Lignum Vitae Bahamas 4-H

I’m so proud of our organization which offers a structured free camp to many children in the surrounding communities. The children are rotated through a variety of project areas and look how much fun they are having here while using fine motor skills, math and creative arts.

For our ongoing 4-H programming and support of families I invite you to view our website & pages:
www.lendahandbahamas.org
Facebook://lendahandbahamas

Lend a Hand Bahamas | Support Now Lend a Hand Bahamas is a Bahamian nonprofit organization working to bring more opportunities and activities to areas of the Bahamas

4-H experiential camps begin today in conjunction with Lend a Hand Bahamas at the Grace Gospel Church on East Street. We’re on the count down for the opening of our new center of Lewes Street -

Join us as we kick off Our Bain Grants Town Social, Agricultural and STEM Camp with Lend a Hand Bahamas on July 23rd.

Support Brighter Futures I support brighter futures for our nation's children! Find National Summer Learning Day resources & events near you. http://thndr.me/1KvMSM

We’re very excited to be teaming up with Tammi and providing programs for youth and families in Historic Charles Towne • Nassau • The Bahamas

Please welcome Tammi Clarke-Rahming as the Executive Director for the Neville and Nora Dorsett Community Center currently nearing completion in Nassau, Bahamas. She firmly believes in a strong work ethic, collaboration, and the continual pursuit of new ideas for improving Bahamian Urban Communities. She holds a Bachelor of Arts Degree from the University of the Bahamas, and was employed at The Department of Social Services as a Community Social Worker in the Western district of the Bahamas where she offered financial services to families residing in such areas such as Bain Town, Big Pond, Gambier, and Carmichael Road. Tammi is an amazing asset to our team and we hope you will support her and Lend a Hand Bahamas as we seek to make a difference in the lives of many.

Raising kind, loving, Compassionate kids.

Many parents want to raise their children to become caring adults, but kids often hear mixed messages from their parents regarding the importance of kindness. A recent study by Harvard psychologist Richard Weissbourd found that “80 percent [of youth]... said their parents were more concerned with their achievement or happiness than whether they cared for others.” The overwhelmingly majority of children also believed that their parents care more about their grades than if they are kind. That's why Weissbourd runs Harvard's Making Caring Common Project focused on strengthening the "abilities of parents and caretakers, schools, and community members to develop caring, ethical children.” In the Washington Post, he shared his top five tips for parents and educators on how to raise kids that care.

The first step to raising kind kids is making it clear that kindness is a priority. By recognizing caring gestures as much as individual accomplishments, parents send a strong message that kindness is valued in their family. Along with that, parents need to provide guidance with how to deal with destructive emotions. Reminding kids that “anger, shame, envy, or other negative feelings... are okay, but some ways of dealing with them are not helpful.” This will help them learn positive ways to cope with these emotions “so that [they] can express [their] feelings in a helpful and appropriate way.”

The best way to do both is to model what you want your kids to do: “Children learn ethical values by watching the actions of adults they respect.” You don’t have to be perfect, but showing your children that you’re striving for kindness is a powerful message. One easy way to model compassion for others, according to Weissbourd, is by doing a community service project together as a family on a regular basic.

Parents also need to remember that “[c]hildren need to practice caring for others and expressing gratitude for those who care for them and contribute to others’ lives.” Both real life and media like TV shows and video games provide opportunities to discuss whether people or characters are being considerate of other people’s needs and feelings. The Making Caring Common project also encourages parents to widen their children’s “circle of concern.” It’s easy to care for your family and close friends, but “[o]ur challenge is help our children learn to care about someone outside that circle, such as the new kid in class, someone who doesn’t speak their language, the school custodian, or someone who lives in a distant country.”

“Children are not born simply good or bad and we should never give up on them,” the researchers say in their study. “They need adults who will help them become caring, respectful, and responsible for their communities at every stage of their childhood.” By working to raise kind kids, they conclude, we can “make these values live and breathe in the day-to-day interactions of every school and home.”

