The provision of a bright inviting and well stocked library is at the heart of School Aid’s work to support literacy development in South Africa. Key to the success of each library is the inclusion of a full time Library Assistant, their role is to encourage and support both children and teachers when they visit the library.
Library Projects for 2014-2016 are at Nancefield Primary School, Soweto Johannesburg, Heatherdale Primary School, Althone, Cape Town, Cosmo City Primary School, Randburg, Johannesburg, Koeberg Primary School, Maitland, Cape Town, Impala Crescent Primary School, Lenasia, Tsosoloso Ya Afrika Secondary School Library, in Ebony Park - Tembisa, and Vuka Uzenzele Primary School Nellmapius. See below for details:-
School
Launch Date
Nancefield Primary School
19th March 2014
Heatherdale Primary School
16th March 2015
Cosmo City Primary School
10th November 2015
Koeberg Primary School
26th February 2016
Tsololoso Ya Africa
18TH July 2016
Impala Crescent Primary School
29th July 2016
Vuka Uzenzele Primary School
September 2016
New Libraries in 2016
On the 29th July 2016 Impala Crescent Primary School Library Assistant - Tshepiso Malakoane and South African Poet/Author - Dr. Don Mattera unveiled a plaque at the library launch ceremony today in Lenasia. The library was refurbished by School Aid and The Bookery - courtesy of Usborne Books At Home and The Peter Cundill Foundation.
On the 18th July School Aid South Africa in partnership with Standard Bank relaunched Tsosoloso Ya Africa Secondary School Library on 18 July 2016. The plaque was revealed by School Aid South Africa Chairperson - Vuyelwa Masangwana and Standard Bank Head of Retail Banking for Gauteng - Prudence Mashalane
28th February – Koeberg Primary School official library launch, School Aid Cape Town Representative Susie Moffatt reports:
“Today was the launch of Koeberg Library. I so wish you could all have been here - it was wonderful. Shanaaz Majiet and her staff really went out of their way to make it a memorable event. The library itself has turned out to be everything we envisaged, and is a truly inspirational place to be. It is full of the children’s book reviews and art work. After the speeches we went to the library and found children listening to a story in the Reading Room; some reception class children were drawing pictures from “The Foolish Tortoise’; boys were playing chess..."
Library Assistant Training
Working in collaboration with corporate sponsor Nedbank’s Trainer, Ms. Mmasechaba Matli, and qualified Librarians, Paula Krynauw and our own South Africa Project Manager, Michael Makwela, a new Library Management and Administration course was written. The course is delivered through workshops designed to provide library assistants with the basic skills of sorting and circulating library material, to promote their libraries within their schools and work closely with educators. This three part modular course is supported with a training manual which includes simple testing sections to monitor each library assistant’s knowledge and understanding. Part one of the course was held at Impala Crescent School on the 8th of April for 15 library assistants (includes other School Aid partner schools).
We are delighted with the positive comments received from the attending library assistants and especially pleased with comments received from the Western Cape Department of Basic Education who reviewed our course, endorsed its content and suitability for use in their schools and commended School Aid’s work:-
Dear Colleagues
“I find this Learner Guide to be very useful and helpful to Library Assistants. It elaborates more and clearer on the critical issues such as difference between fiction, non-fiction and reference, of which some of the learners and their mentors find it very difficult to understand.
Secondly, it is also going to help them understand classification more, for those who are still struggling with DDC. Using this Guide in conjunction with other Manuals, will indeed empower Library Assistants. I believe these are the powerful and best tools, to guide them to understand the library and its organization, much better. We would really like to express our gratitude to School Aid for developing such a guide”.
Monitoring and Evaluation of Libraries
Each School Aid refurbished library is supplied with a computer and a professional library software package. Initial reports for the month of March across the four libraries submitting results show that 848 books were borrowed, an average of 53 books per week per library. The most popular books borrowed were from the fiction section and included “Matilda” by Roald Dahl and “How to draw Cartoons” by David Moystyn.
