Booklet 02 Educators Guidebook

Make yourself
2
ready.
Educators
Guidebook
A short companion for “Make Yourself Ready”,
designed to help you plan and
carry on the teaching of Disaster
Preparedness techniques to your community
Make Yourself Ready - Educator’s Guidebook

2
Who made this booklet?
This booklet was made as part of a Master Thesis for the Technical University of
Delft, in the Netherlands. It was an assignment from a Product Design student
and was completed in August 2010. This project was supervised by Professors
Iemkje Ruiter and Henk Kuipers and was supported by Ir. Lard Breebaart from
Lard Design.
Contact information
Author: João Rocha
E-mail address: digitalgraphite@gmail.com
Project Client: Ir. Lard Breebaart
E-mail address: XX to be disclosed XX
URL: XX to be disclosed XX
Project Mentor: Prof. Henk Kuipers
Chair Professor: Prof. Iemkje Ruiter
University Information
Name: Technische Universiteit Delft
URL: http://home.tudelft.nl/en/
Address:
Postbus 5
2600 AA Delft
The Netherlands
Faculty Information
Name: Faculteit Industrieel Ontwerpen
URL: http://io.home.tudelft.nl/en/
Address:
Faculty of Industrial Design Engineering
Landbergstraat 15
2628 CE Delft
E-mail Address: io@tudelft.nl
Tel: 015 278 4750
Fax: 015 278 73 16
Introduction
Delft, 2010
Make Yourself Ready Educational Package

3
Table of Contents
These are the sections in this book
page 5
A. Introduction
A short explanation of what is this booklet, what is Disaster Preparedness and
which things will you teach
• 7 What is this booklet?
• 8 What is Disaster Preparedness?
• 10 What things will I teach?
page 11
B. Method
A description of what is the recommended way to organize education activities in
your community.
• 13 What will be my roles?
• 16 What method should I follow?
• 20 What are the conditions for a good project?
page 23
C. Disaster Preparedness
Basic information about Disaster Preparedness, how to do it and how to convince
others to do it.
• 25 Introduction
• 28 How can families prepare for Disaster?
• 31 What products to get?
• 33 What plans to make?
• 34 How to stay informed?
• 35 How to convince people to prepare for Disaster?
page 37
D. Education
Basic information on how education happens and what influences its process
• 39 Introduction
• 41 What matters in teaching/learning?
• 46 How do people learn?
page 51
E. Your Community
Instructions on how to study your community to get useful information to adapt
the Disaster Preparedness teaching activities you will plan.
• 53 Introduction
• 55 How do I study my Community?
• 58 How is my local Culture?
• 62 What are the local Education Conditions?
• 64 What tools do I use?

4
Introduction

A Introduction
What is this booklet, what is this
Project about, what is Disaster
Preparedness and what you will
teach.
6
Introduction

7
A1. What is this booklet?

This booklet is a source of information for people that are interested in
teaching Disaster Preparedness to their community or a community they
are familiar with. It gives an overview of what is Disaster Preparadness
and how to achieve it and also explains how should a person teach Di-
saster Preparedness techniques to his or her community.
“Why do I need this booklet?”
If you have this book, we assume that you also have the original “Make Yourself
Ready”, which contains practical advice for Disaster Preparedness techniques.
This Educator’s Guidebook has a different type of information, it teaches people
how to teach Disaster Preparedness.
If you live in an area that is frequently exposed to Natural Disaster (e.g. Flood,
Hurricane, Landslide, Earthquake, Storm, etc) it is possible that you are affected
someday. Maybe you have even already been affected. Proper knowledge about
Disaster Preparedness can reduce your risks and the risks of your community.
For people to start working on their Disaster Preparedness, it is not enough to
give them instructions on how to make things. It is necessary to help and moti-
vate them. In this booklet, you can learn methods to teach and encourage people
to work for their own Disaster Preparedness.
“For who is this booklet?”

This guidebook was designed to be used by “normal people”, not specialists,
that are familiar with a community that is often victim of Natural Disaster. You can
start using the knowledge in this book right away, without being a social worker,
an educator, scientist or designer. It was made for simple and flexible use.
All the techniques that you will find in this guide were selected based on their
simplicity and low cost. This is because if something is possible to be made or
bought with very low effort, more people will be able to use it.
As the name suggests, this book is for “Educators”, but it does not mean that you
must be a school teacher to teach people about Disaster Preparedness. No mat-
ter what your job is, if you want to teach Disaster Preparedness to the commu-
nity, this booklet will be useful for you.
Introduction

8
A2. What is Disaster

Preparedness?
Disaster Preparedness is the continuous preparation for a possible
Disaster, before the Disaster happens. It can save lives and reduce the
damage that Disasters causes
“Can we avoid Disasters?”

Yes. One important thing about “Disasters” is that with preparation and some
luck, their worst effects can be reduced. Storms or Earthquakes, for example, are
common Disasters, but if we learn how to prepare for them, then their destruction
will be less strong and less people will suffer.
Imagine that very strong winds reach two different villages. One has good houses
and people know what to do during a storm, while the other village has fragile
houses and people don’t know what to do during a storm. As you can imagine, it
is the less prepared village that gets the worse effects.
We cannot avoid most of the causes of Disaster

(e.g. Wind, Rain, etc), but if we prepare for those causes, the
caused damages will be lower and people will be less affected.
“Why should people prepare for Disasters?”

Disasters can be very destructive to people and things and it is very common that
after a Disaster, people are harmed and buildings are damaged.
Preparing for Disasters gives people the tools to reduce their risks and to return
to normal life faster. Prepared people can fix their broken homes or make tem-
porary homes, cook, drink safe water and learn more what kind of help will come
(e.g. Civil protection, firemen, police, army, foreign aid).
If people are prepared for Disasters, when Disasters happen,

less people get injuried and less houses are destroyed. When
people prepare for Disasters, their lives return faster to normal.
Introduction
“How to prepare for Disasters?”

Preparing for Disasters can be a lot of things, from fixing fragile houses to plan-
ning for how public services recover after a Disaster takes place. These things
seem complex, but there are other steps that a family, neighbourhood or commu-
nity can take to prepare for Disaster.
These are things you can start doing today:
• Stock up on Supplies (e.g. Food, Water, Medicine)

• Make a Plan (how to reunite the family or how to rebuild)
• Stay Informed (what Disaster risks are out there and what should you do
in case of one)
These three actions will be explained in detail in section C, “Disaster Prepared-

9
ness”
“Why is difficult to Prepare for Disasters?”

In most cases, people do not prepare correctly for a Disaster and it is possible
that this is happening in your community. Especially if people are generally poor
or have little access to education, it is very likely that they have not prepared.
This is a common situation but can be improved.
For people to prepare, they have to recognize that a Disaster is possible and
there is something that can be done about it. Depending on the Culture of your
community, people might have an opinion that Disasters are certain facts of life
and there is nothing you can do about them. Convincing people that it is possible
to prepare for Disaster will require a lot of sensibility to their cultural values and
beliefs and should be approached carefully.
More on this topic can be found on chapter C, “Disaster Preparedness”.
For people to prepare, they must also see the value in Preparation. If your com-
munity does not think that preparing for Disaster has any advantage, people will
not do it.
Finally, people must know what to do to prepare, and it this is information that you
will find on this guide book.
Disaster Preparedness is difficult because it needs people to understand that it is
possible to reduce Disaster impact. Also, even if people understand and accept
that they can prepare for Disaster, Disaster Preparedness is complicated and
expensive.
Although it can be difficult, Preparing for Disaster saves lives,

time and money.
“How can I help my community preparing for Disasters?”

The best way for you to help your community is to show it the advantages of pre-
paring for a Disaster and teach how can people prepare. “Make Yourself Ready”
contains a lot of information but your community will need someone to help it
access this information. It is not enough to give or lend ”Make Yourself Ready” to
people, even if they can read. This is why it is necessary to have a responsible
person (or persons) that can take the information in this book and use it to edu-
cate the community.
More information on section B, “Method”. Introduction

10
What things will I

teach?
To get your community ready for Disaster you should teach it some basic
knowledge about Disaster Preparedness and also the techniques listed in
the booklet “Make Yourself Ready”.
The basics of Disaster Preparedness

Disaster Preparedness can be a vast field, but we tried to simplify it in this
booklet and “Make Yourself Ready”, so it becomes more accessible and easy to
teach/learn. We wrote both booklets so they can be an introduction to people that
habe no notions of Disaster Preparedness.
There are some basics of Disaster Preparedness that everybody should know.
These are included in this booklet. Knowing these basic notions is a good start
for people to begin working for their own Disaster Preparedness.
Disaster Preparedness is more than having some products, it also needs people
Useful Information
to know some behaviours that are important in case of Disaster. These are in-
International Federa- cluded in the Basic Disaster Preparedness taught here.
tion of the Red Cross Clearly, it is good to learn more about Disaster Preparedness, and so we in-
and Red Crescent cluded details on how can you find more information on the topic. Look for the
Societies: side bars, as the one on the left. There is also more available info on section C,
“Disaster Preparedness”.
“Disaster
Management
resources” Techniques to make useful products for Disaster Preparedness
http://www.ifrc.org/ Besides teaching people what simple behaviours they should have to be pre-
what/disasters/re- pared for Disaster, you will also teach them how to make products and tech-
sources/publications. niques that are useful for Disaster Preparedness. These are:
asp#dp
• Shelter or improvised housing
San Francisco
• Water treatment knowledge
Department of
Emergency • Cooking conditions
Management: • Communication devices
“72 hours, are you
prepared?’ The best type of knowledge allows for adaptation and is useful in several situ-
Introduction
ations. In this guidebook, an effort was made to suggest techniques that are
http://72hours.org/
simple, yet useful enough to be adaptable. Also, they are flexible and you might
find them useful in “normal” situations.
If while learning Disaster Preparedness, people also learn useful information for
their daily lives, it is likely that those persons will be more inclined to learn the
Disaster Preparedness techniques.
Disaster Preparedness information is more valuable if it helps

people even without a Disaster.

B Method
What roles should you have, what is
the general method to follow,
creating good conditions to run a
project
12
Introduction

13
B1. What will be my roles?

To teach Disaster Preparedness in your community might be more than
just transmit the knowledge in these books. We believe that for this
teaching to be effective, you must adapt the contents (e.g. the tech-
niques) and the methods (e.g. the procedures) we suggest. This means
that your role, your job, will probably be more than teaching and will
involve other tasks.
“What kind of tasks can I expect to do?”
We assume that you will be involved with the creation and management of the
education initiatives. This will require you to be quite versatile and you will take
on many roles. Naturally, these roles might change with the circumstances, but
the following list is what you can expect from a project list this:
• Act as an Intermediary
• Get support
• Manage people
• Observe
• Plan
• Supervise
• Motivate
• Teach
This list does not mean that you will have to do all this things at the same time,
but it is likely that at some point or another you will do them. Also, as you can see
from the list, most of these roles involve your interaction with other people
(e.g. be an intermediary between the book and the people, motivate your cowork-
ers).
Act as an intermediary
In your educational project you will start by making the connection between this
book and your community. You learn the things in this book and then apply them
in your community, with your people.
Probably, you will also be an intermediary between people, as the project pro-
gresses (e.g. introducing people to each other and asking the help of important
people in your community).
Acting as an intermediary will require good social skills and a good standing in
the community
Get support
Getting support is a little like being an intermediate. In fact in some cases, you
will be getting support from other people, as you act as an intermediary.
Getting support, help or assistance from other people is a work of persuasion.
You will need to convince people of the benefits of their contribution to the proj-
ect. An example: convince a public official to help the education efforts by lending
some resources, by showing how the community can benefit and the government
Introduction
might save money on Disaster recovery in the future.

