My wife usually takes the lead but when it’s time to clean out the house and take items to the local goodwill shop I get involved too as I usually have to carry, load drive and so on but I also have had the joy to go to the kids and guide them through the process of sorting their rooms to find items to give to the local charity. I don’t know why but they always have enjoyed this tradition and usually want to give away something quite new and relatively expensive and keep the old “obvious to me junk” it’s a pick your battle type thing and in the spirit of giving I usually let their will or heart decide.

Sometimes the cleaning for the needy becomes over the top as one of my son’s tell me “it will serve them better than me” and even if the item being lobbed onto the pile is a new or again an expensive item I am locked as I can’t really say “you can’t give that away” or can I?

In any event when my boys have had to weed out for charity it has always been a joy to see them, even from an early age, transform into a philanthropist and a true giver with smiles and purpose.

Sure they have had sponsored kids in their name since before they could talk and inherited the annual birthday giving to the sponsored children as they matured and were able. That info card and photo is proudly displayed in their rooms as it has been for many years, usually proudly displayed.

I do not know if their attitude was learned from me or my wife, or both. Perhaps it is instinctual, I do know it is a trait I am pleased with and it without a doubt is a small piece of the family puzzle that brings us closer together.

I know my youngest still wants to help all the strays and heaven forbid you walk past a beggar without giving. No point in dissecting the pros and cons of giving to beggars it’s just “dad we have to give” so we do. I think that is a good thing too, as the other side of that coin is rather cold. Concerning my kids empathy is alive and well and I always go back to our sponsored kids and wonder if they were the key, who knows, but being a sponsor is something we all can share and it has without a doubt added to my children’s compassion, willingness to give and just added to their being.

Do you sponsor a child somewhere?

If you are a sponsor, don’t forget to take down the photo you have of your sponsored child and talk with your kids about the child, share the photos and the letters. If you’re not a sponsor why not jump in and help a child while you at the same time teach your own a valuable life lessons to your children, its close and personal and takes very little time. Sometimes giving should be for the joy of it, for yours and your children’s, but there are many added benefits not in the least the life of the sponsored child.

A few weeks ago I wrote about how slow in general the construction of housing and other things are in Haiti. The reasons are many, and it is tragic for the victims.

Star of Hope has fought hard to re-build the schools that were destroyed in the disaster, 2.5 years ago. Star of Hope is also building new buildings in the projects that Star of Hope has supported for many years. Teachers are given training, water has been drawn, the classrooms have been equipped and much more.

Now, the 3 000 children supported by the Star of Hope are on summer break. From the seven projects that Star of Hope supports 150 children have completed kindergarten and will start elementary school in the fall. 130 have completed primary school and is now continuing in the secondary school.

To complete the vision in Haiti, Star of Hope needs more sponsors in the fall. Would you or someone you know become a sponsor, let us know as soon as possible.

Once again Metro Manila and the Philippines is hit by a disaster. Torrential rains have battered the megacity and floodwaters have poured in from almost all sides. A state of emergency was declared in and around Manila.

More than 50 were reported dead due to the combination of intense storms, monsoon rains and flooding, and at least 250,000 were evacuated, officials said. A landslide in the district of Quezon City killed nine people, including three children.

The flooding is the worst to hit the area since two storms in 2009 killed more than 900 people.

Manila is particularly vulnerable to flooding. The metropolitan area, which has a population of more than 14 million, sits in a low-lying area between a large lake and the ocean. The lake, Laguna de Bay, at the south of the city, drains to the ocean via the Pasig River, which runs through the center of town. The lake and the river are heavily silted and prone to overflowing their banks.

Star of Hope's school in Taytay, Rizal is in almost waist high water on Wednesday. The classrooms on the ground floor are flooded. Staff has moved books and expensive equipment to the second floor.

In some areas in Taytay, the water has reached the second floor Wednesday. Living in the area are 2 500 children attending the Star of Hope School. No reports of injured children yet but many sponsored children's houses are under water.

Pictures by Norman Coruna from Tuesday at Star of Hope School. More information soon. Internet and phone service is very poor at the moment! I wish I could be there to help out.

According to a report the Philippines struggles to curb child labour. More than half of the country's five million child workers do so under hazardous conditions. For example they work on garbage dumps, in charcoal factories and in sugarcane fields.

But now the government says its new policies will be able to eliminate child labour by 2016.

Many children work because they want to support their parents, but they are part of the illegal economic system of child labor.

Every child has the right to the most basic of necessities in life like a healthy environment, formal education, and most importantly, a loving family to come home to. Yet, poverty hinders the child to any of these things and forces labour in farming fields, mining shafts and peddling in the busy and dangerous streets in Manila and beyond.

Star of Hope runs two schools and one preschool in the Philippines. All together almost 3,000 children get their basic education and family support by Star of Hope to get a good start in life to create a more positive future for themsleves!

I met little Paul on a visit to the village of Gomoa Domainase, Ghana in 2008. He lives with his parents and younger sister Linda. Dad Kwabena and mom Esi are farmers and operates normally other landowners farms and as salary they get to keep a third of the harvest, the other two thirds goes to the landowner. In southern Ghana, they usually get two crops per year, depending on what they grow.

Like many others who try to survive as farmers in Ghana the work gives poor income and the family lives by "from hand to mouth." They find it hard to get to it financially.

The family lives in a small room in a ruined school. A single room of 15-16 square meters is the family's home. A bed, a TV, a closet and a larger bucket is the family's possessions. With the bucket, they fetch water from a well in the yard. Cooking is done outdoors in a small campfire.

Paul goes to preschool, in the outskirts of the village, supported by Star of Hope. He thinks it's fun to learn letters and numbers. He is shy and somewhat reclusive but is diligent and take part in the activities in the classroom according to the teacher.

Thanks to dedicated teachers and support from the Star of Hope and its sponsors Paul and his classmates get a good start in life. The parents are very grateful for the support and do everything they can to keep Paul in school as long as possible so he an get a good education.

As part of the recovery program after the earthquake in January 2010 Star of Hope started a sewing school in the fall of 2010, as a pilot project where young women and men from the Boyer area have received professional level seamstress training.

They have been taught appropriate technology and given design skills to enable them to produce products that are marketable both inside Haiti and outside.

The school was a success and the pupils graduated in the summer of 2011. The program continued to Jeanton village in late 2011 and the students will graduate next week. In the fall the program continues in Hesse.

You can pictures from last years graduation here.