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Peet le Grange of Eastvaal Auto Middelburg handed over a brand-new Kia Sedona to Helping Hand to ensure our staff travel safely while they give hope to our children lunchbox by lunchbox, school case by school case. We would like to thank Peet and his wonderful team at Eastvaal Auto Middelburg – your sponsorship gives speed to our plans and projects.
Some of the Helping Hand projects (The Helping Hand car is often used to launch and roll out the project):
Helping Hand believes that every child should have the necessary stationery at the beginning of his or her school career. In 2008, Helping Hand launched the Schoolbag Project to distribute schoolbags and stationery to underprivileged Grade 1 learners all over the country.
Helping Hand’s School Case project was launched in 2008 and after only three months 9 000 needy Afrikaans-speaking grade ones already benefited from the project. However, the need for basic stationery and school equipment is five times larger than the means which Helping Hand could make available up to now.
Addressing the need
The two biggest factors that play a role in the success of a child’s school career is to what extent he/she is prepared for his/her first day of school and whether he/she has the basic equipment. Children’s school readiness is addressed by Helping Hand’s Lunchbox project.
To have hope is a choice one has to make. One cannot give hope to a child – he/she has to choose it. What then can one give a child so that he/she chooses hope? The answer is love. Loves comes in the form of hugs and attention and time and effort, but sometimes it is blue and packed chock-a-block with pencils, crayons, a ruler and an eraser. A school case is a gift of love with everything a needy child requires to feel he/she belongs to a group and has an equal chance.
Helping Hand’s School Case project seemingly addresses a one-dimentional need for stationery, but a school casw is so much more than equipment for school. It is a symbol of hope. A grade one child takes courage because of that bag in her hand, because that bag is her proof of your faith in her potential, proof that you support her in entering the new challenge of the big school. A school bag is proof of involvement, love and care, and this allows a child to take heart and to seize every development opportunity with both hands.
The School Case project is aimed at giving needy grade ones an equal footing.
Helping Hand’s National Lunchbox Project
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provides food coupons to underprivileged nursery schools; -
trains mothers as child minders as part of a job-creation project; and -
distributes blankets and soft toys to nursery schools.
Helping Hand Lunchbox project
So many impoverished toddlers will not develop optimally as a result of physical, emotional and mental neglect and consequently start their formal education with a handicap.
In impoverished areas many parents cannot afford nursery school fees and the schools are under pressure to obtain financial support from external sources.
Helping Hand’s research indicates that nursery schools in less privileged areas have a large need for remedial services such as occupational therapy, speech therapy and psychological help for toddlers. The research further indicates that, in many cases, the food toddlers receive at nursery schools is their only meal for the day.
Shortages that Helping Hand has identified in the holistic development of needy toddlers:
1. The training of caregivers and mothers: job creation
Helping Hand is currently training 49 caregivers in Danville using funds generated through last year’s Lunchbox Project.
Proper training of caregivers will address many of the developmental problems of toddlers in a preventative manner. The training programme also serves as a job-creation project, as the mothers/caregivers are trained as day-care mothers and may register their own day-care centre on completion of their training. The pressure on impoverished nursery schools is thereby also alleviated.
The training programme is in Afrikaans, which strengthens mother-tongue education.
The day-mother programme is aimed at caring for toddlers between the ages of two and five years in small groups of six. This model ensures good individual and interpersonal contact for toddlers who would otherwise not receive any development stimulation during the day in a squatter camp, shelter or commune.
2. Support to impoverished toddlers and nursery schools regarding hand-made educational material: job creation
Helping Hand’s branches will utilize needy communities throughout South Africa to make educational material for nursery schools by hand. The project will therefore contribute to job creation. Educational material such as clay, wooden blocks, puzzles, form- and colour-recognition boards, string wound around tops, balls and books will be packed into a crate and distributed to the schools who qualify for the project.
3. Support to needy toddlers and nursery schools with regard to nutrition: community involvement
This support entails giving training about what constitutes a balanced diet for a toddler, as well as suggestions for affordable meals and balanced nutrition packets to which boiling water can be added.
The project depends strongly on community involvement. Churches, schools, businesses and various organisations pack lunchboxes and distribute them at nursery schools and collect non-perishable products which nursery schools use in bulk to prepare food for the toddlers.
The Foundation for Empowerment through Afrikaans assists with the training of mothers, while the Association for the Education and Care of Young Children assists with identifying nursery schools and grading them according to their needs. The Lunchbox Project also has a media partner, the magazine Baba en Kleuter.
Thank you Eastvaal Auto Middelburg
Lindie Strydom, PRO of Helping Hand, takes delivery of the
Kia Sedona from Peet le Grange of Eastvaal Auto Middelburg
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