Project Life
Teach and Travel in Southern Africa for 12 Weeks

The days begin at around 7am with breakfast before volunteers take a local bus to work at around 7.45am so that you are ready to start work by 8am.

At the crèche most of your morning will be spent teaching and organising educational games/activities for the children. The standard of English amongst the children is generally poor and it is a challenge to teach at this level. Your biggest role is providing face-to-face contact with children that need positive role models in a childcare capacity (feeding, teaching and interacting with them), while simultaneously giving them some contact with the outside world.

On the community care project you may get involved in many of the following activities (depending on the timing of your placement):

• Care – giving adult care, support and love to the children to help them feel wanted
• Activities – organising games and playing activities, and helping to arrange and take them on educational outings, such as visiting a game reserve
• Outreach and Needs Identification – visiting homesteads to help find vulnerable children to develop profiles for them and identify their needs
• Feeding Programmes – helping with activities like developing trench gardens, helping to source food donations, and helping to feed the children
• Shelter Improvement – helping to improve basic shelter structures for vulnerable children
• Fundraising – organising events to raise awareness and funds to help meet specific needs for vulnerable children.

On the Teaching Project

School starts with an assembly, which includes singing songs and the national anthem, making it a great way to start the day! You then meet with your fellow teachers in the morning to discuss the day’s activities. Most of your morning will be spent teaching and perhaps marking. The standard of English amongst the students is generally poor but at a level which enables you to teach. One of your primary aims should be to improve the level of English in your classes. You might also want to learn the local language, siSwati, from the kids in your class.

Other activities may include:

• Teaching - shadowing a teacher or taking your own class
• Preparing tests and homework
• Sports – introducing new sports or teaching existing sports (e.g. football, netball)
• Extra curricular activities – helping with school drama productions, music classes and any other activities that interest you as a volunteer
• Agriculture - the school has agriculture classes and vegetable gardens, which volunteers can get involved with
• General help – getting involved with the staff at the school and getting involved where ever possible in the things that are happening at the school.

After the school/crèche finishes in the early afternoon, you are free to go home or you may want to help with sports and extra-curricula activities. You may also get involved assisting at a small community centre for disabled people in the afternoons. This involves helping with income generating projects and basic education for a small group of people with various disabilities. You could also use this time to organise fundraising events or plan your lessons for the next day. There are always endless projects to work on – it is up to you how involved you would like to be!