COMMUNITY ANIMATION SERIES

ABCD Foundations

A 2-day foundational course for residents and community workers who care deeply about their communities - and want to take meaningful, collective action grounded in real relationships and local strengths.

Most community efforts start with problems.

The most powerful ones start with people.

Course Overview

Community Animation Foundations is a practice-based, place-based course grounded in Asset-Based Community Development (ABCD). Rather than starting with problems or gaps, participants are guided to:

Start with what is strong, not what is wrong
Explore what a “better life” means in their own own community
Discover the gifts, assets, and relationships already present
Learn from community initiatives in action
Mobilise neighbours and peers around what they care about

Throughout the course, participants are encouraged to plan as they learn, so that nothing remains abstract or theoretical. By the end of two days, each participant will have identified concrete next steps they can take within their own community.

Who Is This Course For?

This course is designed for residents and community workers who wish to start or strengthen a community initiative in a community they are part of.

This includes:

Residents, volunteers, and informal community leaders
Community workers (e.g. social service practitioners, programme staff, faith-based workers, grassroots or sector-based staff)
People who live in, work in, or closely identify with the community they hope to support

You may be a good fit if you:

Care about the well-being of your own community
Prefer place-based initiatives with face-to-face engagement
Want communities to have greater ownership and voice in their neighbourhood
Are new to ABCD (or have only basic familiarity)
Are comfortable learning in English (around ‘O’ level proficiency)
Prefer learning that is practical, grounded, and not overly academic

This course is not intended for commercial ventures or initiatives disconnected from one’s lived or working community.

By the end of the course, you will be able to…

Apply an asset-based mindset, starting with strengths rather than deficits

Articulate what a “better life” means in their own community context

Identify the gifts of individuals, including themselves and others in the cohort

Recognise and map community assets across multiple forms

Understand how different community functions support well-being

Learn from ABCD in action through the Resilience Trails

Mobilise neighbours and peers to start an initiative that improves the well-being of their community

Structure & Curriculum
(2 Days)

MORNING (Discovering What Matters)
Cohort Compact
- Setting shared expectations, trust, and psychological safety for learning together
The Better Life Conversation
- Guided reflection and sharing around what makes for a better life
Discover Community Functions
- Understanding how ABCD helps a community reclaim its essential roles and sense of connectedness
The Gifts of Individuals – Gifts of the Cohort
- Surfacing personal gifts, skills, passions, and motivations
- Recognising the collective gifts present within the cohort itself
AFTERNOON (Discovering & Connecting)
Discovering Community Assets
- Learning to notice and map the abundance within a local environment through an immersive, abundance-based lens.
Connecting What We Care About to Community Functions
- The Role of the Connector: Understanding the attributes of those who bridge gaps, build trust, and invite others into collective action.
- Exploring how to non-intrusively invite others to share their gifts and join a common cause.
The Principles of ABCD
- Anchoring practice in core ABCD principles and values
Briefing for Resilience Trails
- Orientation to the Day 2 experience
- Setting the learning intentions for observing ABCD in action
MORNING (ABCD in Action)
Resilience Trails
- Experiencing Discover, Connect, and Mobilise in real communities
- Learning directly from Community Guides and Community Catalysts
- Observing how assets, relationships, and action come together to spark local action and resilience.
AFTERNOON (Mobilising For Action)
Mobilising My Neighbours and Community
- Turning reflection into action around what participants care about
- The Smallest First Step We Could Take: Identifying immediate, collaborative actions that leverage local assets without relying on external funding.
Reviewing ABCD Concepts Learned
- Consolidating key ideas and experiences from the two days
Check Out: Reflections & Closing
- Individual and collective reflection on learning, confidence, and next steps

Course Faculty

Meet the experienced community practitioners who will be facilitating the course

Dr Wong Sweet Fun

Dr Wong Sweet Fun is a community-centred design practitioner and healthcare innovator whose work focuses on strengthening the relationship between communities, systems, and wellbeing.

Trained as a clinician, Dr Wong is widely recognised for pioneering approaches that extend care beyond institutional settings into neighbourhood and community contexts. She is known for advancing frameworks such as Communities of Care, which emphasise mobilising resident strengths, social networks, and local assets to improve long-term outcomes

Her work consistently reflects principles aligned with Asset-Based Community Development (ABCD), particularly in reframing communities not as passive recipients of services, but as active contributors to health, resilience, and social cohesion. Through initiatives such as Wellness Kampung and community-based care models, she has demonstrated how relational engagement and asset-oriented strategies can drive sustainable impact

As a facilitator and educator, Sweet Fun brings a systems-aware perspective that bridges community practice, institutional realities, and leadership decision-making. Her approach integrates participatory learning, reflective dialogue, and practice-grounded insight.

Mr Wilson Chan

Wilson served previously on the panel of CSC-MCCY’s Partnerships and Engagement Experts Panel (PEEP) from 2020 to 2021, and then again from 2022 to 2023, and was engaged to provide expertise in Engagement and Facilitation Strategy and Design within the Public Service. Over the years, Wilson has conducted ABCD workshops for various government organisations, including MSF, URA, CSC, and NYC. Most recently, Wilson was the lead trainer for the “Leading with Empathy” workshop for participants in the Social Sector Milestone Programme under CSC from 2024 to 2025. Wilson is a MOE-registered instructor.

Mdm Ng Bee Leng

Bee Leng is a social worker by training and is an official ABCD Guide accredited by Nurture Development and ABCD Institute, Europe.

Working with disadvantaged communities for the past 30 years has brought her to believe in asset-based community development that focuses on strengths rather than deficits of communities. Attention to “what is wrong” leads to an emphasis on deficits which is followed by a reliance on experts to solve their problems. However, when people in the community focus on “what is strong” and come together to participate in resolving their problems, they take control and collectively improve their own lives and the lives of others.

Bee Leng conducts participatory research projects with the community from under-resourced neighbourhoods. Together with her community, Bee Leng will then adopt an asset-based community development approach to co-create and implement community-driven solutions.

Key Details

Course Fees (Lunch and refreshments included):

Organisation-sponsored Individual - $895
Learn Alongside Bundle - $2,100
Self-sponsored - See registration link below for more info (CHAS / PG / Merdeka cards)

Completion Requirement: Minimum 80% attendance

Read more about the course’s Terms & Conditions

Join the Foundations course

Sessions available around your neighbourhood

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Coming soon near you!

Please stay tuned for more sessions to be released in the NORTH and WEST areas!

BONUS

Community of Practice (CoP)

In addition to the 2-day ABCD Foundations course, there will be Communities of Practice (CoP) sessions for continued peer learning and support, offering ongoing support and opportunities for continued application of what has been learnt.

Details of the CoP will be shared with participants after the course, so please join us for the workshops to find out more!