Our Work
The Kidogo Way
Every day working mothers living in East Africa’s informal settlements drop off their child at an unlicensed, congested “babycare” with an untrained caregiver for a fee.
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Create linkages with community health systems, provide nutrition counseling & menus, and ensure adequate sanitation & hygiene practices for cleanliness.
Support early learning & stimulation across cognitive, social, and physical domains through fun & engaging activities throughout the day.
Train and mentor caregivers to support children’s development with care and individual attention.
The Childcare Crisis
Every day, thousands of working mothers in East Africa’s informal settlements drop off their young children at unlicensed and congested “babycare” centres.
The health, growth and development of the child is severely compromised. Without supportive care in their early years, these children enter school with physical & learning disabilities that result in them being locked in an intergenerational cycle of poverty that is near impossible to escape. In addition, their mothers are unable to hold consistent employment, as they lack reliable childcare services during the working day.
As rural-urban migration trends continue, this problem is only expected to get worse…
Our
Social Franchising Model
We identify, train and support female entrepreneurs (Mamapreneurs) to start or grow their own child care micro-businesses in their local communities.
By joining the Kidogo Network, Mamapreneurs receive intensive training & mentoring on early childhood care & education, entrepreneurship, and health & nutrition to improve the quality of services offered to young children. Mamapreneurs are also provided with a starter kit including key resources for their centres, and ongoing quality assurance to maintain Kidogo’s minimum standards.
Our
Centres of Excellence
Kidogo operates a small number of ‘centres of excellence’ across Nairobi.
These centres provide space for training Mamapreneurs, and displaying best practices for childcare / early learning in low-resource environments. We also leverage these centres to pilot new innovations, engage with the broader community, and host key stakeholders as part of our advocacy efforts.
The Kidogo Way
The Kidogo Way is our proprietary approach to promote young children's healthy growth & development. This framework guides our training, curriculum, and quality assurance for caregivers and centres in the network.
Design spaces that allow children to explore safely and discover the world around them.
Provide solutions to help Mama-preneurs adopt best practices and run profitable businesses.
Work closely with parents to ensure that healthy practices and learning from our centers extend into the home & community.