SA: Matlhaku creche

My name is Sylvia Mboni Monyela.  I started working at Mokopane in Thari ya sechaba creche. I was working on behalf of the principal, as she was busy attending difference workshops. By that for time we were only two . I was caring children, cook for them, and manage to do all the administrative work. Because of my hardworking, I found a better job at Matlhaku creche. I found that principal was working with 6 ladies and 4 men. Principal promoted me as a vice principal because of my hardworking and patient at my work. I used to work hard which made the children of the centre to love me more than anybody did. I started to work at Mathlaku in 2014. I even help in the kitchen for cooking purposes, if there are lack of staff who has not attended to crèche.

Context

I love to work with children after  I saw many children at our village not cared safely. My neibourhood was left her child with her friends when going to work. The children of that aunty used to smack that girl for nothing. I did not tell the mother if that child , I just encourage her mother to bring the child to any creche for the child to learn easily about the world around her, and for the mother to have enough time to to come back not dodging from her work because of time . We were having extra time to care for the children whom their parents come late at home.

Key Actions

At Matlhaku, we aim to develop children physically, socially, mentally, spiritually, emotionally and morally. In the morning we welcome the children in the centre, check their health inspection. After welcoming the children we give them breakfast, and allow them to play outdoor free activities while some staff supervise them whereas others clean their classes .we then ring a bell which call the children to enter the class. We make a morning devotion for us to thank god for a new day. We then allow children to go to toilet and advise them to wash their hands in each toilet routine. We mark register, discuss weather chart, celebrate birthday chart if there is any child who is having a birthday. We then discuss theme of the week .this will assist children to develop speaking and listening skills. After finishing morning ring they go to toilet after each routine, they then go to indoors free choice, some go to book area, some go to educational toy area some go to art area and some go to fantasy and block area. They eat morning snack. They develop mentally and socially in those different types of learning areas. They go to outdoor activity where they swing, run, hop jump and do all physical activities. We ensure that they placed in a health and safety environment. They go inside for music ring, which will be related to the theme of the week. They then go to story conner to listen to story. They eat healthy balanced lunch .after lunch they go to resting time. When they wake up they eat afternoon snack and they departure to home.

Partners

We registered with social department that monitor our centre for health inspection and monitor the programme .we register with basic education who help us to train our practitioners. We register with non-profit organisation where we submit our annual narrative report to them. We work with Capricorn district municipality, which introduce gender links to us. We collaborate with Evelyn Lekganyane clinic for health campaigns. We collaborate with Moria primary for feeding them with grade r children and attending their ceremonies as well as us. We also collaborate with university of Limpopo, which bring their students who do foundation courses to make their practical at our creche. Our main partnership is Zion Christian Church that is our main sponsor. They gave us land and building free to help community children. We collaborate with Putco which donate us a nice building.

Strategies

We encourage volunteering at our centre to groom women empowerment. We allow them to work at any area of development where we asses them, their hardworking, passion, attendance, all the requirements of a good employee and give them points which will add their profile during interview. Volunteering does not mean a person is employed, is her duty, which will help her to win the post .we, also advertise through media for the community to reach information. We also paste posters to the nearest taxi rank, post office, complex, clinics and many community centres where people can reach the information. We will appoint the employee and sign the contract with her.

Challenges

We never receive any funding from social department, when we inquire them; they told us that we are having everything. Whereas our children qualified for the grant of 15 per child per day. I then ask donation in the church, which help us with capital asset, meals and salaries. We find that Matlhaku does not have enough resources for outdoor equipment and outdoor equipment. We find donation from toys for all worth R109, 000.00. We find that children bring their lunch boxes where you will find that some of the food are not fresh enough to be eaten by a child, which lead to malnutrition, we ask donation to mma Elizabeth Lekganyane who feed our children from 2009 to date. We find that children play on a rough playground, as the centre I situated in a mountainous area. We plant loan for the children to play on a health and safety environment. Even the staff was not enough for the centre. We hire both men and women who was paid by the church

Immediate results and next steps

Matlhaku creche looks beautiful, clean, and safe environment. Children eat healthy balanced meal. Mathlahu is selected by local cluster to attend Capricorn district municipality workshop of introducing us Gender Links. Mathlaku managed to be selected for the summit awards of gender links in 2015 where we got runner up award , in 2016 we continue to present in summit awards of gender links we got 2ñd position .in 2017 we got position two again . We entered the Eswatini summit award where we got position one in the category of economic justice. We go on entering our Capricorn district municipality summit award of Gender Links; we got position one that is the winner award. Evelyn Lekganyane clinic selected mathlaku creche as the best centre for producing a health results during immunisation campaign. University of Limpopo selected mathlaku to be their stable centre of their student practical is who make foundation courses. Matlhaku won R10, 000.00 from shorprite community award. Turf FM from university of the north invite mathlaku creche to come and present their daily activities. We managed to attend workshop of eLearning at fortis hotel on the 8 march this year. We wish to introduce digital learning to our children .we wish to have workshop with parents to work as a team for the program. Matlhaku will send parents homework’s, newsletters of the centre.

Long term Impact

The programme is going to be easy for both parents, children and their teachers. We are going to train teachers first, as we already train two teachers, we are left with another four teachers . We will be busy introduce the project , give a short abstract about our organization , to the sponsors .digital system in crèches education summit is a collaborative and engaging platform where ict experts , influencers and though leaders from education , business and civic society sectors to share knowledge , expertise on ICT integration in school education .

The summit is the brain child of South African learn a global social enterprise business transforming the country  future in digital and ICT integration .the current challenges facing teacher development on integrating technology in the classroom using curriculum content has prompted us to embark , on this initiative, after examining your social contribution mandste of integration tech using curriculum content we have identified a potential business development opportunity which might be levarage to our organization .

Learning and application

This need a thermally marketing tragedy .we will provide a collaborative and engaging platform for government, business and civil society in collectively leveraging ICT resources and addressing the challenges faced by the schools in the changing ICT environment. We wish to provide a networking platform where government, business and civil society can socialize and have fun and show their ICT roadmap. We wish to familiarize teachers with the current internet trends and how they can be applied in the creation of an e-lesson. As sponsors and funders most of them are very concern about competition in the market so , we wish to prove to them what impact will the project have towards them seeing at the top among their competitors this it works positively towards their business development strategy .