Service-Learning at Cambodia YMCA

Our students taught at two centers of the CYMCA.  One is in the slum at Toul Sanker, at the north end of Boeng Kak Lake (which has been completely filled in).  The other is at San Sok, 11 kilometers to the north west of Phnom Penh.  Many of the residents at San Sok were actually living in the slums in Phnom Penh.  They were driven out of the city’s alums and moved to San Sok by the government.  But then they found that there were no jobs in San Sok, and many moved moving back to the city center to make a living - often by picking recyclable materials from the garbage dumps. 

Many of the houses at Toul Sanker were built directly above piles of rubbish.  Practically all of the houses on the western shore of Boeng Kak, i.e., on the east side of the old railway track, have been cleared.  Many have been presumably moved to San Sok.


The children at both Toul Sanker and San Sok were taught digital story telling using stop motion animation.  Most of them have never used a compute before.  Yet they learnt to make figures with PlayDough, photograph the scenes, and then used the photographs to create animated stories.

We, and the CYMCA, are hoping that we can help to arouse their interests in computers in specific, and learning in general, to that they can be re-integrated into the government school system, and perhaps to  take a more active approach to their own education.