14
Manage people
A project like the teaching of Disaster Preparedness to a community will involve a
lot of people. These people will be involved in different tasks and different groups.
You will notice that not everybody is motivated in the same way or that people do
things in ways that you did not expect.
You will also have to organize people into teams, give them tasks and make sure
they are ready for the job.
The point is that you will need to carefully make sure people are working well,
and having a productive relationship with their colleagues. You must be careful to
do this in a way that makes sense in your culture. Managing people in a country
is different from managing people in another country.
Because it is difficult to give you advise that will certainly work in your commu-
nity, we suggest you pay attention (and maybe even ask for help) to the people
in your community that are known for being good at managing people (e.g. shop
owners, religious and civic leaders, teachers, doctors, etc.)
Observe
Just because this project will probably have the cooperation of many people, it
does not mean that you will only do management work. If you are reading this
booklet, it is probable that you have skills that are very useful besides manage-
ment.
Observing your community, paying attention to the way people do things, pos-
sible sources of danger or possibilities for improvement, is an important task.
Especially in the beginning of this project, you can expect to do a bit of this for
initial research.
Plan
By having access to this booklet, we can already assume that you have some
prior capacity for planning and management. We expect that with our sugges-
tions, you become even more capable of planning activities.
Planning will require someone that has an overview of all the participants in the
project (which to educate your community about Disaster Preparedness). As the
responsible for this Disaster Preparedness education project, you are in a good
position for this. Expect to be responsible for the planning of activities.
Supervise
When the project is already running and people are researching, planning, mak-
ing things and teaching people, you still have to be alert for possible problems
Introduction
that come up.

Your role as a supervisor is to observe people working, pay attention to their
needs (e.g. A team member that tells you he/she needs a some tool ) and to cre-
ate a working environment where people know that what they are doing matters.
There are many styles of supervision, where some people prefer a very close
watch on all the activities and other managers prefer a more free way of super-
vising. This all depends on your culture and you.
Motivate
Especially with long projects, that take a lot of time before results are shown,
people tend to lose motivation. People might get tired of working on a project
that is difficult and is taking too much time to show results. Because a Disaster
Preparedness education effort will take a long time before people are actually
prepared, you should expect your coworkers to start losing motivation.
Because people work much better when they are motivated, you should know
how to motivate your team workers.

15
Some people are naturally better than others at this, but motivation to work is
different for different cultures. The best way to understand what better motivates
people in your community is to pay attention to what people around you find
important and worth working for (e.g. The welfare of the family, the success of the
crops, the keeping of traditions, etc)
Teach
Finally, after all the project management activities that were previously described,
it is probable that you will be responsible (in some way) for teaching people about
Disaster Preparedness. Even if you are not the actual person that will teach the
practical advice to your community, while you explain the project to your collabo-
rators, you will be in a position of teaching.
There is also the possibility that you end up being the person that teaches the
techniques described in “Make Yourself Ready” and the general Disaster Pre-
paredness advice contained in this booklet.
Introduction

16
B2. What method should I

follow?
Teaching Disaster Preparedness is a complex task. Although you are free
to plan and organize your efforts in any way you find appropriate, it is
suggested to follow some specific method. In this section you will learn
our suggested method.
5 steps
We suggest you follow one working method that considers 5 general steps in
establishing this educational effort. These steps are more useful if you use them
together and in order.
These steps are:
• Prepare
• Research
• Plan
• Make
• Educate
Introduction

17
Prepare
This is the very first step in starting any project. In this step you should compare
what you have to work with (e.g. How much money, which kind of team, working
spaces, time) with what you will need.
It is also in this step that you set up your working group, get the support of the
community and set up the objectives and time limits of the project.
Questions you should ask yourself:
• What are the Disaster risks in this community?

• Who do I want to teach? (consult section D, “Education”)
• What is my objective for this Disaster Preparedness education project?
• What resources do I have? (e.g. collaborators, funding, material, working
space and time)
• Who can help me? (consult section “Managing a good project”, in this
chapter)
The idea of these questions is to understand your objectives for this project and
what do you have at your disposal to fulfil them. It is important to have clear
objectives because they help you make sure you are working in a good direction.
When the project is already running, in the future, you can compare your current
status to what you defined as objectives.
An example: Imagine that in the beginning of the project, you defined that in 3
weeks, you want to teach 50 people about the techniques explained in “Making
Yourself Ready”. But, because unexpected things come up (e.g. collaborators
give up, money is spent, etc) you loose focus on your objectives. If you do not
have clearly stated objectives, it is very easy to let guard down and stop pro-
gressing.
Research
This book has a lot of information, but it does not know you or the people you will
be teaching. Because of this, the educational information you find here must be
adapted for your culture.
To adapt our information to your needs, you will need to conduct a quick research
on your community. With this research you will be able to understand what pieces
this book can be adapted to be more useful for you.
Another advantage of research, is that you will be more in touch with the needs
of your community. You might even realize that there are other problems that can
benefit from your educational efforts.
Questions you should ask yourself:
• How prepared for Disaster are the people in the community?

• If people are little prepared, why is that? (compare with information on
section C, “Disaster Preparedness”)
• What educational facilities are available? (e.g. schools, religious centers,
town hall meetings)
• How can I best teach the people from my community? (consult section E,
“How is your Community”)
Introduction

18
Plan
After conducting research on your community, you will understand much better
how specific it is and what are its needs. At this point, you can use this informa-
tion to adapt the techniques you find in this book.
You can plan what subjects you will teach, to whom, how, when and with which
methods.
Things you should plan for:
• A definitive period for the project

• What are the roles of the several collaborators
• How to keep track of the project progress
• What are the phases of the project and their periods (check part B2)
• How to increase interest for Disaster Preparedness in the population
• How to use the available spaces and tools
Make
When people learn, they usually need products that help their learning. An
example: a person learning how to read will learn better if he/she has a book to
practice.
When learning about Disaster Preparedness, people can learn better with educa-
tional material that teaches and reminds them of the skills they learn.
In this step, “Make”, we suggest you some points on how to create your own
educational material to aid classes.
Things you should consider when making new educational material:
• What means of communication can people understand?

• Can people read’
• Do people prefer to learn through more humane stories or more accurate
facts?
• Do people understand sequential images? (e.g. like a comic strip)
• What direction people read from? (e.g. from left to right and up to down
or in some other way?)
Useful Information • Are there taboos in representing people and gestures?
Introduction
World Health Organi- • How do people tell stories?

zation -
“How to improve the For more information on this, we suggest you consult the excellent document
use of medicines by “How to improve the use of medicines by consumers”, from World Health Orga-
consumers” nization. The document has a focus on medical care, but is mostly devoted to
explaining what communication methods are best and how to elaborate them. It
Available at: is listed on the left, and is free to download and copy.
http://www.who.int/
medicines/publica- You can, naturally, adapt the instructions from “Make Yourself Ready”. In fact,
tions/WHO_PSM_ maybe you need to, as some people might not understand them correctly. If you
PAR_2007.2.pdf do so, remember the previously listed considerations.

19
Educate
This is the final step, where people learn the suggested Disaster Preparedness
skills and test their knowledge on the topic. In this case, “Educate” is more than
just teaching the students. We strongly recommend that you test their success,
by giving them opportunities to test their new skills.
When teaching people, we assume the previous phases are already completed.
You should take care to:
• Plan each lesson, so you know exactly what you want to teach, how
much time you need, what materials do you need and how many people will
you teach.
• Pay attention to see if people are following what you are teaching, and
understanding
• Teach in an appropriate way ( consult section D, ”Education”
• Make sure that all students have a fair opportunity to learn, by paying
more attention to those that have more difficulties.
• Motivate all students.
Useful Information Teaching is not always a straightforward thing and it is too complex to be ex-
plained in such a simplified document. The suggested points of interest should be
International Net- able to help you, but if you can ask the advice of other more experienced people,
work for Education in you should do so.
Emergencies - In addition, you can consult the information available at the International Network
“Resources” for Education in Emergencies (INEE). This might be a little bit more technical, but
Available at: is a resource worth consulting. It gives advice on how to plan education efforts
http://www.ineesite. and it is listed on the left.
org/index.php/re-
sourcedb/
Using what you have learned
Depending on your intentions, your educational efforts can stop at the end of the
5 steps, but they can also be a continuous process. If you prefer to do the edu-
cational initiative as a repeating event, you can always improve on the method
presented in this chapter, making it more appropriate to the new things you have
learned.
You will realize that you will gain experience with each step of the process, and if
you repeat your efforts, you will be more prepared.
Introduction

20
B3. What are the conditions

for a good project?
The success of your efforts in educating your community depends on
many things. Hard work and motivation are the minimum, but follow this
advice to increase your chances of getting a good result.
A good project needs good conditions.

If you decide on starting a project to teach Disaster Preparedness and tech-
niques to make Disaster Preparedness supplies, it will be a challenge. You will
face unpredicted situations and things will not always go according to the plan.
Luckily, there are a few things you can do that can create conditions for a good
project:
• Involve the Community and get the right people in your team
• Set a place to work at
• Set a time limit
These conditions are mostly important for the planning of the educational activi-
ties. For more good advice on important factors for such a project, try to consult
the IDEO Human Centered Design Tool Kit. IDEO is an innovation and design
firm that is focused on helping businesses and organizations by using design
methods to solve problems of all kinds, including education and society.
Involve the Community and get the right people in your team
If you see the advantage in Preparing for Disaster, it is likely that other people in
your community have already though about that. Maybe they achieved some
success, but it also may be that there is still work to be done. In any case, when
you work in the right team, the results are usually better than if you work alone.
There are a few characteristics of a good team:
• People are motivated and passionate about the issues to solve

• The team members have diverse expertise (different jobs, genders, ages,
etc)
Useful Information
Introduction
• Team roles are clear and defined

IDEO -
“Human Centered Teaching your community about something that can be complex (like Disaster
Design Tool Kit” Preparedness) will require a lot of effort. Working in a good team is the first step
Available at: to make sure that you can deal with the numerous problems that will appear. But
http://www.ideo.com/ not any team will be useful, you need people that are willing to invest time and
work/item/human- effort in taking the education project forward.
centered-design- Goodwill is important, but only hard-working teams will reach good results.
toolkit/
When you look at a problem alone, you will not have the valuable constant com-
mentaries of people that look at the problem from other points of view. On the
other hand, when different people try to solve the same problem together, they
will reach different and often innovative solutions. This diversity can be in terms
of people’s jobs, gender, socioeconomic status or religion. If you can make a
good mixed group that works well, it is worth it.
Include people from different backgrounds in your team and you will be
surprised at the original and adequate solutions you will reach.

21
In team sports, even when all players are good, the coach is very important. In
teamwork the same happens. A good group has a structure and clearly defined
roles. If someone is very good at motivating others to work, that person should
be responsible for directing the team. Deciding what roles people occupy is an
important step in making a group. It is always better if people either choose or
are assigned roles that they believe fit with their capabilities.
Get a place to work at

Running this education project can help your community immensely, but it will
also involve a lot of work. To make sure your team can do its best, it is important
to create the right conditions for work. If you have a good team, made from the
community, you already have some support from those around you.
Getting a dedicated place to work out the details of this project will help you to
keep focused, have a productive environment and keep your work organized. If
you have a designated place to work at, you can immerse yourself in inspirational
images, notes and records.
Another advantage of having a working place is that people might take your task
more seriously and might even come up to you with ideas or comments. Any of
these comments from those around you are very valuable and will motivate you
to work better.
A place to work will make you work more efficiently and lend credibility to
your efforts
Set clear goals and time limits

When we work on an open or complex project, it is easy to loose control of time
and start delay the finish of a project. Having a time limit (a “deadline”) and
respecting it helps you in staying motivated and productive during the whole
process. Without some time pressure, we can get too comfortable and avoid tak-
ing difficult decisions. The final goal of this project is to educate your community
about Disaster Preparedness and many tasks have to be done for that. If these
tasks are not finished, people will not receive the benefit of this Disaster Pre-
paredness.
Having a limited amount of time forces you to work efficiently and achieve
results faster.
Introduction

22
Introduction

C Disaster Preparedness
Disaster Preparedness for the Family
and how to convince people to pre-
pare for Disaster
24
Introduction

25
C1. Introduction
To teach people how to prepare for Disaster, it is necessary to teach
them some basics of Disaster Preparedness theory. This chapter outlines
the basic notions that are important for Disaster Preparedness.
“What can we do to reduce Disasters?”

