Children at SPARK Cresta school in Randburg spent the week learning about personal safety, online awareness, and the importance of speaking up, as the school observed National Child Protection Week with a daily programme of themed assemblies and a final community march on Friday.

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Principal Mamta Bhula said each morning assembly, which the school calls SPARKS Fly, was dedicated to a different aspect of child safety. Monday’s theme centred on bodily autonomy, with the message that every child has the right to feel safe and to say no to anything that makes them uncomfortable. Tuesday shifted focus to self-expression, encouraging learners to speak up, share their feelings, and trust that they would be heard.

Wednesday’s session tackled online safety, reminding learners to keep personal information private, communicate only with people they know and trust, and report anything suspicious to a trusted adult. Thursday brought a lesson on kindness and respect, and it was this theme that resonated most strongly across the school, according to Bhula.

“You would hear, like for example, if another scholar was troubling someone, it was like, ‘No, it’s Child Protection Week, you mustn’t trouble me,'” she said. “So even though they sometimes didn’t fully understand the full extent of it, they know: I need to be safe, I need to be heard, I need to feel good.”

Also read: Child Protection Month uncovers the growing concerns over child neglect and abuse

Bhula noted that the theme also tied in naturally with the school’s core values. SPARK, the acronym that gives the school group its name, stands for Service, Persistence, Achievement, Responsibility, and Kindness, and she said it reflected what learners recite every day as part of their ‘daily creed’ and who they are as a community.

Friday brought the week to a close with a Community Protection Day, during which learners marched around the school grounds in a small protest to give their voices a public outlet and to draw together the lessons of the preceding days.

Tshegofatso Kompane, Child Protection Officer for SPARK Schools, said the week served as a reminder that safeguarding children is a shared responsibility that extends well beyond the school gates.

“It takes a village to raise a child,” Kompane said, “and the importance of that village being well equipped with the necessary knowledge to make sure that they know how to protect kids and where to go when they notice that a child might be at risk.”

She said that in practice, this means communities knowing how to contact the Department of Social Development, Childline, or the police when they have concerns about a child’s welfare.

“The protection of children is everybody’s business and everybody’s concern,” Kompane said.

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