Children do their bit for others their age

With hundreds of children manning stalls and stations, the mood at the tsunami disaster charity drive in Alice Smith Primary School, Kuala Lumpur, was cheery and colourful.

Children, as young as pre-schoolers to those from Year Six, set up games stations and stalls for two days beginning Jan 19 as part of their annual charity event.

Sponge the Teacher and Smash a Teacher stations were the popular stops. The youngsters had a fun time throwing water-soaked sponges at their teachers whose faces peeked out from behind a character board.

Smash a Teacher allowed participants to throw tennis balls at tin cans that were labelled with teachers' faces.

"We thought the teachers deserved some payback," said Year Six student Struan King, who took charge of the station with classmate James Lau. "In this way, there is a lot of fun."

A popular station among the girls was one that provided a make over. Little girls painted pretty nail polish on finger nails of their schoolmates for a fee.

Other stalls included one that sold cakes and one, called Mufti Days, where children who were not in uniform donated RM2 for each of the day they wore "civil" attire.

A Heart of Gold involved filling a large piece of paper with Malaysian coins by Year One and Two pupils.

Proceeds from the two-day affair will be channelled to the United Nation's Children's Fund (Unicef) in support of the "School in a Box" project. The box contains supplies and materials for a teacher and 80 students.

In addition to basic school supplies such as exercise books, pencils, erasers and scissors, the kit also has a wooden teaching clock, plastic cubes for counting and a set of laminated posters.

The kit is supplied in a locked aluminium box and the lid can double as a blackboard when coated with a special paint that is included in the box. The cost of each box is RM710.

With the aim of helping out in the education sector, the Alice Smith Primary School's target is to raise RM10,000 to help over 1,000 children in tsunami affected areas.

Event coordinator Sarah Wheeler Tan said Unicef representatives gave an inspiring talk about their work with children.

"The highlight was on child victims," said Tan, adding that it motivated the children to do more for the victims during the charity drive.

Last year's drive raised RM13,500 and the proceeds were donated to the Good Shepherd Home, Rumah Peace and Paws.