A very important fact about Natural Disasters is that we cannot change their ori-
gins (e.g. we cannot stop a Storm), but we can change their effect. This was al-
ready mentioned in the introduction of this document in section A, “Introduction”.
The people that are professionally involved in dealing with Disasters (e.g. Police,
Firemen, Civil Protection and so on), consider that we can reduce Disasters by
doing different things before and after the Disaster. In official terms, this is called
the “Disaster Management Cycle”.
This Disaster Management Cycle has four phases:
• Mitigation
• Preparedness
• Response
• Recovery
Most organizations follow this model or models that are similar to it. The most
Introduction
important characteristics are the cyclic nature of this model, that repeats itself
and the assumption that there are things we can do before a Disaster, to reduce
its impact.

26
The Disaster Management phases
The four phases in Disaster Management are divided in pre-Disaster and post-
Disaster. “Mitigation” and “Preparedness” happen before a Disaster and “Re-
sponse” and “Recovery” take place after.
Most times, it is much more efficient (and cheaper) to reduce Disaster damage,
by preparing before it rather than by having better Disaster Response. When you
prepare for Disaster, you remove some of the dangers so that no less damage
will be created. If there is less created damage, one needs less Disaster Re-
sponse.
The United Nations estimates that 1 dollar invested in Disaster

Mitigation and Preparedness can save up to 5 in Response and
Recovery.
Mitigation
Disaster Mitigation efforts must start much before the Disaster (weeks, months,
years, preferably) and their objective is the removing of dangers. This can mean
things like building houses in more protected places or the creation of regulation
that does not let people build houses in dangerous areas.
Disaster Mitigation can reduce Disaster risk a lot, by it takes a long time and
need a lot of cooperation between people, the government and private compa-
nies. Because it is so difficult and its benefits can only be observed if a Disaster
happens, Disaster Mitigation is often neglected.
Preparedness
Disaster Preparedness is a preparation for Disaster that is focused in getting peo-
ple ready to survive during and after a Disaster. Disaster Preparedness, unlike
Disaster Mitigation, will not remove dangers (e.g. poor construction of houses),
but will equip people so they can better survive.
Disaster Preparedness is very related with the acquisition of products that people
can use after a Disaster. This is why the book “Make Yourself Ready” has instruc-
tions to show to build useful products.
An advantage of Disaster Preparedness is that each person can take care of his/
her own, independently without approval or effort from government. An example:
If a person wants to prepare for Disaster, that person just has to follow the steps
in this manual and “Make Yourself Ready”. But if a person, a civilian, wants to
change the quality of the houses of the people in his/her city, it is much more dif-
ficult.
Introduction
Preparedness is not one single thing that you can do once and consider yourself
prepared, Preparedness should not stop until it is needed. Please consult the
present section, attentively, to learn more about what to do, for Disaster Pre-
paredness.

27
Response
When a Disaster has already happened, the first priority is to help the people
that might be hurt or trapped. Ambulances and Firemen are often used in the
Response phase. In this phase, the damage has already been created and it is
necessary to limit the destruction. People should be rescued before they perish
and buildings emptied before they fall.
Response has to be fast and capable, and its quality and effectiveness depends
a lot on how prepared are the people working on it (e.g. if the Firemen are well
trained before a Disaster, when the Disaster happens, they will be more ready)
After a Disaster, most people are rescued by their neighbors or family, but it is
necessary that there are specialized people (e.g. Firemen) that can save trapped
people in unexpected circumstances.
Because of this need for speed and high capability, Response is very expensive.
Recovery
After a Disaster has happened and the people have been rescued and taken care
of, it is necessary to rebuild the affected area. To this phase we call “Recovery”.
The Recovery phase can last for a very long time (e.g. even years) and should
make sure that the community returns to a normal (perhaps even improved) con-
dition. This means the reconstruction of houses, working places, farms, govern-
ment buildings, basic infrastructure and so on.
The Recovery phase is very important to make sure that some past mistakes are
avoided. If an Earthquake was very destructive because most houses were of a
poor quality, it is necessary to make better houses, this time.
Because Disaster Management is circular, Recovery and Mitigation often overlap
at this point.
Preparedness is available to families

From all the four main things people can make, it is clear that most are beyond
the reach of families and must be managed by the local government or with
external help. Mitigation requires plenty of time, resources and political power;
Response requires technical expertise and advanced equipment and Recovery
needs virtually the same as Mitigation.
Preparedness is then, the only one that is available to families. It requires some
training and effort, but because it is accessible, it can be achieved by families.
Families that are prepared are better equipped and informed on what to do and
how to do it, should a Disaster happen.
This increased preparation is good not only for the people that are prepared, but
also for those who provide assistance. When assistance providers know that
people are somehow equipped to face Disaster, they can focus their efforts in
helping the people that need it the most.
Introduction

28
C2. How can families

prepare for Disaster?
Disaster Preparedness is to be ready for Disaster and its consequences.
Disaster Preparedness for families is focused on the creation of conditions
for survival and reunification of people that were separated when the
Disaster struck.
The whole family must participate

Disaster Preparedness is for the whole family and everybody in the family, includ-
ing women and children, should learn the principles of Disaster Preparedness
and what to do in case of Disaster.
Naturally, some activities in Disaster Preparedness are not appropriate or safe for
children (e.g. building the stove described in the book “Making Yourself Ready”).
We recommend that you pay attention to what kind of tasks and chores children
in your community do, and adapt what dangerous techniques you teach. to them.
Preparation must be continuous

Disaster Preparedness, ideally, should be continuous until a Disaster happens. If
you only do some Disaster Preparedness activities once, you risk not being ready
when the Disaster happens.
If you acquire some material for a Disaster Preparedness Kit (as suggested
in “Make Yourself Ready”) and then do not make sure the material is in good
condition, it is possible that when a Disaster happens and you need you Disaster
Preparedness Kit, it will not be in good condition.
To be sure that you and your family are prepared for Disaster, you must follow
Disaster Preparedness methods continuously, until you need it.
Disaster Preparedness has 3 areas

Disaster Preparedness is continuous and, for families, it has 3 phases. These
phases are:
• Get equipment (a Disaster Preparedness Kit)

• Make plans
Introduction
• Stay informed
The first step, “Get Equipment” is one that can be mostly done once. Once peo-
ple have their supplies (e.g. the described products in “Make Yourself Ready”),
there is no need to do it again. But in the two other areas, a continuous attention
to Disaster Preparedness is necessary.

29
Get equipment
After a Disaster, people’s homes and possessions are often damaged or de-
stroyed. It is common that the most basic products are not available (e.g. hous-
ing, clothing, tools, etc). People without these and other basic products endure
difficult situations that can even be dangerous.
if the main characteristic of Disasters is the destruction of homes and posses-
sions, to be ready, people must have spare products. At least the kind of products
that are essential for survival, such as shelter, cooking conditions and water treat-
ment. Useful additions are first aid and radios, for example.
In this book and “Make Yourself Ready”, we suggest that you can start your
Disaster Preparedness Kit in a very basic and cheap way. To do this, we suggest
that some things in a Disaster Preparedness Kit are more important than others.
We consider that the following products and knowledge are essential for you and
your family’s survival after a Disaster:
• Shelter
• Cooking Stove
• Material to treat water
Useful Information • Radios
International Federa-
tion of the Red Cross Using the book “Make Yourself Ready”, people can learn how to make or acquire
these things. If they do so, we are confident that they have already improved their
and Red Crescent chances of having sufficient living conditions after a possible Disaster
Societies:
But these are the minimum, a good start. There are other things that are recom-
“Disaster mended for people to have. Please consult parts C3, C4 and C5 of this docu-
Management ment.
resources” As you can imagine , there are a lot of products that can be useful after a Disas-
http://www.ifrc.org/ ter. Having them all is expensive and requires work, but can really help people
what/disasters/re- that are affected by a Disaster.
sources/publications.
asp#dp When you have things that can perish (e.g. Food or Medicine supplies), you must
pay attention to their expiry dates and replace them before they become unus-
San Francisco able. Otherwise it might happen that when you need them the most, you realize
Department of they are too old or not good anymore. This means that you need to take care of
you Disaster Preparedness Kit continuously.
Emergency
Management: Consult part C3 of this chapter to know more about this.
“72 hours, are you
prepared?’
http://72hours.org/
Introduction

30
Make plans
People never know when and where will a Disaster happen, it might happen dur-
ing the night, it might happen when people are at work or it might happen at any
other time of the day. It is very possible that a Disaster happens when the family
is not together (e.g. children in school, parents at work).
Also, after a Disaster, communication services tend to stop working because of
too much people using them. Transports might also be halted and people are left
separated.
In these situations, it is very important to have plans, made before the Disaster,
that people can follow, even without talking to each other.
It is useful to have several different plans for different situations and to make sure
everybody knows the plans. This might need that people practice the execution
of the emergency plans several times
Consult part C4 of this chapter, to learn more about these
Stay informed
Not all Disasters give a warming, but some do. If people are informed (e.g. via
radio, loudspeaker, messenger or newspaper) about present Disaster Risks, they
can react to the Disasters faster and have better chances of evacuating or surviv-
ing the Disaster. This is an activity that people should do everyday, to make sure
it is possible for them to receive emergency information, in case of need.
Another way of staying informed is to always search for more information about
Disaster Preparedness, how to predict and survive Disasters
This is an area where radio can make a very good impact in people’s lives.
Consult part C5 of this chapter, to learn more about these
Introduction

31
C3. What products to get?

In this section, we present you a more complete list of Disaster Pre-
paredness supplies that people should try to acquire. Consider this as an
upgrade of the minimal Disaster Preparedness Kit that is suggested in
“Make Yourself Ready”.
Basic Disaster Preparedness Kit as recommended by the Red Cross

These are the things that Red Cross recommends people to have in case of
Disaster, regardless of the type of Disaster:
• Water
(two liters per person, per day)
(3-day supply for evacuation, 2-week supply for home)
• Food
(non-perishable)
(easy-to-prepare items (3-day supply for evacuation, 2-week supply for home)
• Manual can opener
• Flashlight
• Battery-powered or hand-crank radio
• Extra batteries
• First aid kit
• Medications and medical items
(7-day supply)
• Multipurpose tool
• Sanitation and personal hygiene items
• Copies of personal documents
(medication list and pertinent medical information, proof of address,
deed/lease to home, passports, birth certificates, insurance policies)
• Cell phone with chargers
• Family and emergency contact information
• Extra cash
• Emergency blanket
• Maps) of the area
Additional Disaster Preparedness Kit as recommended by the Red Cross

These are additional things that the Red Cross recommends people to have in
case of Disaster if there are special needs in the family (e.g. people with seeing
or hearing impairment, small children, elders and pets)
• Medical supplies
(hearing aids with extra batteries, glasses, contact lenses, syringes, cane)
• Baby supplies
(bottles, formula, baby food, diapers)
• Games and activities for children
Introduction
• Pet supplies
(collar, leash, ID, food, carrier, bowl)
• Extra set of car keys and house keys