You can read all of the Making Caring Common Project’s tips at http://wapo.st/1sy0MnH

Richard Weissbourd offers more guidance on raising kind kids in his insightful book "The Parents We Mean To Be: How Well-Intentioned Adults Undermine Children's Moral and Emotional Development" at https://www.amightygirl.com/the-parents-we-mean-to-be

For two uplifting new picture books about the power of kindness, we highly recommend "Be Kind" for ages 3 to 7 (https://www.amightygirl.com/be-kind)
and "I Walk With Vanessa" for ages 4 to 8 (https://www.amightygirl.com/i-walk-with-vanessa)

For another excellent parenting book focused on raising kind kids, we also recommend “UnSelfie: Why Empathetic Kids Succeed in Our All-About-Me World” at https://www.amightygirl.com/unselfie

For two wonderful books that help foster children's compassion for others by giving them a visual way to think about kindness, we recommend "Have You Filled a Bucket Today: A Guide to Daily Happiness for Kids" for ages 4 to 8 (https://www.amightygirl.com/have-you-filled-a-bucket-today) and its sequel "Growing Up With A Bucket Full Of Happiness" for ages 9 to 12 (https://www.amightygirl.com/growing-up-with-a-bucket-full-of-happiness)

And, for many empathy-building books for children and teens themselves that emphasize the value of compassion, visit our "Kindness & Compassion" section at http://amgrl.co/2lPjUyP

As Easter is all about new beginnings and hope, its a fitting time to share the vision of our new community center, almost completed on Lewes Street in Bain Grants Town. From our inception 9 years ago, we have worked here, and the surrounding communities with mothers, children, teens and young adults.

Facebook://Lend a Hand Bahamas is growing as a half of our Board Members and several of our Lignum Vitae Friends have merged over. We are seeking sparky, confident, creative volunteers to join our exciting new collaboration www.lendahandbahamas.org.

2018 is looking set to be an impactful year for us. Over the last 18 months, we have focused on four key areas: working with unemployed mothers, offering after-school/weekend 4-H youth clubs, empowering teens (12-16) to put some new workforce preparation skills into action, a 2-week summer camp and a new project, supporting the development and completion of a Community Center in Bain Grants Town. Within this center, we will collaborate on implementing programs for all ages and invite volunteers & partnering agencies to reach the surrounding community regardless of nationality, age, or background.

In peace and solidarity,
May we collaborate to build stronger communities.

home

As we approach 2018, we are proud to collaborate and merge our 4-H youth service-programs with an amazing Non Profit, Lend a Hand Bahamas. From our inception in 2009, much of our focus has taken place in the heart of Bain Grants Town. Recognizing that for our Bahamas, joining hands to renovate and establish an NGO-managed community center in the heart of this community, has been one of our dreams. We ask you, our sponsors and friends, to step forward with us to build a model center with a focus on research-based, experiential programs.

Lend a Hand Bahamas
Phase 1 Nears Completion and Merge with Lignum Vitae-4H.
We are proud to update our many supporters and potential supporters that construction continues on the future Neville and Nora Dorsett Community Center in Grant's Town located in Nassau, Bahamas. We are gearing up now to place on the new roof then the windows and doors to follow in the coming weeks. Thank you to all of our initial donors and volunteers who helped make this next phase possible.

In the spirit of community building and resource sharing, we have strategically decided to join forces with the local Lignum Vitae-4H nonprofit organization to help us ensure we have robust and effective programming to positively impact communities in Nassau and elsewhere on the family islands moving forward. Lignum's team led by Shelagh Pritchard will be joining us and merging their efforts with ours moving forward to bring more opportunities and activities to Bahamians of all ages. Lignum leaders and volunteers have already been running programming for the past two years with children from the area where the center will operate once completed.

We invite you to join us in this next exciting phase and hope that you will consider making a gift now or offline towards our efforts moving forward.

Ways to Get Involved and Exciting Events Coming Up
Consider making a gift to support our efforts!
Sign up to be a volunteer by registering HERE
Reach out with any program ideas or opportunities
Recommend a good Executive Director for the Center
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Stay tuned for more information concerning a Spring Charity Event