ABOUT HALF THE SKY

We have been very blessed that Ava resides in a Half the Sky orphanage in China. You can read the following that was posted by RQ about the Half the Sky program:



Half the Sky is an organization that works to help children in orphanages in China. They have four programs that they put into orphanages - a baby sisters program, a little sisters program, a big sisters program, and a foster village program. You can read about some of their programs at their website, but I want to talk about the Baby Sisters program today.

The Baby Sisters program is for, well, babies. It is an infant nurture program that provides play time for the baby almost every day. Each HTS nanny is assigned 3 to 5 babies. The babies are carried to the playroom once a day to play with their HTS nanny - she plays with them, interacts with them, talks to them, and watches over them as they explore their world and play. My friend adopted a child from an orphanage with a Baby Sisters program and she was told that her child spent about two hours a day in the playroom with her HTS nanny (I understand that many HTS orphanages offer more than two hours per day per child). My friend’s 14 month old daughter was very close to where you would expect a child to be developmentally, her gross and fine motor skills were both in the normal range and she learned English very quickly. My friend also has pictures that were taken of her daughter about once a month for her entire stay at the orphanage. What a wonderful wonderful gift.

The infant nurture centers (playrooms) are painted in soft colors. The floors are carpeted and half the room is padded with play mats. There are rocking chairs and mirrors and pull-up bars and lots of developmental toys. But the core of the program is the one-on-one nurture that the babies receive.