Counseling helps individual school children to find their answers to their basic problems and make their own choices in life. It helps reduce confusion and gain a different perspective to cope with life’s challenges and make positive changes when and where necessary.

Counseling children and adolescents are often different from counseling adults, though the objective is the same. As an organization, we take into consideration age, development stage and individual challenges to device method of approach. Our role is to help the children, no matter the age, ethnic background or religion to make their own decisions rather than making decisions for them. This is backed by the belief that going by other decisions will certainly land you into their destination. Therefore counseling children will not only help them overcome their challenges but also for them to be decisive, analytical, judgmental and rational in thinking. This way, it will help them grow to learn to become good leaders capable of building their communities and countries.

Cradle of Hope for Relief and Development is actively involved with organizing counseling, sensitization and orientation workshops for the public to create a positive attitude towards the vulnerable children. We believe that this will help familiarize others with the specific needs of children with an economically weak background. Our staff and volunteers are given tips on handling and assisting these children to help them overcome their challenges. Counseling and sensitization programs are designed and delivered to address socio-economic difficulties and increase the understanding, acceptance, and inclusion for vulnerable children within communities in which we operate.

Two basic concepts used are as follows:

(1) Psycho-Social Counseling:- under this concept, we organize weekly orientation workshops for groups such as Parents, NGOs, Teachers, Opinion Leaders, and the General Public. The idea is intended to husband various efforts toward children’s good upbringing.

(2) Career Counseling:– our effort is focused on keeping the school children aware of career choices. We speak to children on a one-on-one basis to have in-depth knowledge about career difficulties and design strategies to help them overcome it. We also organize a forum to speak to a group of school children to nurture their lives, build confidence and keep them focus on their career pursuit amid socio-economic and negative peer pressure challenges.   Additionally, children are counseled for the following challenges:

  1. Not coping with lessons
  2. Problems with friendships or fear of being bullied
  3. Effect of problems with their parents’ relationships, eg. Divorce
  4. Drug abuse and its related consequences
  5. Problems caused by money and or the lack of it.
  6. Problems about body image or self-esteem
  7. feeling unsafe or uncomfortable with what is happening
  8. Feeling depressed

This effort is aimed at:

  1. Challenge some of our general assumptions, attitudes, values, and beliefs regarding vulnerability.
  2. Educate the public by providing a more realistic, practical, and positive picture of children’s vulnerability and the need to support them.
  3. Provide rational suggestions to stakeholders, well-wishers and donor community on ways of providing services to the vulnerable children.