Project Summary

Umbalabala Education Toolkit is a collection of novel methods and apparatuses for making learning, teaching and assessment easy, especially in Foundation Phase classrooms. The low-cost, high-quality, patented toolkit, is built largely from re-and upcycled waste plastic materials. It is designed to accelerate learning, and to capacitate and prepare learners for the Fourth Industrial Revolution, through the use of inclusive technology. The toolkit forms part of an innovative, integrated, and explorative learning method that makes learning fun, easy, enjoyable, and effective. The first early pilot took place in 2021 with 526 children during lockdown in South Africa, using Botanical Gardens open spaces. A dozen of childre that were part of this program were outside of the schooling system (i.e. homeless children). The second pilot took place with 200 Foundation Phase educators, practitioners and care givers. The company entered commercialisation phase in Spring 2023 with Foundation-Phase training workshops aimed at educators. Watoto-Wazania NPC (The African-Child)