32
Reinforcement to Disaster Preparedness Kit as recommended by the Red
Cross
These items are recommended additions to reinforce people’s Disaster
Preparedness Kit to be ready to stay away from home for several days.
• •Whistle
• N95 or surgical masks
• Matches
• Rain gear
• Towels
• Work gloves
• Tools/supplies for securing your home
• Extra clothing, hat and sturdy shoes
• Plastic sheeting
(if don’t already have it from “Make Yourself Ready)
• Duct tape
• Scissors
• Household liquid bleach
(if don’t already have it from “Make Yourself Ready)
• Blankets or sleeping bags
Introduction

33
C4. What plans to make

Here you can see what sort of plans are recommended by the Red Cross
for families to make
Basic Planning Conditions

Before you start planning, it is recommended that people do the following:
• Gather the whole family

• Discuss how prepared the family is for a Disaster that can happen at
home, at school, at work and at play areas.
• Identify responsibilities of each family member (e.g. one person is re-
sponsible for water, other for food, other for tools, etc.)
Basic Reunion Plan

After a Disaster, it is very possible that the family is separated. The most impor-
tant plan you must have is to reunite the family. This are the things you should
consider:
• Meeting point for family near home

• Meeting point for family outside the areas of living (e.g. outside city, or
away from the shore)
• Write down contact information for all the family to have in case of Di-
saster
Evacuation Plan
It is possible that you family is forced to evacuate after a Disaster, leaving your
home and even community behind. For evacuation, you must consider the follow-
ing things:
• Evacuation point (e.g. family house, friend’s house, assistance camp)

• Evacuation route
• Alternative Evacuation routes
Introduction

34
C5. How to stay informed?

In this section, you can see how can you stay informed about Disasters
in your area and what to do about them.
Know where to get information

To get useful and reliable information, you must know what are the best sources
of information and what their information means
• Identify how local authorities will notify you during a disaster and how
you will get information, whether through local radio, TV, loudspeakers, com-
munity alarms
• Learn how to identify the different types of Disaster Alerts (e.g. Earth-
quake, Flood, Storm, etc) and what to do in case of each of them
• Stay informed about learning opportunities in your community, so you
can educate yourself more about how to prepare for Disasters.
Introduction

35
C6. How to convince people

to prepare for Disaster?
It is true that Disaster Preparedness is an efficient way of increasing
one’s chances of survival, but it is also true that most people do not
prepare for Disaster (consult section A). To convince people to prepare
it is necessary to use the right motivation and to create conditions that
simplify the Preparedness efforts.
“What do people need to prepare for Disaster?”

Usually, people need three things to prepare for Disaster:
• Awareness
• Knowledge
• Capability
Sometimes, people know that they are under a risk that could be avoided (they
are aware of the risk), but do not know how to avoid it (they do not have enough
Knowledge to change their situations). It might also happen that people do not
have the economic capability to prepare. In fact, people must have Information,
Awareness AND Capability, to prepare for Disaster
In this section, we suggest ways to make sure people have these things and so,
can Prepare for Disaster.
“How to create Awareness?”

To create awareness, you need people to realize that there exists a certain dan-
ger of Disaster and that they can avoid that Disaster, by taking action.
To show the possibility of Disaster, it might be pretty straightforward, in a place
that has an history of Disasters (e.g. like we suppose your community is). There
are many ways to show people that their community is in danger. You can take
people around the community to see old marks of destruction, you can ask the
elders in the community to tell stories (many people like personal stories, consult
section D, “Education”) or you can show numbers, simulations and predictions
from experts.
Your first objective here is to make people realize that the area they live in is, at
the moment, dangerous.
Once people understand that they live in a dangerous area, you must make them
realize that they can change the conditions of their place, and then reduce Disas-
ter risk.
This second part might be more difficult, because in many cultures, people have
adopted a culture where man accepts life as it is and does not influence destiny.
In these cultures, people sometimes think that death by Disaster is like fate, and
no matter what man does to change it, it always happens the way it was pre-
determined.
To break this mind set, you need to prove people that either their fate is not writ-
ten or that maybe it was also fate that brought you to them and allowed them to
Introduction
Prepare, survive and prosper. Naturally, this aspect of one’s opinion on his/her
impact is very culturally dependent and you should use your common sense in
trying to change people’s minds.

36
“How to create knowledge?”

For people to know what they need to prepare for Disaster, they need information
that is relevant and adapted to people’s learning ability. This information should
tell people what are the risks and how to prepare for them.
In this book and in “Make Yourself Ready”, we give you this sort of information.
Now it is necessary that you take this information and present it to your commu-
nity in a way that people can understand it.
The bulk of this book and “Make Yourself Ready” are precisely about having
available information and ways of making that information appropriate for teach-
ing.
When making this knowledge available, let people be comfortable in asking ques-
tions and searching for more information. By being generous with the information
you have, you create the feeling that it is OK to ask questions. This is good for
people, as they become engaged with the topic.
“How to create capability?”

Capability can be the economical capability of people but also other factors, like
their previous level of instruction (if it is too low, maybe people have an harder
time to execute some tasks related with Disaster Preparedness.
Unfortunately, it is very unlikely that you can improve the economical capability of
people, but there are things you can do, to lower the capability requirements of
Disaster Preparedness.
To start with, you can teach the techniques in “Make Yourself Ready”, that were
already simplified so they could be accessible to more people.
You can also organize group activities, where people share costs for materials
or you can request the aid of government or external institutions, to help in the
financing of the Disaster Preparedness efforts of you and your community.
“What tone to adopt when convincing people to prepare for Disaster?”

You probably already realized that people often do not do things that are good
for them, like quitting drinking, washing hands before eating or using condoms.
People often do not do things that are good for them, not because their are lazy,
but because they do not see the benefit in adopting those good practices.
In Disaster Preparedness the same happens. Many people do not see the point
in preparing for Disaster, so they do not do it. In the previous paragraphs, you
saw what are the basic conditions for people to prepare. But it is also important to
present Disasters in the right way, if you want people to feel compelled to act.
Introduction
When talking about Disaster Preparedness, you should always explain the ad-
vantage of Disaster Preparedness like:
If you do some specific action, then you avoid some negative consequences.
An example:
“If people make a Cooking Stove before a Disaster, they don’t have to spend
much money on fuel, after a Disaster”
People need specific instructions to take action. it is not enough to say that peo-
ple should “prepare”. For this reason, when you are teaching Disaster Prepared-
ness to your community, you should tell people the specific things they need to
do, not some vague notion like (be prepared).
People are also more compelled to act if they think they are under risk, so it is
good to associate an action to the protection from some specific danger.

D Education
A model for education and
Experiential Learning Theory
38
Introduction

39
D1. Introduction
Before teaching people about Disaster Preparedness, it is useful to learn a
bit about how learning takes place.
Because Education can be complicated, in this section you will find
information on how Education, Teaching and Learning happen and how
can you manage them.
“What does “Education” mean?”

You probably already have an idea of what “Education” is, but we felt that it would
be good if we made clear what is the definition of “Education” that is used in this
guidebook.
Education in it simplest form is an action (e.g. a school exercise) or experience
(e.g. listening to a teacher in class, training for sports) that leads to the develop-
ment of one’s mind, body and character.
Another way of looking at Education is its place in a society. In a society, knowl-
edge, skills and moral values are transmitted from one generation to another
through education. This education does not need to be the “official” type, with a
teacher, students and a school. An example: a father teaching his son how to do
a certain job, is educating that child.
For this project, Education will be the transfer of knowledge and skills from this
book and “Make Yourself Ready”, to you and from you to the people you will
teach.
“I’m not a teacher, can I teach?”

Yes. The things you will teach to your community can be taught in a short time
and do not need a continued effort (as teaching mathematics does, for example).
Also, it is very likely that you have taught some sort of knowledge or skill to a
family member or a friend, even if not being a teacher.
If you are a teacher, you probably have quite some experience in educating peo-
ple. Naturally, this is an advantage and will probably help the teaching of Disaster
Preparedness and the technical skills for the making of supplies.
“Who should we educate?”

Everybody. It is common to think that Education is something for children and
happens in schools, with teachers and books, but Education can be more than
this.
Education can involve adults, both Men and Women, just like it can be for chil-
dren.
Education activities must be planned and carried on in different ways depend-
ing on whether one wants to reach to children, women or men. Because each of
these groups is different and tends to have different interests and influence, there
are also different advantages in teaching each of these groups.
Teaching children
Children are naturally curious and enthusiastic and might be very open to learn-
ing some of the skills presented in this guide. Also, if children are attending
school, they already have a routine of learning and participating in educational
Introduction
activities. In some cases, children going to school can be used as a way to reach
the families at home.
Children, on the other hand, require close supervision and educational materials
(e.g. posters, booklets, drawings) that suit their educational level.
40
It should be noted that some activities (e.g. the fusing of plastic, cutting of metal
and making fire) might present some hazards for the young ones. Children
should be protected and supervised, but it is also quite possible that in your com-
munity, children work or help their families in potentially dangerous activities. Use
your common sense in determining what activities children should and should not
take part in, and always supervise them.
Teaching men
In most societies, there are differences in status of men and of women. When
such differences exist, typically men have a position of authority and have the
responsibility of providing for the home. This might not be the specific case with
your community, but it is worth to pay attention that what are the roles of men and
women in your context.
Because of a generally higher status and the responsibility of providing for the
family, men can be hesitant in joining Education initiatives, if they conflict with
their working routines and/or their status.
If you can get the interest and active participation of the men from the community,
your chances that people will actually use the Disaster Preparedness knowledge
you gave them are much bigger.
Teaching women
Like previously said, in most societies, men and women do not occupy the same
place in the community. Traditionally, women have a sort of a “soft power” be-
cause even if they do not have an active voice in discussing important community
problems, they are in charge of the home finances. Also, women are usually in
charge of the education of children.
Because of their responsibilities and influence on the whole household, women
are a very interesting group to teach.
Introduction

41
D2. What matters in

teaching/learning?
Education, as explained in the previous section “D1 - Introduction”, is
the transfer of knowledge, skills and/or moral values from one person to
another. This transfer can be affected by many things (e.g. the student’s
ability or the teachers support). If you can understand what things influ-
ence Education, then it is possible to plan better to create the best condi-
tions for it to happen.
“What factors affect the success of Education efforts?”

In this guidebook, we decided to focus on three main things that can affect Edu-
cation. These things are:
• Student Characteristics
• Education Characteristics
• Education Context Characteristics
Introduction

42
Student Characteristics
Teaching something to a student that is motivated, curious and positive is much
different than teaching a student that does not want to learn, is indifferent to what
is being taught and does not believe in his ability to learn or extract anything use-
ful from what is being presented. The following characteristics are important to
ensure in a student:
• Minimum level of capability to learn

• Belief in own capability for learning
• Motivation and interest in learning
• Involvement with the education efforts
Minimum level of capability to learn
In order for the teaching of Disaster Preparedness to work, the students, regard-
less of age, gender or status, must be able to understand and memorize the
techniques that will be taught.
Belief in own capability for learning
If a person is not confident of his/her capability for learning, he/she will much
more likely to be an unsuccessful student. This happens because, during learn-
ing, most people will face, sooner or later, a moment where they feel they are not
capable of progressing.
If a person is confident that him/her can learn the things that will be presented,
then that person will be more likely to put a greater effort and overcome initial
obstacles.
Motivation and interest in learning
Learning is a mental process and it depends a lot on the student’s will to learn.
If you try to teach someone that does not want to learn, you will not be able to
do it. A person with no motivation will not pay attention or put effort into trying to
understand the concepts you teach him/her.
Motivation is important also because without it, students will not be curious and
try to discover things on their own.
Motivated students will learn better and will also push you to do a good job as a
Introduction
teacher.
Involvement with the education efforts

This is related with the previous point on motivation but has some small differ-
ences. A student can be very motivated but still, work mostly alone and on his/her
own tasks.
On the other hand, a student that gets deeply involved with the education efforts
will be more exposed to the study subject. At the same time, when a student gets
more involved with the education efforts (e.g. helping in planning classes, teach-
ing other students, experimenting and searching for more solutions that the ones
you give ) he/she will see the “backstage” of education and understand better
how Teaching/Learning works.

