The first week of holiday club on board the Livingstone Bookbus
2013 has been one of the busiest but most memorable ever. We visited 2 new
schools, for 3 days each, even going in on Saturday. Both schools were rural,
around 30km from Livingstone and the turnout for the Bookbus was exceptional.
The first three days were at Kamatanda Village, where there
is a community preschool and school with grades 1, 2 and 3. The nearest government
school is 9km walk, this prohibits the younger children beginning school until
they are older, so the local community, backed by a retired teacher, started
their own school. It is in a straw and mud hut but the children flock in and
love to learn.
When the Bookbus first arrived, they had never seen anything
like it before. There was a lot of open mouthed staring but we just jumped
straight in reading some classic stories and getting the kids and teachers to
join in with the actions. Being far from town and not on the tourist trail,
villages like this seldom get visitors and if they do it may just be a fleeting
visit, As Ann the headteacher said to me, “If anyone visits us, they are soon
come and gone. We can’t believe that you have spent 3 days in our village. Thank
you. Our children will never forget this.”
Lots of curious parents and onlookers were always around,
coming to see what we were doing. There were also some older children from the
village who joined in and in one morning we turned Kamatanda Community from
this
to this!!
Fun was had by everyone and the teachers were busy learning by
doing. They thanked us for teaching them new skills and ways of interacting
with the children.
Each day we returned, the welcome would get louder and the number
of kids following the bus would increase. We read stories, sang songs, made
elephants, lions, butterflies, fish, crowns and windmills. We made new friends
and many memories for many people. It was a great 3 days and we rounded it off
by giving the 150 children each their own book to take home. They were so proud
and eager to look at the books. The teachers were amazed that the books were
for the children to keep. We left accompanied with waves, smiles and lots of
requests for a return visit.
The second three days were at Siandunda village, on the
banks of the Zambezi River. The journey to school involved some off-roading,
down sandy tracks through Mopani woodlands. Here the number of children was
over 200 growing 260 on day 3. There is only a preschool in the village, with
the nearest school almost 10km walk, but being summer holidays there were
children of all ages around. This village was actually featured on the Comic Relief
program last year where celebrities walked with some children to school to see
the distance. They promised to build them a school, so we shall have to see.
We set up shop outside the headman’s house. He was delighted
to have us and sat watching everything from the shade. The older children had a
library corner and were happy reading a variety of books, many adults joined
them and they were all fascinated by the wordsearch puzzles we handed out. The
crowd of younger children enjoyed the stories and the crafts, on Saturday 220
lions and windmills were produced. Once again the teachers were super keen to
join in and loved learning how to make things and read the books in a fun and
interactive way.
One volunteer teacher told me it was the best teacher training
he had ever received. On the Saturday as we rolled up the mats and packed away
the crayons for the last time, we were constantly asked if we were coming
tomorrow and if not tomorrow then when. The headman thanked us for bringing joy
to his village and we left each child with their own book to continue reading
until the Bookbus returns again.
Kelly August 2013
