Nal’ibali is a national reading-for-enjoyment campaign to spark and embed a culture of reading for enjoyment across South Africa, with a pre-existing strong focus on promoting reading in homes and equipping caregivers to support children’s reading. This is especially important during the COVID-19 crisis where South African schools have been closed since the 16 April, with no certainty as to when they might reopen. While the Department of Basic Education has hustled to find ways to enable curriculum-based formal learning to continue in the home, these efforts are largely web-based, excluding the vast majority of children. Even in connected homes, most adults are not well-equipped or confident to “homeschool” children.  

Alongside efforts to deliver curriculum remotely, South Africa urgently needs a response that enables, promotes, and supports literacy development, enrichment, and informal learning at home – one that is accessible to all regardless of internet access or caregivers’ education level. 

While this presents an urgent challenge, it is also an opportunity. Reading aloud, storytelling, and reading for pleasure provide significant educational benefit: children who are read to regularly build key literacy skills and are more likely to score higher in reading assessments. Routine activities, like a daily read-aloud or storytime, can build loving connections in families and give children stability and comfort during a stressful and frightening time. One of the responses that Nal’ibali has adopted was hosting online training on how to run reading clubs in the home on their Facebook platform. To date, this has reached 112,600 people and with a total of 8335 people engaged on the platform. We are certain more children in South Africa and around the globe need such home-based Reading Clubs and would appreciate your support in reaching them.  

In the support of Activate change drivers, Na’libali will be hosting a WhatsApp chat webinar in order to reach out to more children. The WhatsApp chat webinar is expected to take place on the 30 April 2020 from 4 pm to 6 pm.