43
Education Characteristics
It is easy to understand that the way you teach something will influence how well
people will learn it. This is why people teach different things in different ways. A
father will teach a son how to fish, by taking him with him and showing the child
how it is done. A teacher teaches mathematics with lessons and exercises. You
can see examples of this all around you.
The following list shows what things affect the Educational methods the most:
• Principles of Learning
• Training Content
• Training Delivery
• Cognitive Style
Principles of Learning
Principles of Learning are a group of conditions that should be met for any
Educational Method. These are characteristics of a good Method and you should
follow them in your efforts. It is possible to write entire books on the topic, but for
this project, we prefer a simpler introduction. The following principles of learning
are commonly used:
• “The previous knowledge of students can help or affect new learning”

You should teach students according to what they know and at the ap-
propriate time
• “The way students connect pieces of knowledge influences their learn-

ing”
You should teach students in an organized way, so they can make
good mental connections between pieces of knowledge
• “Student’s motivation influences what they do learn”

You should keep your students motivated and they will learn and re-
tain much more knowledge
• “Students achieve mastery by learning skills, practice their application

and learn when to apply them”
When teaching, your should give students opportunities to practice
what they have learned and to determine when to use specific skills
• “Students learn better when they have clear objectives and feedback on
their performance”
You should give your students clear objectives and tell them how well
they are doing
• ”The development of students is influenced by the social atmosphere of

the learning environment”
You should promote an appropriate (not too strict, not too relaxed)
social environment in your efforts
• “For students to become good self-learners, they must be able to notice

Introduction
and adjust the way they learn”

If you want students to become independent, they must be able to be
self-critical and able to decide on how to change their situation.

44
Depending on the culture of your community, you might realize that these princi-
ples might not have all the same influence, but generally speaking, try to incorpo-
rate them in you teaching efforts.
“Training Content”
Naturally, what you teach your studnts is very important for their success in learn-
ing. Since you will start by teaching them the techniques found in this book, this
has been already adapted to be simple and accessible.
In the future, when you start your own educational efforts (e.g. teaching your own
techniques or other things besides Disaster Preparedness), you should keep this
in mind.
Always teach only what is relevant and accessible to your students.
Training Delivery
Training Delivery is, very simply put, the way you will teach your students. As it
was said previously, different things to teach require different ways of teaching.
When you teach practical skills (e.g. fishing, cooking, building houses, repair-
ing motors or the technical skills in this book ), it is best to teach in a practical
way, where people observe but also experiment with the subject. When teaching
theoretical subjects (e.g. the importance of Disaster Preparedness ), people learn
better by a mix of theoretical explaining and exercises.
Cognitive Style
Cognitive style is the way people think. Not everybody thinks about thinks in the
same way. People receive new information and make sense of it in diverse ways.
You can see this when you see people that reach different conclusions after
learning the same things.
Cognitive Style can depend on the culture of an individual, and it is possible that
the people in your community have a cognitive style different from the one of the
writers of this book. A similar concept is the “Learning Style”, described ahead in
this section.
Introduction

45
Education Context Characteristics
Teaching/Learning are part of a process, which why so many factors influence it.
The Environment where these take place also has an importance. This environ-
ment is not just the physical place (e.g. class room), but the more general social
ambient that surrounds people when they are being educated.
There are a few factors that influence the education environment:
• Support from teachers

• Support from colleagues
• Opportunity to use knowledge
Support from teachers

People learn better when their teachers are open to new questions and willing
to help them understand things that may be more complicated. When a student
sees that a teacher has no problems in answering questions, that student is more
comfortable in asking for help, when he/she does not comprehend some topic.
If students are comfortable to expose their doubts and the teacher helps them in
fully understanding a topic, the student’s knowledge will advance with no gaps.
“Support” also means encouragement from teachers, when a student is doing
well in his/her studies. If a teacher realizes a student is not doing his/her best, the
teacher should also be supportive, by encouraging the student to perform better.
Basically, “Support from teachers” is an attitude where the teacher cares
about the student’s development and takes active steps to improve it.
Support from colleagues

People do not learn all at the same time, some are faster, other slower. Some
people learn some issues better than others and some people have personal
problems that might affect their learning.
Basically, this means that not all your students will be at the same level in learn-
ing the material you teach them. This is normal.
When there is an environment where students help each other (but not cheating),
students that are more advanced in learning can help other students in learning
better. This can be very motivating because the students know that other people
in the same situation (other students) can help them if there is a more difficult
topic or if they are not feeling motivated.
When students help each other, everybody benefits.
Opportunity to use
People learn better when they have the opportunity to apply what they have
learned. You can observe this with most tasks you can think of : reading, writing,
practicing an instrument or repairing machines. With the Disaster Preparedness
techniques shown in this book, the same happens.
If you want people to learn better, you should use their knowledge. This means
letting people try the techniques themselves and guiding them in the process.
Give your students an opportunity to apply the things you teach them, so
the students become more familiar with them.
Introduction

46
D3. How do people learn?

Because “Education” can be such a complex topic, there are many theo-
ries around it and about the way people learn. For this book, we have
used Kolb’s Experiential Learning Theory. This theory is widely accepted
by Education professionals as a valid way of explaining how people learn.
“What is Experiential Learning Theory?”

Experiential Learning Theory says that learning is something that happens in a
person’s mind when the person transforms experiences into knowledge.
An example: When you touch a hot cooking pot, you get burned. You experience
the burn and in your mind, you understand that hot cooking pots burn.
This theory says that everything we learn, we learn because we experience
something and then transform that experience, in our minds, into facts that we
memorize.
When we learn, there are two things that are important:
• How we experience things (or “perceive”)
• How we transform experiences into knowledge (or “understand”)
Useful Information
Introduction
Experiential Learn-
ing Theory and the
Learning Style Inven-
tory were developed
by David Kolb, as a
result of his studies
in adult education.

47
“How we experience (or “perceive”) things?”
Different people experience things in different ways. Some people prefer to arrive
to new experiences, by THINKING and other people prefer FEELING.
An example: Imagine that you need to now if the water boiling in a pot, is hot.
There is two ways of knowing, you can remember that boiling water is very hot
or you can touch the water and get burned. In both cases, you experienced the
discovery that that water in that pot is hot.
Officially, in this theory, “FEELING” is called “Concrete Experience” and “THINK-
ING” is called “Abstract Conceptualization”. To keep things simple, in this book,
we will use the terms “FEELING” and “THINKING”.
How we transform experiences into knowledge (or “understand”)”

Now imagine a different situation: You are teaching your son how to do some-
thing (e.g. wash his hands).
There are two ways he can learn how to wash his hands. He can pay a lot of at-
tention to you, washing your hands, and observe. Or he can wash his hands and
learn by doing it.
When you transform experience into knowledge by WATCHING or observing
something, we say you are doing “Reflective Observation”. When you transform
experience into knowledge by DOING, we say that you are doing “Active Experi-
mentation”,
Again, to keep things simple, we will use the words “WATCHING” and “DOING”.
“Does everybody learn in the same way?”

No. If you pay attention to the Experiential Learning Theory, you will see that it
has 2 phases, an initial perception phase, where people experience an event,
and a second understanding phase, where people convert that experience into
knowledg. Each of this phases has two modes:
• Perceive
• THINKING
• FEELING
• Understand
• WATCHING
• DOING
Different people prefer different Perceiving modes and different Understanding

modes. These preferences are also related to culture, so people from the same
culture, probably like to learn in similar ways.
Section E, “Your Community”, has more information on this.
Introduction

48
“What are the possible combinations of preferences in learning?”
There are four possible combinations of modes in Experiential Learning Theory,
and they are called Learning Styles. Originally, they were explained with the of-
ficial names, but in this book, we will use the simpler names “THINKING”, “FEEL-
ING”, “WATCHING” and “DOING”.
The possible combinations are:
FEELING + WATCHING
FEELING + DOING
THINKING + WATCHING
THINKING + DOING
Each of this combination, means a different preference for learning. When you
understand the preferred learning style of the people in your community, you can
prepare education activities that are more appropriate.
FEELING + WATCHING (officially named “Diverging”)

People with a Diverging learning style have plenty of cultural interests and like
to gather information. They are interested in people, tend to be imaginative and
emotional, and tend to be strong in the arts. People with the Diverging style
prefer to work in groups, to listen with an open mind and to receive personal
feedback.
To teach people that prefer this style, it is good to:
• Use group activities

• Encourage participation (e.g. open discussions)
• Use diverse teaching activities
• Use theater, music and dramatization as education activities
FEELING + DOING (officially named “Accommodating”)

People with a preference for this learning style like to use other people’s analysis,
and prefer to take a practical, experiential approach. They are attracted to new
challenges and experiences, and to carrying out plans. They commonly act on
‘gut’ instinct rather than logical analysis.
Introduction
People with an Accommodating learning style will tend to rely on others for infor-
mation than carry out their own analysis. This learning style is prevalent and use-
ful in roles requiring action and initiative. People with an Accommodating learning
style prefer to work in teams to complete tasks. They set targets and actively
work in the field trying different ways to achieve an objective.
• Give people opportunities to experiment (e.g. let people build their own
Disaster Preparedness supplies)
• Give people information and present challenges
• Give people clear instructions on how to do things
• Motivate people by showing their progress and their goals
• Show people how to do things and let them do things themselves

49
THINKING + WATCHING (officially named “Assimilating”)

People that like to learn in this way, prefer a concise, logical approach. Ideas
and concepts are more important than people. These people require good clear
explanation rather than practical opportunity.
They are very good at understanding very varied information and organizing it a
clear logical format. People with an Assimilating learning style are less focused
on people and more interested in ideas and abstract concepts. The find abstract
topics more interesting than practical knowledge.
• Give information in readings, lectures and presentation

• Give people the opportunity to reach their own conclusions
• Focus on theoretical topics instead of practical information ( they prefer
the teaching the theory behind Disaster Preparedness instead of the tech-
niques to make the products)
THINKING + DOING (officially named “Converging”)

People that prefer this approach to learning like to solve new problems. They like
to think about solutions and then try those solutions. These people find technical
issues more important than human issues (e.g. the need to solve the problem is
more important that saving face) and are best at finding practical use for ideas
and theories.
These people like the idea of specialization and the opportunity to test real-life
situations.
• To teach people that prefer this style, it is good to:

• Show practical information and how can this information be useful
• Divide work groups based on their specialty or job
• Give people the opportunity to test new ideas
• Give concrete goals
“Do these learning styles make sense with everybody in my community?”

It depends. As you will find out in section E, “Your Community”, it is possible to
predict what kind of learning styles are better for each culture.
Obviously, not everybody in your community is exactly the same, but probably,
people share similar preferences in learning.
Introduction

50
Introduction

E Your community
How to study your community, how
is the local culture and what are the
education conditions.
Includes Assessment Questionnaires
and Interpretation Guides.
52
Introduction

53
E1. Introduction
When this book was written, it was made to be useful for the largest
number of people and contexts. This means that its information and the
way that this information is given to you are very general.
For better results in educating your community, it is important to adapt
to it, but first, you must understand its particular characteristics
“What is important in characterizing my community?”

