INEE Good Practice Guide: Child-friendly Spaces

During an initial emergency response, NGOs and communities often work together to create "safe areas" or "child-friendly spaces" for children and adolescents to play, socialize, learn and express themselves. These activities have a strong psychosocial component as they provide a caring and normalizing environment to mitigate the impact of the crisis on the children when their parents and guardians may be otherwise occupied. Typically these activities are located under trees, in schools or any available space and offer regularly scheduled activities such as games, drama, art activities, non-formal education and sports. Eventually these activities transition into formal schooling, after-school recreational activities for out-of school adolescents and youth, and club activities or community social activities.