WHAT: Children are trained by school teachers, Splash staff or implementing partners depending on the country behavior change strategy. The country behavior change strategy is determined by the local and global BC Managers. These specific strategies can be found in the Behavior Change for Children Annex and standards around Teacher Training is referenced in the section “BC for Teachers” of the Splash Standards.

During the training, children will be guided through the curriculum and will receive or prepare a hygiene booklet, vest and teaching materials.

• Program Content Areas: Germs and handwashing with soap
• Proper sanitation
• Personal hygiene
• Menstrual hygiene management and adolescent health
• Environmental hygiene
• Water purification and conservation
• Child rights to WASH (India-specific)
• Food Hygiene

WHY: With the use of interactive games and activities, knowledge is increased and beliefs are formed. Emotional triggers such as disgust, pride, and perceived threats can all influence a child’s decision to change their behavior. Emotional drivers can also play a role in long-term habit formation by motivating children to spread awareness and change to others, and bring meaning to the action, further imprinting the behavior into their daily routine.  

HOW: Site Administration selects 20-30 children with strong leadership skills to participate in the Hygiene Club (unless a relevant club already exists, in which case that club can be trained). Once selected, children are offered a 2-day training using the Splash curriculum. The training is always conducted by Splash or Splash-trained trainers/teachers. Children will evaluate the hygiene conditions of their school and the behaviors of their peers. Based on this evaluation, the hygiene club will develop 5 priorities they want to focus on. The club will have a monthly meeting, facilitated by the focal teachers, to address these priorities, determine additional needs, and assess the club’s effectiveness. The club will be responsible for developing a chart which outlines daily responsibilities and who is responsible each day, see example in the Behavior Change for Children Annex. These responsibilities will be monitored by the focal teacher and spot checked by the Splash BC team. More details on the student’s responsibilities are as follows:

• Disseminate good practices to other children.
  • Be an advocate and educate peers on proper hygiene and handwashing
• Instruct students to follow desired hygiene practices.
  • Ensure soap is always available at the handwashing stations and (if applicable) inside the latrines
  • Monitor and guide peers on proper handwashing (physically standing by the station during breaks and lunch, wearing their vests, and guiding the children)
  • Monitor and guide peers on proper drinking at the water station (physically standing by the station during breaks and lunch, wearing their vests, and guiding the children)
• Discuss the unresolved issues.
  • Ensure cleanliness of latrines and inform adults if they are dirty
• Document the key decisions.

In addition to the above responsibilities, the hygiene club and focal teachers are also responsible for conducting a soap drive at their school. They should make an announcement to the school for every student to bring a bar of soap to school. On the following day, the soap is collect during an assembaly, where the accomplishment can be celebrated. The hygiene club then documents the total number of soaps collected. The club is responsible for conducting additional soap drives every time soap runs out.

WHEN: Because the hygiene club training must be closely tied with access to infrastructure, the child training should take place within the window of 4 months prior to installation and 2 months after infrastructure. The reason for the shorter window after installation is because we want to leverage the excitement of the new environment to have adoption of new behaviors.

WHO: Children from Grade 4 through Grade 12 should be included in the training. Training can be administrated by Splash staff or Splash trained teachers and implementing partners.