Naturally, everything is important to understand what makes your community
different from other communities. All the little details make a difference and the
more you know, the more appropriate you can make your education project,
Obviously, it is impossible to learn EVERYTHING about your community, so we
suggest you pay attention to a few important factors:
• Where are you, geographically

• What are your neighboring communities and what do you think you have
in common with them (e.g. customs, language, traditions, occupations, reli-
gion or beliefs, etc)
• How wealthy or educated are the people in your community
• How does the majority of people define success (e.g. is it money? Is it
family bond?, etc)
• How people see personal development and learning
Perhaps you have noticed some differences between your community and other
communities in the same region. They are different because their “contexts” are
different. If you can see differences within the same region, you can imagine how
different your community is from ours, where this book was written. Because
probably live in very different places, you must study what makes your commu-
nity special and different from others.
“Why study the community?”

Because this book was written in another country and possibly some time ago
(Netherlands in 2010), its is quite possible that the way it is written is not immedi-
ately understood by your community. Not only language, but also cultural ways of
thinking about Disaster, Preparation and Education might be different. If the book
had been written specifically for you situation (where you are, the Culture that is
around you, etc), the information it contains would already be somehow adapted
to fit with your context.
Because when the book was written, we did not know whether you would be in
the Americas, Africa, Europe, Asia or any other more precise place, we had to
make it general and easy to adapt.
People learn better if the things they learn are important to them and if the way
theses things are taught is compatible with their own culture.
In this chapter we show you how to study your context in a way that can be
useful later on, when you need to adapt the information in this book to teach the
people in your community
Introduction

54
“What needs to be adapted to the community?”
We consider that in education, there are two important factors that determine how
people will receive it:
• What is taught
• How it is taught
An example: if you teach people how to how to prepare a meal, but the people of
the communtty does not like it, people will not want to learn how to cook it. Also if
you teach how to cook that recipe, by using teaching methods that people do not
like or understand, they will not learn.
It is easy to understand that people will be more interested and successful in
learning things that are important to them and within their capabilities. This is why
people learn simple mathematics before learning more complex sciences.
The way things are taught is also very important because different methods of
teaching will be more focused on different skills. When people study drawing,
they have to draw and when people study history, they have to read and listen. It
is important to know what is being taught and what are the best ways of teaching
it.
It is usually easy to understand what is important for people. You can ask them or
observe what problems they face in their day to day lives, and this can become
apparent. It is often more difficult to understand how people like to learn.
Because this book was made so you can teach Disaster Preparedness tech-
niques to your community, we already know what you will teach. Perhaps people
are not initially interested (e.g. maybe they think it is too complicated) but it is
quite straightforward to adapt the things you want to teach, so they become more
interesting for the people (e.g. by simplifying the things you want to teach).
However, because it is generally more difficult to understand how people like to
learn, in this booklet, you will find a way of evaluating your community and choos-
ing the best way to teach its people.
Introduction

55
E2. How to study my

community?
To study your community, you must take a look at it and pretend you
are not familiar with it. You must question what things do people do and
why would they do those things in the way they do.
“How will I study my community?”

You are probably very familiar with the people in your community and you might
even feel that you know everything about it. This might even be true, but for this
phase, it is necessary to understand the deeper reasons behind people’s actions.
An example: If a family does not send the girls to school, is it because they
have no money to pay for education, is it because parents need the girls to stay
at home and help, is it because people are suspicious about educating girls or
because it is not safe for the girls to go to school? In fact it can be any of these or
other reasons, but you must try to understand the reasons behind every behavior
and take note of them. We can tell you this will need some effort.
Naturally, to understand the reasons why people do the things they do, you must
know what they do. Still using the example above; imagine that you did not know
that a family does not send the girls to school, then you would never ask “why”
and reach the conclusion.
The best way to study the community is to spend time in it, speaking with the
people, see people doing their jobs and asking questions every time you have a
doubt.
Because we wanted to make research easy and even fun, in this manual you can
find explanations and methods that will help you in studying your community. You
can find which formularies you will need and also instructions on how to inter-
pret the answers you get. There is also a section with very practical advice on
how to do certain research activities (e.g. interviewing people or organizing work
groups).
Again, consulting the free IDEO Human Centered Design Tool Kit is a good idea,
it is listed on the left.
If you are curious, you can jump to part F5, “Evaluation Questionnaires” to take
a look, but do not start research without reading the present chapter. It might
Useful Information appear a bit uninteresting but it will save you precious time and you will not make
simple mistakes.
IDEO -
“Human Centered
Design Tool Kit”
Available at: “What things I need to discover in this study?”
http://www.ideo.com/ The research you will conduct will give you an understanding of two things:
work/item/human-
centered-design- • How is the local culture of the people you are willing to teach about Di-
toolkit/ saster Preparedness
• What are the present Education Conditions in your community
Introduction

56
Culture of people to be taught about Disaster Preparedness

The Culture of people that you will teach (and if you are from the same culture,
this also applies to you) will influence a lot of your teaching efforts.
People from around the world think in different ways and like to learn things in dif-
ferent ways. You probably already have an understanding of how people in your
community like to learn, but if you use the research suggestions in this guide-
book, it will be easier to adapt the instructions we provide.
“Culture” is a very large thing to study and to simplify, we propose that you con-
sider three important types of characteristics:
• Communication Habits
• Cultural Values
Communication Habits
Communication Habits are related to how people express themselves and how
they interpret others. Communication changes a lot from culture to culture and
this has an effect on education. In this case, we suggest you study “Communi-
cation Habits” to understand how to adapt the teaching material. An example:
some cultures read from left to right, while others read from right to left. When
writing instruction manuals, this has an influence. Also the way people express
measures and quantities changes, with some cultures using liters others using
gallons and other using their own units. Again, this factors will affect the presenta-
tion of instructions.
Cultural Values
A deeper aspect of culture is the set of values that make people prefer to act
in specific ways. Values are usually deep within people’s reasoning and most
people will no be able to identify them if asked directly. An example:
Although in many cultures people prefer to work in groups ( this means they are
“Collectivistic”), if you ask them if they are collectivistic, they will not be able to
answer.
Present Education Conditions in the community

It is important to know what the Education Conditions in your community because
it shows you what you have to address with your planning for educational efforts.
Your goal with this project is to solve what issues are missing, so it is fundamen-
tal to know what people think about Disaster Preparedness, what is their educa-
tion level and how is the educational system in your area.
Introduction

57
“How will I use the results of this study?”
When you finish your research, you will have some information that you can use
to adapt the teaching materials in this manual, so they are more relevant for the
people you are trying to help prepare for Disaster.
This information will be useful for:
• Planning how to teach Disaster Preparedness

• Adapt teaching methods
• Create teaching material
Planning how to teach Disaster Preparedness

If you try to teach the contents of this guidebook to people, without preparing
properly before it, you might have some success in teaching a few people, but it
is likely that your efforts will not last for long.
For an efficient effort you will need to plan a little, and in this guide, you will find
instructions on how to do it, based on the information you got during the research
phase. You can find these instructions in section C.
Adapt teaching methods

It was mentioned before, but it remains important to be said: people learn in dif-
ferent ways and education should be adapted to that. In your efforts, you will be
more successful if you start with teaching methods that people from your commu-
nity can relate to
Create teaching material

Depending on what teaching methods you end up using, teaching material of
some sort will be useful. This can be wall posters, small leaflets, puppet shows or
stories.
In this manual you will find resources to make teaching material of the printed
kind.
Introduction

58
E3. How is my local Culture?

People from different places or groups think and act in different ways
because their Cultures are not the same. This difference in Culture means
that people also learn in different ways. In this section you will learn how
to characterize the Culture of your community in a way that lets you
adapt the information in this book to be more practical
“What does “Culture” mean?”

“Culture” is the group of attitudes, values, objectives and ways of doing things
that a group shares.
You can observe this in your community, because “Culture” is everywhere and
does not need to be written or “official”. If a certain group of people does things in
a certain way, that ways of doing things is part of their “Culture”.
A simple example: In some villages, people have traditional foods, types of art,
religious beliefs and moral rules. All these things (and many others) are the ele-
ments that make up that village’s Culture.
In your community, people also have specific ways of doing things. If you had not
realized this before, try to compare how things are done in your community and
in other communities you might know. It is easier to detect “Culture” of a place
when we compare it with another, different place.
“Isn’t “Culture” too big for me to research?”

No, because we will focus only on a few parts of it.
Culture is, in fact, a huge field and it would not be realistic for you to study all that
it contains. The good thing is that you do not need to know everything about your
community’s Culture, only a few important factors.
“What are the important parts of Culture that I have to research?”

There are many ways of studying Culture. One of them is to divide Culture in a
few broad categories and then see how relevant those categories are for each
studied Culture.
These categories are usually called “Cultural Dimensions” by social scientists. XX
include an explanatory graph with layers of values and stuff yy
For our study of “Culture”, we will focus on 8 Cultural Dimensions. The Cultural
Dimensions that will be used for your research are:
Introduction
• Collectivism
• Power Distance
• Future Orientation
• Gender Egalitarianism
• Humane Orientation
• Assertiveness
• Uncertainty Avoidance
• Performance Orientation

59
Maybe this list of factors seems too complex and you feel that it will be very dif-
ficult to conduct the Cultural characterization of your community’s Culture. That is
not the case. Each Cultural Dimension is explained ahead. Also, in the question-
naire provided, questions are grouped by cultural dimension in an easy way to
understand. All was made so you can understand the questions and the answers
to your study of the local culture.
An example: Communities that make a big distinction between jobs for men and
jobs for women have a low gender egalitarianism. This means that men and
women do not have equal rights and duties in those communities.
“What do these Cultural Dimensions mean?”

Now that you understand the idea of Cultural Dimension, it is necessary to ex-
plain each listed one. Perhaps you can even already understand them through
their names. In any case, a short description follows:
“Collectivism”
Collectivism is related to how people of a culture relate to each other. Its opposite
is “Individualism”. A culture might be more inclined towards “Collectivism” or “Indi-
vidualism”. In Collectivistic Cultures, people tend to belong to groups (e.g. family,
caste, neighbourhood, etc) that are very close. People in Collectivistic societies
will consider their groups as a major factor of their personal identity.
In individualistic societies, the opposite happens. People are more indepen-
dent and while they also belong to groups, groups are not their main identity. In
individualistic societies, people look after themselves (and immediate family) and
expect others to do the same.
“Power Distance”
Power Distance is related to how much people of a Culture will accept an unbal-
anced distribution of power among its people. While in some Cultures, everybody
is seen as equal to the others, with similar rights and duties; in other Cultures, dif-
ferent people have different privileges and responsibilities. One can say that the
“Power Distance” is lower in the first example (because everybody has the same
“Power”); and higher in the second example (because there is a difference in how
much power people have).
A simple indicator of an high Power Distance in a culture is when people of that
culture occupy the same social position during all their lives because their are not
allowed to achieve a greater status.
“Future Orientation”
Future Orientation is how much people in a certain culture encourage behavior
that is focused on the future and not on the present situation, like planning or
saving money. Cultures with a strong Future Orientation will promote the delay-
ing of instant gratification versus impulsive action (e.g. saving for a better house,
instead of spending money on immediate pleasure). Also, cultures that score high
in Future Orientation usually see material success (e.g. getting rich or having
plenty of possessions ) on the same level of spiritual realization (e.g. being happy
and fulfilled).
On the opposite, where Future Orientation is low, people do not save as much
and have a less planned life. Instead of setting goals and plans, people are more
Introduction
likely to be inflexible and do things the same way, regardless of changing circum-
stances.

