THE PROJECT

The Hedgehog File' - a project for the prevention of violence and sexual misuse for nursery and primary schools use In 1998, on the initiative of Kaufbeuren's Rotary Club in Germany, the actor, writer and director Olaf Krätke created 'The Hedgehog File' together with Thomas Garmatsch (a theater pedagogue). 'The Hedgehog File' is a project intended for nursery and primary schools which mainly consists of a theater play (that Olaf Krätke and Thomas Garmatsch wrote together) that is performed in the classes or asembly halls of the establishments as well as an interactive dialogue between the actors and the children.

The project, which is managed by the Mato Storytelling Company is strongly supported by Local Government and other organizations, such as the Bavarian Ministry of Education and Cultur, the Deutschen BKK, Medu Publishing, the Helga & Alfred Buchwald Foundation, the „Brücken für Kinder e.V. Foundation, Rotary Club, Lions Club Lindau-Westallgäu, the broadcast company Neue Welle (Karlsruhe), the Deutschen Kinderfilmakademie (Sindelfingen), Filmsortiment Kay Gollhardt (Hamburg), Kiwanis Distrikt Deutschland e.V., the Social Services Department of the Berlin Senate,Landratsämter Ostallgäu, the city of Kaufbeuren under the motto of 'the prevention of violence against and amongst children and adolescents'. Opening events include regional informative events (also in movie theaters), parents' evenings and special performances in selected and interested cities and towns and their environments. These are typical locations for a presentation of 'The Hedgehog File'.

The primary intention of the project is to awaken the awareness of children to the problems of violence and sexual misuse by addressing them in their classrooms and assembly halls in a way that best suits their age groups. In parallel, aid organizations such as 'The Net', local government organizations, child psychologists, therapists such as Susann Tabatabai-Schweizer, who are involved in the project provide support and advice to primary school and nursery school teachers as well as to parents and the children themselves.
This project is to be understood as an 'emotional door-opener' and the institutions can build on the material presented and provided in the play (e.g. with picture painting, action and role plays, essays on the topic, video and picture projects etc.). The results of this work at a regional level can be made available to the general public, which incidentally has already been done in Germany in the town of Kaufbeuren as well as elsewhere with a high degree of success. Another objective is to make the general public more aware of the issues involved and the project itself using informational events and in close co-operation with the regional and interregional press.