Roots of Empathy Baby Celebration

To Your Worship Kerry Prendergast, Mayor or Wellington City,   to Your Worship Wayne Guppy, Mayor of Upper Hutt City,   to Rod Alley from the Peace Foundation,  to,  Richard Wood from the Ministry of Social Development,  to Dennis McKinley, Executive Director of UNICEF,   to Wellington Peace Foundation staff, Distinguished Guests and Ladies and Gentlemen - Greetings, kia ora, kia orana, fakalofa lahi atu, taloha ni (sign ‘good morning’).  These are the languages of the Realm of New Zealand.

Thank you for the invitation to attend and speak at the Roots of Empathy Baby Celebration this morning with my granddaughter, Lola - our pride and joy.

As a Patron of the Peace Foundation, I would like to congratulate the Foundation on the achievements stemming from the wonderful Roots of Empathy programme that leads to a brighter future for our children.

The arrival of grandchildren into our lives is a reminder to us of the past and the future.  All parents have hopes and dreams for their children.  Grandchildren remind us that the world is changing as new challenges exist which are different, from the worries that Anand and I faced as parents.

Safe and caring classrooms are important for a child’s development, learning and confidence.  With technological advances including mobile phones and the internet, cyber bullying is possible.  It is now more important than ever before to ensure that our children understand the values of respecting, of caring for others and of parenting.

Having empathy for others is necessary in displaying responsible citizenship and responsible parenting.  The children in the classroom today are the parents of the future.  The importance of fostering the development of empathy and nurturing cannot be overstated.

I would like to thank the Peace Foundation for sponsoring, introducing and delivering this programme to New Zealand schools in conjunction with Roots of Empathy, Canada.  This is the last year of the three-year trial which started in 2007 with support from the Ministries of Education, Social Development and Health, along with a number of philanthropic organisations and trusts.

With the body of research gained from the trial, I am confident that the programme will have been proven to positively affect the lives of those children who have been involved.  Early findings suggest students in participating schools were more cooperative and sharing while demonstrating fewer anti-social behaviours such as rule-breaking and bullying in comparison to other schools. 

In three years this programme has steadily grown from delivery in ten classrooms in Auckland in 2007, to now thirty classrooms in Auckland, twenty in Wellington and ten in Christchurch.  I am pleased that the Foundation’s goal is to launch the Roots of Empathy programme nationwide next year.

We must thank Her Worship The Mayor for hosting this celebration which is a chance given to us to toast the success of the programme and its impact on participants.

Make no mistake about the special-ness of this learning.  By using inter-active teaching techniques, teachers can explain average expectations for a baby of a given age and a class can track their baby in relation to that.  Tenderness and parenting ideas develop naturally.

I would like to take this opportunity to thank all those involved in the delivery of this programme.  Funders are vital in so many ways and those parents who generously share their baby to help other children and make this learning possible.

Principals and teachers are essential in recognising the value of the programme, welcoming it into schools and making it work.  Without you, it could not happen.

This morning is a chance to celebrate these babies - whose involvement is crucial to the programme.  Their innocence has helped to teach schoolchildren the value of human empathy - something that will last a lifetime.

I would like to end by reading a poem written by a boy called William from Room 13 Mairangi Bay School in Auckland and a participant in the programme.  His poem was written as a result of William’s interaction with a baby and is aptly named “Cute little Anna”:

See how she kicks
See how she kicks
She really likes to kick on her tummy
And always stays very close to her mummy
But she sometimes squeals if she is very hungry
That’s cute little Anna
Cute little Anna.
 
I wish you every success and fortitude in your endeavours

Tēnā koutou, kia ora, kia kaha, tēnā kouto katoa.

Susan Satyanand

For more photos of this event, click here.