60
“Gender Egalitarianism”
Gender Egalitarianism can be understood as how equal are Men and Women in
a society, regarding their rights and obligations. Naturally, cultures that are more
gender egalitarian will allow women a greater freedom and equal access to edu-
cation and work.
On the opposite side are cultures that have a low Gender Egalitarianism score.
In these, Women and Men do not do the same work and there are divisions on
what is considered to be appropriate for either sex. Women are usually limited to
taking care of the home and family and will not have much of an active voice in
community decision making.
“Humane Orientation”
Humane Orientation has to do with a culture’s appreciation of benevolence, kind-
ness and generosity. Putting others above oneself is considered to be a good and
noble thing to do and a valued characteristic in people.
At the same time, in highly humane oriented cultures, self-enhancement can
sometimes be considered merely self serving and self gratifying and hence, little
humane oriented.
Competition, personal success and ambition are on the natural opposite of Hu-
mane Orientation.
“Assertiveness”
Assertiveness is the measure of how much a culture supports the belief that
people should be tough, aggressive and persistent in their efforts to achieve suc-
cess. Cultures where assertiveness is high, people have respect for the strong
and successful and competition is seen in a good way, as it forces people to
achieve and fight for their objectives. In these societies, there is a belief that one
can control his/her reality and results are more important than relationships.
There is, obviously, the other side of the scale, where people prefer to avoid con-
frontation and accept life as it is presented to them. For people that are not very
assertive, persistence in the face of adversity is sometimes seen as pointless and
people are more important that achieved results.
“Uncertainty Avoidance”
Introduction
Uncertainty Avoidance involves the extent to which, in a culture, vagueness is

tolerated. Cultures with an high Uncertainty Avoidance, try to reduce the amount
of ambiguity and undefined situations. This happens through the implementation
of formalities and procedures. These cultures usually resist change and take risks
only after some moderate thinking.
Cultures with a low Uncertainty Avoidance are much more open to new, unfamil-
iar situations and are more keen on taking risks. Work and private life may not
be as “scripted” as in the uncertainty avoiding cultures and people encourage a
more risk-taking atittude.

61
“Performance Orientation”
Performance Orientation reflects how much a culture cherishes and rewards
innovation, high quality of work and constant improvement. Cultures that have a
high score for Performance Orientation have a preference for demanding objec-
tives that will take one out of his/her comfort zone and accomplish better results.
Time is seen as linear, mono chronic and a sense or urgency is also common
Where Performance Orientation is low, the opposite is observed. People tend to
prefer a pleasurable take on life, less competitive and more collectivistic.
“How do I measure the Cultural Dimensions of my community?”

Much like the evaluation of Education Conditions, in this guidebook you can find
a questionnaire that you guide you in getting a feeling for the culture of your com-
munity. The questionnaire presents you with questions grouped by the different
cultural dimensions, not all the Cultural Dimensions are present, only those that
are found to influence learning preferences.
The process of measuring the different Cultural Dimensions in your community is
the following:
• Read and get familiar with the questions in the given questionnaire
• Observe community and answer questions in the form
• Check answers against interpretation guide
“How do I interpret my results?”

The results of your research will be interpreted against what was will be intro-
duced in D, “Education”. There is a relationship between the Cultural Dimensions
and people’s preferences in learning styles, so interpreting the results just re-
quires the matching of the Cultural Dimension scores and the appropriate teach-
ing/learning style. Like the questionnaire, the interpretation guide can be found in
part E5.
Introduction

62
E4. What are the local

Education Conditions?
Before embarking on an education effort to teach people about Disaster
Preparedness, it is necessary to understand what are the conditions that
will define that education effort. In this section, you are presented with
simple ways of evaluating the Education Conditions of your community.
“What does “Education Conditions” mean?”

“Education Conditions” are the factors that influence education in your commu-
nity. In the specific case of this guidebook, they mean three things:
• What people think about Disaster Preparedness

• What is the Education Level of people in the Community
• How is the Educational System in the community
“what people think about Disaster Preparedness”

If people do not know about Disaster Preparedness or think that there is no point
in investing the resources to prepare for Disaster, they will not be receptive to
your efforts. If Disaster Preparedness is not seen as an important activity, it is
very likely that people will not be motivated to learn it and apply it.
It is necessary to know if people think Disaster Preparedness is important,
in order to predict the population’s interest in Disaster Preparedness edu-
cation
“What is the Education Level of people in the community”

People can only learn what they are ready to understand. Being ready to under-
stand something depends a lot on how educated a person is. You can imagine
that teaching a complex subject can only happen if the students already learned
simpler notions.
By knowing the education level in the community you become equipped to adapt
the things you will teach and the way you will teach them to the people.
The education level of people will influence what you can teach them and
Introduction
how can you do it
“How is the Educational System in the community”

As it was already said in section B, “Method” , if you are trying to run a project
like this, the education of your community, you will need the help and support of
others. Some of the best support can be from schools, teachers, parents or stu-
dent associations. The reasons for this are simple: these people are all involved
with teaching and learning and will know valuable things that can help you.
Also, if the educational system is in good shape, you can even be able to use its
resources like classrooms, teaching support for teachers and even perhaps use
the normal classes as a place where to teach these contents to the children
The education system of your community can give you plenty of support
and insight on how to run a project like this

63
“How do I evaluate the Education Conditions in my community?”
Now you know what are the three factors that influence more how your Disas-
ter Preparedness education efforts will be received, you need to know how to
answer the questions they create. For this, we created a simple questionnaire
that you can fill based on your observations or with the help of others. You can
consult this questionnaire in part F5.
There are three main steps in evaluating the Education Conditions of your com-
munity:
• Read and get familiar with the questions in the given questionnaire
• Observe community and answer questions in the form
• Check answers against interpretation guide
“How do I interpret the results of my evaluation?”

Along with the questionnaire, we provide you with instructions on how to interpret
its results, so you can be confident of your judgement. Whatever results you get
from the evaluations, you will be able to understand how the Education Condi-
tions of your community influence your efforts.
Like the questionnaire, the interpretation guide can be found in section F5.
Introduction

64
E5. What tools do I use?

It would make no sense to explain how culture and learning are related
and how educational conditions are influent and then do not provide
tools for the reader to make an useful evaluation for him or herself. In
this section, we introduce two evaluation questionnaires
“How precise are these questionnaires?”

These questionnaires were made to be simple to understand yet, accurate
enough to allow you to take responsible decisions, based on their results. They
are, naturally, simplified. We suggest you verify their advice, but also use your
own common sense to see if their suggestions make sense.
“Who has to answer the questionnaires?”

The person or persons responsible for the planning of the educational activities.
Our objective, by including these questionnaires was to facilitate a preliminary
look at your community to better understand how to teach its people.
For the questionnaires to be useful, they should be answered by one or more re-
sponsible persons, with an overview of the entire Disaster Preparedness educa-
tion programme.
“How much time does it take to answer the questionnaire?”

It depends, but it could take as little as 10 minutes, if you already know the an-
swers. For example: if you do not know if people prepare for Disaster, you have
to ask a few people if they do it. This “field research” can make your evaluation
longer. It would not be uncommon, if it took you around a week to collect basic
information, but this obviously depends on the size of the community.
To speed up the process, it might be useful to have more than one person asking
questions to the people from the community. Each person should be the sole
responsible for his or her questionnaires, but with more people filling them in, the
faster it is to have several opinions from people in the community
Introduction

Formulary - How is the local Culture 65
How is the local culture

Assessment Formulary
This formulary has 5 groups of statements about the culture of your community, each group has 4 state-
ments that you must answer by saying if you agree or not. The 8 groups of statements are related with 5 of
the 8 Cultural Dimensions. Only these 5 have been found to be related to the way people like to learn.
Also, this questionnaire is more useful to find out how people like to perceive things (consult section D,
“Education”). There is no found relationship between these or other cultural dimensions and the way
people prefer to convert experiences into knowledge.
There are four possible answers, from “Totally Agree” to “Totally Disagree”. For each statement, select your
answer by drawing a circle around it.
This assessment can be done individually or in group, but it is important to be very honest.
There are no wrong answers, the objective is to understand what characteristics

define the culture of your community.
At the end of the formulary, there is a guide to interpret your answers.
Example of Statement and answer:
“In this community, people speak in a direct way, saying everything in a precise
way.
4. Always □ 3. Sometimes □ 2. Rarely □ 1. Never □“
In the above example question, the person answering the questionnaire does not think that people in his/
her community speak with each other in such a way. We can see his/her answer marked with a circle
around it. This person disagree
How to make Disaster Preparedness Supplies

66 Formulary - How is the local Culture
A - Collectivism
“Collectivism” is related with the way people relate with each other, if they prefer to work indi-
vidually, in groups and how they help and support each other.
Question 1
In this community, people make a clear distinction between people who are part of their group and those
who are not. (e.g. people treat strangers in very different ways from people from their neighborhood)
4. Always □ 3. Sometimes □ 2. Rarely □ 1. Never □
Question 2
In this community, people are defined by the groups they belong to, like family, job, rank or caste. (e.g.
people think that their family says more about their identity than their possessions or education)
Question 3
In this community, people prefer to work in groups, with other people, instead of alone.
Question 4
In this community, people help and give support to members of their group (e.g. money, influence, emo-
tional help)
B - Future Orientation
“Future Orientation” has to do with how a culture encourages behaviors that will have future,
not instant, effects (e.g. saving money, enduring hardship to collect benefits, etc)
Question 9
In this community, people are capable of delaying instant pleasure to receive better rewards in the future
(e.g. saving money for the future, working extra to avoid extra work in the future, etc)
Question 10
In this community, sending children to school is considered a good future investment
Question 11
In this community, people are able to change the way they do things if they believe there is a future benefit
Question 12
In this community, people prefer leaders that can propose new ways of doing things.
Making a stronger Community |

C - Gender Egalitarianism
“Gender Egalitarianism” has to do with how a culture tries to minimize differences between
men and women, in what concerns to liberties and duties
Question 13
In this community, tasks and jobs are not divided between “appropriate for men” and “appropriate for
women”.
Question 14
In this community, men and women have same rights and duties
Question 15
In this community, opinions from men and from women have the same value.
Question 16
In this community, men and women have similar access to education
D - Assertiveness
“Assertiveness” is related with how society encourages people to be persistent, active and
though in following their objectives
Question 17
In this community, people speak in a direct way, saying everything in precise terms.
Question 18
In this community, people are judged based on their accomplishments, and not on their affiliation
Question 19
In this community, people believe it is possible to control all the events in their lives.
Question 20
In this community, people who are dominant and work hard for their goals are respected

E - Uncertainty Avoidance
“Uncertainty Avoidance” is related to how comfortable are people in ambiguous, undefined
situations.
Question 21
In this community, people do things according to known fixed rules
Question 22
In this community, people interact with each other in predictable, formalized ways
Question 23
In this community, there are many written and unwritten rules that determine people’s relationships, rights
and duties
Question 24
In this community, people are not comfortable in trying new ways of doing things. Traditional methods are
preferred.

