Kiswahili Notes for Standard Four - All Chapters

Water, sanitation, and hygiene are all critical for good health. Schools should focus on improving WASH in schools to ensure that their students stay healthy.

The World Health Organization (WHO) has identified school-based water, sanitation, and hygiene as a key strategy to fight the global spread of infectious diseases.

Schools should take a unified focus on improving WASH in schools because they have an opportunity like no other organization has, using the fact that their students are at the learning age about these essential principles they need to learn.

There have been many scientific studies regarding the benefits of drinking water throughout the day and focusing especially on the fact that it’s a way of protecting health and contributes to well-being for both staff and pupils

It is recognised that children should drink at least 3 to 4 glasses of water during a day and even more when in warmer times of year and when partaking in more rigorous exercise in PE or Games.

Therefore, it seems natural that water needs to be situated in a convenient and safe location for easy access to encourage regular drinking. It should also be attractive in terms of taste and temperature and children need to be encouraged and supported to keep drinking during the day.

Companies such as Glug Glug Glug supply mains fed water coolers and fountains that would help satisfy this requirement with chilled and filtered fresh water. They use a simple carbon filter to remove bad tastes and chlorine smells and encourage the children to drink more water.

Importance of WASH:

We must remember that regular consumption of water will have many benefits such as:

- Improved concentration

- Reduction in tiredness & irritability

- Healthy & low-cost hydration

- Helps with the reduction of obesity

- Prevents short-term illnesses such as headaches & bladder or bowel problems

- Maintains a healthy kidney

Finally, the body requires constant re-hydration to combat fluid it loses. The pupils could begin to feel tired and lack concentration after only losing 1% hydration of the body

Challenges for WASH in Schools

Water is a limited resource that unfortunately only meets the needs of half of the world’s population. As water becomes more scarce, creating a plan for the future becomes critical, especially for places where water scarcity is an issue.

Children should have the chance to stay healthy and fit for school by having access to clean drinking water and sanitation facilities. Recently, there have been successful efforts in this regard, with schools adopting innovative water conservation strategies and creating access to sanitation facilities on school campuses.

According to the World Health Organization (WHO), 844 million people lack access to clean water, while 2 billion people lack access to improved sanitation.

These numbers highlight the importance of this problem and how it could affect the education of children worldwide if not adequately addressed.