The books, the books, the books! When we decided to give the children hard-back books instead of loose papers to write and draw on, we hoped that they would react by taking ownership of the project and making it their own. We wanted some consistency and dedication. We wanted more focus on the job in […]
The books, the books, the books! Read More »
CBN’s Administration person is one totally reliable friend! Arriving for any meeting precisely 30 seconds before start time, she is unfailingly organized, calm and prepared, ready to take on whatever we throw at her (and that’s usually quite a lot!) and unflappable in the face of last-minute change, sudden emergencies or unexpected diversions. The only
Wilien van Zyl – CBN shooting star! Read More »
In an age of television and instant switch-on, children find it hard to get to the heart of a story or a text. We aim with the Happiness Project to show them that they can find happiness in small events and hone their skills to understand more deeply what is happening around them. We chose
What our new project is all about? Read More »
This project has been enormous. It has also been enormous fun, enormous amounts of work, enormous amounts of hope and a strong belief that it will happen. It came from a desire to lighten up a little, to give the CBN children a break from the anxiety of a long season of lockdown and worry.
We have some happy children! Read More »
My favourite kind of people are the ones who say they are going to do something, ignore the muttered voices saying it isn’t possible, and then go right ahead and do it. Book Dash people are that sort. One Hundred books owned by every child under five is a serious undertaking. Some people raised their
Book Heroes – Book Dash Read More »
Lisa Witherden arrived like a lucky bean at just the time we needed her. Within two weeks of introducing herself, lockdown began and she was hard at work with the team to create the 18-week project called Lockdown Learning. This was envisaged as being eight weeks long, but the severity of the lockdown in South
Leaving CBN for greener pastures … Read More »
Keeping us on the straight and narrow – Elsa Gebhard It is way beyond time that we recognized the immense amount of work that Elsa puts in to keeping our books up to date, arranging the annual audit and attending board meetings to report on progress and generally making sure that we hand in the
This week, the first unit of the Happiness Project has reached the children we work with in De Kop informal settlement. It is the beginning of a new phase in our efforts to work with children remotely instead of through workshops. During lockdown – from early March to late September – we sent out 100
Time for new Happiness! Read More »
This project has been in our minds throughout lockdown when it was imperative to get material out there as fast as possible – and to make it appropriate, suitable and enough to keep children of different ages interested and occupied during seven months (as it turned out) of restriction. It wasn’t easy for anybody, but
Outline of the Happiness Project (1) Read More »
‘Never waste a good crisis’ Memorably said by Winston Churchill, this remains a very significant way of looking at things. This has not been a year any of us will forget but thinking on our feet is sometimes positive as well as necessary. The CBN team have devised a whole new way of working with
New Version CBN Book Club Read More »
A summary for those who are short of time… Children’s Book Network approaches 10 years of working with children without books or a love of reading. This is happening in a year of global disaster and disruption. We cannot, and must not, give up on children who now – more than ever – need the
Introduction Soon, it will be ten years since CBN began to work with children from poor communities who had little interest in books and reading. Those of us who love children and love books felt that we had to DO something about these lost readers. Children who would never dive headfirst into a book, swim
Twenty-Twenty Vision: The way forward for Children’s Book Network Read More »
If ever we needed it, it’s now! But we have been forced to admit that it is not possible to achieve all we wanted to do in the circumstances of even more necessary lockdown. Playing music, showing film clips of our New York collaborating author, Kate Hosford, and enjoying the treats we have planned are
Update on the Happiness Project Read More »
We have been very fortunate to receive funding from Rotary Rotweil that will enable us to continue our reading programme for children out of school. This was cause for celebration. We know we have to do this, but it is impossible without money to buy stationary and to pay for the considerable photocopying costs. (One
Lock-Down Learning Rides again! Read More »
We are glad to report that the eight weeks of Lockdown Learning is extended for another week and that Vuyo reports a really good response to the 20-page (sometimes more) reading booklets CBN distributed. Many thanks to our generous friends in Germany who funded this project. Lockdown is not yet over – in fact, South
Reporting on our Lockdown Learning Read More »
Children’s Book Network has nearly completed an 8-week reading programme called Lockdown Learning with children in De Kop and Stanford South. Circumstances are not easy – especially as the weather has turned wet and cold, but Vuyo Siza and her husband Phumlani are doing a great job of reaching the children in their community. We
Eight weeks on … Lockdown Learning Read More »
We are really thrilled that three long-standing friends of CBN are joining us internationally to raise funds for the continued work of CBN at a time when it is more necessary than ever. They are (in alphabetical order) Anele Mhlahlo who was a faithful member of our workshop team and served on our board for
Introducing our Funding Ambassadors Read More »
Now in it’s fifth week, with daily activities, reading, writing and illustrating as well as games and songs, we hope this is making a difference in difficult times. The weather has changed, and the glorious autumn days of early lockdown have been replaced by proper Cape winter weather. Cold and wet and stormy. Vuyo is
Lockdown Learning continues Read More »
Each week since the 11th of May, we have distributed CBN Lockdown Learning Booklets to our children in De Kop settlement in Stanford. Each booklet is based on a special theme. Topics and activities have to be created with built-in stories as getting books to each child is impossible in lockdown. Our team is writing
Children’s Book Network Lockdown Learning Programme Read More »
In mid-June, for the last week of our Lockdown Learning project, we are introducing a programme designed to remind us all about free-range joy, something that has also gone into lockdown these past months. Whales and tales, dancing and making music, beautiful illustrations and incredible artwork. All of these will be part of the fun
The Happiness Project Read More »