How is the local culture

Formulary Interpretation Guide
Now that you have the answers for the cultural assessment questionnaire, you must understand what it
means about your community and the way its people prefer to learn.
It is important to remember that we made this questionnaire to be a simple, easy way of understanding a
bit more about your culture. It is possible that you had never though about some of these questions, but
understood exactly what they meant, the moment you read them
The interpretation of this questionnaire is not an exact science, but we believe it can be a good guidance
To interpret the results of your questionnaire, the first thing you must do is to add up the numbers of each
answer you gave, for each of the five Cultural Dimensions.
As you can see, each question that you answer with “Always” is worth 4 points. Each “Never” is worth one
point, and the other possible answers are worth the number of points written before them.
an example:
“4. Always □ 3. Sometimes □ 2. Rarely □ 1. Never □ = 4 points“
A - Calculate points for each Cultural Dimension

Go back to the questionnaire and add up the points of each of the five Cultural dimensions.
Then write them down below. The maximum is 4 x 4 points per Cultural Dimension and the
minimum is 4 x 1 point.
Collectivism: __________ points

Future Orientation: __________ points
Gender Egalitarianism: __________ points
Assertiveness: __________ points
Uncertainty Avoidance: __________ points

B - Interpret Results
This questionnaire was made in such a way that the higher the points per Cultural Dimension,
the higher that Cultural Dimension is. Comparing the scores of the Cultural Dimensions of your
community and the interpretation below, lets you know how to adapt your education efforts
to your community. For a more detailed overview of the terms “FEELING”; “WATCHING”;
“THINKING” and “DOING”, please consult section D of this book, “Education”.
Collectivism
• Low Collectivism (score between 1 and 8):
People have a preference for FEELING as a way of experiencing things
People have a preference for WATCHING as a way to convert experiences into knowledge
• High Collectivism (score between 9 and 16)

People have a preference for THINKING as a way of experiencing things
People have a preference for DOING as a way to convert experiences into knowledge
Future Orientation
• Low Future Orientation (score between 1 and 8)
• High Future Orientation (score between 9 and 16)

Gender Egalitarianism
• Low Gender Egalitarianism (score between 1 and 8)
• High Gender Egalitarianism (score between 9 and 16)

Assertiveness
• Low Assertiveness (score between 1 and 8)
• High Assertiveness (score between 9 and 16)

Uncertainty Avoidance
• Low Uncertainty Avoidance (score between 9 and 16)
• High Uncertainty Avoidance


Formulary - What are the Education Conditions 71
How are the education

conditions
Assessment Formulary
This questionnaire has some simple questions that are useful for you to understand what are the education
conditions in your community. This is useful to plan educational activities that are meaningful and within
the reach of the students.
In this questionnaire we consider the same three areas as introduced before in this chapter:
• What people think about Disaster Preparedness

• What is the Education Level of people in the Community
• How is the Educational System in the community
To answer some of these questions, it is useful to speak directly with the population (more than one per-
son, and individually) and ask them these questions. When you have a few opinions (more than 5 people,
from different groups)
There are no wrong answers, the objective is to understand what characteristics

define the culture of your community.
At the end of the formulary, there is a guide to interpret your answers.
Example of Statement and answer:
“In this community, people see Disasters as events that cannot be avoided by
Man.
4. Always □ 3. Sometimes □ 2. Rarely □ 1. Never □“
In the above example question, the person answering the questionnaire does not think that people in his/
her community consider Disasters unavoidable. We can see his/her answer marked with a circle around it.

72 Formulary - What are the Education Conditions
A - What people think about Disaster Preparedness

It is necessary to know people’s opinion on Disaster Preparedness, before you try to teach it to
them. If people do not understand the concept of Disaster Preparedness, you must start your
teaching efforts by explaining it.
Group I - people’s beliefs on own resistance to Disaster
Question 1
In this community, people see Disasters as events that can be avoided by Man.
Question 2
In this community, people think that it is possible to prepare for Disasters and be safer when they happen.
Question 3
In this community, people think that they are prepared and not dependent on the Government or other
external institutions to help them after Disaster.
Group II - people’s knowledge about Disaster Preparedness
Question 4
In this community, people think that Disaster Preparedness should be done before the Disaster.
Question 5
In this community, people think that Disaster Preparedness is about getting tools and supplies for survival
after Disaster.
Question 6
In this community, people think that Disaster Preparedness is about making plans for what to do after a
Disaster
Question 7
In this community, people think that Disaster Preparedness is about staying informed about Disaster risks
before and after a Disaster
Question 8
In this community, people think that Disaster Preparedness is a continuous process before the Disaster

Group III - people’s level of preparedness
Question 9.A
In this community, people have set aside materials and supplies to use in the event of a Disaster.
Question 9.B
What are the things that people most commonly set aside for Disaster?
(more than one answer is possible)
Water □ Food □ First Aid □ Shelter □ Cooking Material □ Tools □
Radios □
Question 9.C
What are the reasons for people for not having something from the previous list?
Did not know it was necessary □ Don’t think it is necessary □ Cannot find the product □
Cannot afford the product □ Does not know how to use the product □
Does not like the product □
Question 10.A
In this community, people know what types of Disaster can happen.
Question 10.B
In this community, people have made plans to know what to do in case of Disaster.
Question 10.C
What are the plans that people have made in case of Disaster?
(more than one answer is necessary)
Meeting Point in the area of living □ Meeting Point outside the area of living □
Possible Evacuation Points □ Possible Evacuation Routes □
Who to contact in case of Disaster □ What to take in case of an Evacuation □
Question 11.A
In this community, people stay informed about what types of Disaster can happen.
Question 11.B
In this community, people stay informed about what to do in case of different types of Disaster than can
happen.

B - What is the Education Level of people in the Community

To teach people about something, it is necessary to use contents and methods that people can
understand and relate to. If people have a very low level of Education, you must simplify your
teaching approach.
Question 12
In this community, most people can read with no help
Question 13
In this community, most people have seen other educational material (e.g. posters, leaflets or brochures
from health campaigns) and understood it.
Question 14
What are the ways people entertain themselves?
Music □ Dance □ Group Talk □ Theatre □ Radio □ Television □
Reading □ Sports and Games □
C - How is the Educational System in the community

If you know how does the Educational System work in the community, it is easier to ask for the
help of teachers for support and a place to teach.
Question 15
In this community, there are places where people learn
Yes □ No □
Question 16
What are the places where people learn?
Schools □ Religious Temples □ Technical Education Schools □ Civic centers □
Others □: (say which) ___________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________________________________
Question 17
Can you use them for having educational activities
Yes □ No □

How are the education

conditions
Formulary Interpretation Guide
Now that you have collected information that can help you determine how are the education conditions
of your community, you can interpret those results and better understand how much people know about
Disaster Preparedness, how prepared they are and what will be your challenges and resources in educat-
ing you community.
As you noticed, in the questionnaire, the questions were grouped in three main parts ( “What people think
about Disaster Preparedness”, “What is the Education Level of people in the Community” and “How is the
Educational System in the community”). You probably also noticed that in the second main part, there were
subgroups (“people’s beliefs in own resistance to Disaster”, “people’s knowledge about Disaster Pre-
paredness” and “People’s level of Preparedness”).
For each subgroup, there is a different way of interpreting the answers. All the corresponding ways are
listed here.
A - What people think about Disaster Preparedness

Group I and Group II - Add up the answer points of questions in each group
As you can see, each question that you answer with “Always” is worth 4 points. Each “Never” is worth one
point, and the other possible answers are worth the number of points written before them. The higher the
points in group I, the more people believe they are prepared. The more points in group II, the more people
know about Disaster Preparedness (it does not mean, however, that they are prepared)
an example:
“4. Always □ 3. Sometimes □ 2. Rarely □ 1. Never □ = 4 points“
Group I __________ points (max is 3 x 4 points)

Group II __________ points (max is 5 x 4 points)

Group III - See what is missing in the answers of each question
This group of questions was made to show what is missing in people’s Disaster Preparedness.
In the questions with “4. Always” to “1. Never” as possible answers, if you selected “4. Always” as the an-
swer, it means that people are already in a good direction in preparing for Disaster. If you selected another
option, it means that you must pay special attention during your education efforts
In the questions where more than one answer is allowed and you must select which several options apply
to your community, if there is an option that you do not select, it means that it is an area that you must
special attention during your education efforts.
B - What is the Education Level of people in the Community

Add up the points
Learn from answer
In this part there are two types of questions. The first two serve to show how independent are people in
learning and the 3rd question serves to bring out your attention to the way people entertain themselves
and how can you use these activities as a way of educating people.
In the questions with “4. Always” to “1. Never” as possible answers, if you selected “4. Always” as the an-
swer, it means that people are already probably independent enough to learn some Disaster Preparedness
techniques (as described in the booklet “Make Yourself Ready”).
In the third question, you just have to compare the answers to the ways you were planning to teach people
how to prepare. If there is a good match, your chances of success are slightly better.
An example:
If people have fun by reading, you can teach them with written material, lectures or giving them “Make
Yourself Ready”. If people have fun by playing sports and games, you can teach Disaster Preparedness
and the described techniques in a fun, active way, resembling a game.
C - How is the Educational System in the community

Learn from answer
In this group, all the questions are of a different type, but they share the same purpose. They should bring
out your attention to possibilities for support around you, from the established Educational System.
If you answer “No” in the first answer, you can skip the other two, because there is no Educational System
to help you. The question no. 16 shows what are the possibilities of places where you can ask for support.
Question no.17 just makes you state clearly if you can or not use the facilities and support of the institu-
tions mentioned in question 16.
Basically, in part C, all questions are the consequence of their anterior question and ideally should end
with “Yes” in question no. 17.
If the final answer is “No”, it is time to think what other places can you contact and how should you ap-
proach them.

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Make yourself

Make Yourself Ready - Educator’s Guidebook

Make Yourself Ready Educational Package

Make Yourself Ready - Educator’s Guidebook

Make Yourself Ready Educational Package

Make Yourself Ready Educational Package

A1. What is this booklet?

“Why do I need this booklet?”

“For who is this booklet?”

Make Yourself Ready - Educator’s Guidebook

A2. What is Disaster

“Can we avoid Disasters?”

We cannot avoid most of the causes of Disaster

“Why should people prepare for Disasters?”

If people are prepared for Disasters, when Disasters happen,

“How to prepare for Disasters?”

These are things you can start doing today:

• Stock up on Supplies (e.g. Food, Water, Medicine)

These three actions will be explained in detail in section C, “Disaster Prepared-

Make Yourself Ready Educational Package

“Why is difficult to Prepare for Disasters?”

Although it can be difficult, Preparing for Disaster saves lives,

“How can I help my community preparing for Disasters?”

Make Yourself Ready - Educator’s Guidebook

What things will I

The basics of Disaster Preparedness

Disaster Preparedness information is more valuable if it helps

Make Yourself Ready Educational Package

Make Yourself Ready Educational Package

B1. What will be my roles?

“What kind of tasks can I expect to do?”

might save money on Disaster recovery in the future.

Make Yourself Ready - Educator’s Guidebook

that come up.

Make Yourself Ready Educational Package

Make Yourself Ready - Educator’s Guidebook

B2. What method should I

Make Yourself Ready Educational Package

• What are the Disaster risks in this community?

• How prepared for Disaster are the people in the community?

Make Yourself Ready - Educator’s Guidebook

• A definitive period for the project

Things you should consider when making new educational material:

• What means of communication can people understand?

World Health Organi- • How do people tell stories?

Make Yourself Ready Educational Package

Make Yourself Ready - Educator’s Guidebook

B3. What are the conditions

A good project needs good conditions.

• People are motivated and passionate about the issues to solve

• Team roles are clear and defined

Make Yourself Ready Educational Package

Get a place to work at

Set clear goals and time limits

Make Yourself Ready - Educator’s Guidebook

Make Yourself Ready Educational Package

Make Yourself Ready Educational Package

“What can we do to reduce Disasters?”

This Disaster Management Cycle has four phases:

Make Yourself Ready - Educator’s Guidebook

The United Nations estimates that 1 dollar invested in Disaster

Make Yourself Ready Educational Package

Preparedness is available to families

Make Yourself Ready - Educator’s Guidebook