For many of us, August means “Back to School”. It’s the time of year when we take our children shopping and help them choose school supplies. Of course, the children in our Education programs do not have parents to get them a special new backpack or to help their school purchase needed educational materials, so we are holding a Back to School Supply Drive to help the orphaned and impoverished children in our programs…and we invite you to help be a part of kicking the school year off in a great way!

Donations from $10 to $30 can be made to our Back to School Supply Drive, and with these donations you can purchase a variety of classroom supplies like toys for imaginary play or backpacks filled with essential supplies for impoverished and orphaned children heading back to school this fall.

Math Manipulatives. Math manipulatives such as Unifix cubes and colored counting bears help children understand quantities and can be used for counting, sorting, patterning, sequencing, measuring, addition, and subtraction. Learning is maximized when students have hands-on activities in addition to visual and sound input. For $20, you can provide this to a Believe in Me classroom!

Fine Motor Tools: In order for a child to learn to write or draw, a child’s hands must be strong and coordinated so they can hold their pen or pencil. The children in our Believe in Me Schools would benefit from having some fine motor tools such as scissors to help develop these skills. Although these tools can benefit all students, they can be especially helpful for children with cerebral palsy. A $15 donation will help to purchase a set of fine motor tools for a Believe in Me school.

Toys for Imaginary Play: Children learn from experience, and to absorb those experiences and make sense of the world, they need to be engaged in imaginary play. We would like to purchase sets of pretend food, play tea sets, and cooking sets for use in our Believe in Me schools. In addition, we would like to purchase some dress-up clothes and hand puppets to encourage role play among the children. Role play allows children to assume different roles and address various problems and solutions while working alone at first and then interacting with their peers. A donation of anywhere from $10 to $25 can be used to purchase these toys to help children develop language and motor skills (and have lots of fun at the same time!)

 Backpack filled with essential school supplies: A donation of $30 can be used to purchase a backpack filled with notebooks, pens and pencils for the students in our programs who attend public schools through our Orphaned and Impoverished Student Support Programs.

Please join us in our Back to School Supply Drive as we help send these kids in need to school with the tools they need to learn, develop new skills, and be successful!