Dan & Louie

The Need

Cambodia is a country in the middle of great change and transition. Coming out of decades of war and incredible violence during the last half of the 20th century, Cambodia now finds itself in the midst of rapid economic growth and development. And while this growth and development provides many new opportunities, the people still suffer the lasting effects of there recent tragic past. One of the most affected has been Cambodian families and children.

Like many developing countries, Cambodia's population is made up largely of youth and children; the average age of a Cambodian today is 21, and more than 33% of the population is under 14. These children are growing up in a country that has had the family decimated. During the Khmer Rouge years (1975-1978) families were forcibly separated and placed in camps and groups according to age, not family ties. This created a generation of children and teenagers who grew up with no family role models, within an environment that stressed survival at any cost, with no thought to the future. Those children and teenagers are now the parents of today's children and youth. Having received little moral or social training themselves, there is little in the way of good moral / character development that they are able to pass on to their children, even within the church. This has created a real need for training and discipleship of both children and their parents.

In addition, the church in Cambodia is growing rapidly (going from 150 evangelical churches in 1994 to more than 2600 today), but is very young. More than 13% of church leaders (mostly young Christians themselves) don't even own a Bible. In a recent study 64% of church leaders said they only understand a little or some of Christian doctrine. The same study showed that 45% of believers who accepted Christ and were active in a local church, are no longer involved in church in any way. 28% of those who leave the church said it was because of a lack of faith and understanding of God.

Clearly it is imperative that we provide children in Cambodia's churches with good moral and social training as well as sound doctrinal training, in a way that is relevant to their situation and easy for them to understand.

Nara and Grandpa Choy

To help address these issues, four Assemblies of God missionaries (Troy and Lisa Tabor, Rebecca Williams and Larissa Dobson) are developing and producing 26 new episodes of a children's radio program, "Nara and Grandpa Choy", and a corresponding 6 month Sunday School curriculum designed to raise up a generation of Christian young people who are solidly grounded in the Word of God, and able to stand firm in their faith.

"Nara & Grandpa Choy" is based on "Dan & Louie", a children's program originally developed by Pastor Dan Betzer to teach Bible stories in a way that would capture the attention of children. The original program features an older, wiser man, Dan, helping Louie, a ventriloquist dummy, by telling him Bible stories that illustrate a lesson or principle that he can apply to his situation. These programs have been amazingly successful with both children and their parents. In order to better fit the culture here in Cambodia, we have made some changes from the original series; for example, Cambodia does not have ventriloquist, so we changed Louie to Nara, a real boy, and we changed Dan to Grandpa Choy, Nara's grandfather. But the key element of an older person teaching and helping a child by telling them stories remains the same, and that fits in perfectly with both the Cambodian culture, and with the Cambodian learning style!

By using a combination of story telling (the primary means of communicating ideas and information in a low literacy society like Cambodia), humor, fun activities, mnemonic devices, memory verses, original children's songs, and more, a program is created that will re-enforce key issues and truths in the hearts of Cambodian children.

The Radio Program

"Nara and Grandpa Choy" centers around a young boy, Nara, and his grandfather, Grandpa Choy. In each episode Nara finds himself in some type of problem or dilemma, and shares his situation with Grandpa Choy. Grandpa Choy and Nara then "travel" trough their imagination to the Bible Storybook Castle, where Grandpa Choy tells Nara a story from God's word. Finally, Grandpa Choy shows Nara how the story teaches an important lesson that he can apply to his own situation. The stories come alive through clever dialogue, a full range of sound effects and an exciting musical score. Each episode will be approximately 15 to 20 minutes in length, and will be broadcast twice weekly on a local radio station operated by Far East Broadcasting Cambodia. This station has a 10,000 watt transmitter that reaches more than 50% of Cambodia's population directly on FM and nationwide on short wave (a recent survey of Cambodian Christian leaders showed that more than 75% of church leaders who listen to radio listen to FEBC).

The Sunday School Curriculum

The corresponding Sunday School curriculum builds on the issues raised in the radio program. A typical lesson opens with the teacher telling the story of how Nara gets into a particular situation, using full color, large scale flip-book illustrations to help capture the imagination of the children. The class then listens to the radio program while coloring a picture from the story. The lesson continues with a game / mnemonic device that helps children learn the key memory verse, followed by learning and singing an original children's song that also reinforces the key point. Finally, the lesson ends with the teacher telling the final part of the Nara story, showing him applying the lesson he learned from the Bible to the situation he gets into at the beginning of the lesson (this will also use additional flip-book illustrations). Each week's central message or theme is reinforced in every part of the lesson plan.

Topic Selections

Topics addressed each week were specifically chosen to directly impact key aspects of life and faith to the Cambodian community. Nineteen episodes were designed to address 19 key barriers to the faith found in the Cambodian folk Buddhist culture (as identified in a study conducted by Jean Johnson and Diane Campbell, 15 year veteran missionaries to Cambodia). The remaining 7 topics were chosen based on research done by George Barna and the Barna Research Group on the intentional development of a Christian world view. Topics addressed include:

1) Does God Exist?
2) What is the character and nature of God?
3) Why was the world created?
4) What's the nature and purpose of humanity?
5) What sort of spiritual powers and authorities exist?
6) Spirit worship
7) No acknowledgement of separation from God
8) What happens after we die?
9) No acknowledgement of a God who judges right and wrong
10) No prominent sacrificial system to help understand a God-given sacrifice
11) Merit making in Buddhism causes one to depend on self-effort for salvation instead of grace
12) Everything depends on Karma
13) One religion is as good as another/ what is truth?
14) Buddha was born before Jesus
15) Fear of losing your own culture.
16) Difficult to comprehend a God who loves us and is involved in our lives
17) Preoccupied with survival and success for today and the here and now
18) There is Sin, and it's not about getting caught.
19) Bad habits/Bad choices - drugs, gambling, lying, cheating, bad relationships etc..
20) Apathy & resignation to your fate & lot in life due to Karma
21) Jesus is the foreigner's religion
22) Afraid of negative effects of disturbing or not appeasing the spirit world.
23) Superficial belief (seeking jobs, support)
24) Disinterested in a faith that involves regular frequent gatherings & daily disciplines
25) Christians are supposed to hate their parents.
26) Afraid of persecution - just want to keep the status quo

Evaluation / Production

During the course of production, we will test early lessons and programs with Cambodian churches, in both rural and urban settings, to evaluate their effectiveness. Teachers will be briefed on how to use the material and go through a simulated Sunday school class using the material. Then they will take it to their churches to use with their children. In addition to observing the class, both teachers and students will be asked for feedback in order to make any necessary adjustments so that the final program is as effective as possible.

Distribution / Accessibility

In addition to the actual radio broadcasts, the entire program (including CD copies of all radio programs and music) will be packaged together for distribution. The program will be presented at various denominational pastors meetings, as well as being made available through the Evangelical Fellowship of Cambodia and the Cambodia Bible Society. Teacher training sessions would also be held to help familiarize Sunday School workers with the material. For churches in remote areas without electricity, etc, the audio portion of the program (the 26 radio episodes and 24 original children's songs) will be placed on digital audio players. These players, produced by Megavoice, will be able to hold all of the material and require no external power, and use built in solar panels to recharge their internal batteries. In addition, where necessary we will be able to provide battery powered external speakers and a solar battery charger, so that even churches in remote rural areas will be able to benefit from all aspects of the program.

Production Timeline

Recording and editing of all music and radio programs has been completed, and are currently being broadcast. Initial evaluation of early lessons is currently taking place. Artwork, curriculum development / writing, and all editing will be completed by the end of 2011.