back to his beloved Mt. Province and their respective hometowns; notwithstanding the long hours of travel, he now carries with him a treasure trove of experiences and a renewed confidence of speaking up what he thinks matters to him and the other kids who remain voiceless but again hopeful this Christmas, of beautiful things to come.
