How HEEALS implements its WASH projects with origami, the art of paper folding

How HEEALS implements its WASH projects with origami, the art of paper folding

Since its foundation in 2010 HEEALS has a mandate of empowering local and rural communities to become sustainable in Health, Education, Environment and Livelihood Society sectors through engaging workshops,resources distribution and content creation. In a constant effort to improve its projects and find the best solutions to better involve its beneficiaries, HEEALS has recently implemented its WASH (Water, Sanitation and Hygiene) projects with sessions of origami making.

What is origami?

“Origami is the art of making objects for decoration by folding sheets of paper into shapes” (Cambridge Dictionary). The

goal is to transform a flat square sheet of paper into a sculpture through folding techniques, discouraging the use of cuts and glue.

Why origami?

We think that active participation of our beneficiaries is essential for a successful project. Usually HEEALS works with young boys and girls of several Indian schools and marginalized communities, and that’s the main reason that pushes us to create interactive workshop sessions that can be fun beyond instructive.

WASH origami

Our idea is to dedicate some time, at the end of our WASH workshops, to teach kids how to fold simple origami shapes. Doing so they will implement their skills, have fun, remember what is WASH about and connect what they have been taught during the workshop with a practical activity.

WASH is about three things: Water, Sanitation and Hygiene. Each of these parts can be easily represented by simple origami shapes.

• Water, what we explain during our workshops is that having safe water is essential to human life and health. Safe or drinking water is water that “does not represent any significant risk to health over a lifetime of consumption, including different sensitivities that may occur between life stages” (WHO, 2017). Safe water can be daily

used for cooking, bathing, cleaning and much more. We decided to represent Water with a fish origami that is per excellence the inhabitant of clear and neat waters.

• Sanitation, this term describes the strategies used to provide adequate water for drinking and other needs and it refers to the provision of facilities and services in order to accomplish this goal. Providing water filters,collectors or tanks to schools and marginalized communities is a priority for 

HEEALS. A water bomb

origami can best represent and simplify this idea. It is fun for kids and it could be a nice option and a more environmental friendly solution to the huge number of plastic balloons filled with colors and used during the Holi festival. In fact this simple origami shape can be blown with air, filled with water or with colored powders and kids can used them as a very easy-to-make toy.

• Hygiene “refers to conditions and practices that help to maintain health and prevent the spread of diseases” (WHO).

Personal hygiene refers to maintaining the body's cleanliness. During our workshops we always remind kids that personal cleanliness can be preserved by practicing simple daily activities to maintain clean and neat our body, the place where we live and the environment around us. This idea can be represented and simplified by an origami broom, a very common and simple object used daily in every house.

-Manuel

Wash Intern