Touch Africa assisted the staff of the Welkom office of ABI with the staff Corporate Social Investment day on the 10th September.
ABI staff chose the Mohlodi Wa Thuto Pre-School for their CSI initiative. The school, which was originally a homestead, built in the early 1900’s is in a state of disrepair.
Recently a new classroom was built on the property to cater for the needs of the Grade R children. This building needed some work to get it to a habitable state. The Touch Africa crew, with the assistance of the ABI staff on the 10th September were able to repair the leaking roof, fit a ceiling, plaster the building inside and out, built a step outside the classroom, lay a new wooden floor and paint the classroom. The difference was immediately visible as will be seen from the pictures of the before, during and after phases. The children now have a dry and dust free classroom, which is easy to maintain, with brightly coloured walls to stimulate their enquiring minds. The children were delighted, not only with their new classroom, but also the many educational toys that were provided. Up until ABI provided the funding for the improvements, these children had not had any educational equipment to play with, nor had the teacher had this equipment to help her teach them basic skills. Now future Grade R classes will have the benefit of this investment and the children will be better prepared to enter their first year of Big School, where their hand-eye co-ordination skills, fine and gross motor development and number skills will have been developed. Educational toys were provided for the entire school of more than 100 children, so from the littlest to the six year olds, there is sure to be great fun and development taking place at this school for years to come.
The area in which the school is situated is poor and many of the children attending the school depend on the meal they receive there during the day. In order to augment funding that is provided by the Departmetn of Education, the principal and teachers had started vegetable gardens, which were inadequate to provide the amount of fresh vegetables and fruit that the children need on a daily basis. ABI provided funding to increase the number of vegetables patches as well as provide fruit trees and gardening equipment in order to ensure that the gardening was maintained into the future. Seeds were also provided for future planting.
The front of the school was a dust bowl with little interest in terms of colour and activity or any greening. The ABI staff got to work on the garden and transformed it from dust to an oasis of trees, shrubs and flowers to encourage colour, greening, interest for the children and generally a happy place to be in for children and adults alike. The garden beds were not only planted with shrubs, but also vegetables. This will help to teach the children about plants and vegetables and how to look after them and continue to plant to provide for their dialy meals. This is a highly sustainable way of catering for the future.
The playground was looking worse for wear, but was soon transformed, after dangerous and rusty equipment was filed down, sanded and painted in bright colours.
The children celebrated by entertaining the ABI staff with a variety of song and dance routines. All in all it was an enjoyable day for all.
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If you would like Touch Africa’s assistance to carry out any of your CSI requirements, contact Mike Glover on 041 581 5335 or email mike@touchafrica.info