Sikhula Sonke Early Childhood Development Organisation Reaches out to the Enkanini Caregivers/parents of children who do not receive any form of ECD s

The Nkanini caregivers celebrated an early Christmas when Sikhula Sonke ECD gave them hope and a reason to smile. Sikhula Sonke ECD an NPO based in Harare Square, Khayelitsha, runs A Family and Community Motivator programme in Nkanini. This programme focuses on children less than seven years whose parents cannot afford to take them to a pre-school. The children are visited at home and the caregivers are taught how to stimulate their children. This programme of strengthening families is one many programmes that are run by Sikhula Sonke ECD.

When the Sikhula Sonke fieldworkers started working in Nkanini they were faced with the reality of abject poverty that faces the children and their families. They discovered that these families sometimes sleep without food; the children do not have warm shoes and clothes to wear in winter. Sometimes during home visits some caregivers are out to the dumping sites to find food. These are vulnerable children whose dreams are deferred or even die before they even grow up. It is needless to mention the illnesses that are attached to this kind of an environment,
Touched by this situation the Sikhula Sonke ECD community workers decided to make means to find them Christmas food parcels. These are very helpful to bring relief in their plight. The Claremont Methodist church (founder of Sikhula-Sonke ECD) members and friends of Sikhula Sonke ECD made it possible for these families to find a reason to smile and keep up the hope.


Parents, caregivers and children flanked by Sikhula Sonke ECD Family Community motivators (on Green T-shirts) after health and nutrition workshop which ended up with food parcel gifts organised by Sikhula-Sonke ECD.

This event was held on the 25th November 2010 at the Ithemba Apostolic Church of Zion in the community where these people live at Enkanini. These families are in the process of seeking ways to do income generation projects, however the children during this waiting process are starving and their development is affected badly. We are appealing to anybody who can to reach to these families through Sikhula Sonke ECD. We are in 35-903 Cephe Crescent, Harare Square, opposite spar supermarket, Harare, Khayelitsha or call us at 021 363 0057. Contact Person: Thembakazi Nxesi (Project coordinator).You can also email us thembi@sikhulasonke.org.za

Teachers graduate to lay solid foundations

On Friday the 3rd of December 2010, Sikhula Sonke hosted and celebrated a graduation ceremony for our Basic Assistant Teachers’ training. In total there were 37 learners who graduated and received certificates of competence in facilitating all components of active learning and practicals in early childhood development.

The assistant teachers are placed in Educare Centres around Khayelitsha, and most of them are the neediest centres that need support and mentoring. The Sikhula Sonke training not only assists teachers but also offers ongoing coaching and support for the entire educare centre, which impacts highly on the quality of education received by the children.

One of the learners appointed to speak during the event Ms Mirriam April from Nonkqubela Educare shared an emotional story of how the programme has helped her to grow in the care for children. She encouraged Sikhula Sonke staff to grow and be a fountain of knowledge for generations to come.This is indeed an inspiring feedback from the learners that Sikhula Sonke is contributing towards greater good of providing quality pre-education to the children of Khayelitsha.

Meet our new Executive Director

My name is Nomzamo Princess Nkosazana Landingwe and I am born and bred in Cape Town. I have qualifications in social and political studies, I have an extreme interest in community development and I have been working in this field for the past 10 years.
I have been blessed to work in organisations that have invested in my training as well as giving me exposure to the most complex communities. One of my best experiences was working with Higher Education Student Leadership at the South African Centre for Organisational Development, to facilitating practical solutions to HIV and AIDS and Poverty at the United Nations Development Programme. In 2006 I became part of the social development programme of the Anglican Church of Southern Africa as a program manager. It is here that I have learnt a deeper understanding of “Mission and Service” and of what is meant by poverty and starting with what you have. During this time I was involved in assisting urban development to deep rural social action in villages of Mozambique.
When I reflect on the work of the organisations I have been part of, I know that this is God’s plan at work in my life. In this part of my journey I have begun to experience God and to be a part of the Word shared in Mathew 19: 14: “Let the children come to me”.
I have been working for Sikhula Sonke Early Childhood Development since April 2010. It is such a joy to work directly with the beneficiaries, in particular the women and the children, as this is one ministry that is close to my heart. The programs of Sikhula Sonke continue to teach me about child-centred approaches to development. From the beginning of my employment, I have been part of steering the implementation of ELRU’s Family and Community Motivators Programme (FCM) in Khayelitsha. This is a new programme for Sikhula Sonke that seeks to extend support and capacitate the parents and caregivers in especially vulnerable areas of Khayelitsha. Through this program we seek to broaden their knowledge of how to develop their children and how to access various services to increase their support network.

To the community of Khayelitsha, the Board and the staff of Sikhula Sonke ECD I would like to thank you for putting your trust in me to be part of this humbling ministry.

Yours truly,
Nomzamo

Investec Vuvuzela Fundraiser

We would like to say a very BIG thank you to Gillian Scott, Hendrik Du Toit and the staff of Investec Asset Management in London for the generous donation of R12,000. You used an office "fun-raiser" to reach out to a very worthy cause and we really appreciate your care and support in these tough times!

If any of you are ever in Cape Town and you would like to visit our organisation, please let us know!

Warm regards

Wendy Wiemers

Report back on the 2nd Parent Training session for 2010

The second parental training for 2010 was held at Sikhula Sonke premises on 02 July 2010. A total number of seventy (70) parents attended the meeting. This time we had more males than the last training and this was encouraging. The increasing number of male parents encourages us to acknowledge the development of children as not only female parental responsibility. The meeting started at 9.30h00 a.m. It was opened with prayer, some exercise and games.
The new Executive Director, Nomzamo and the Program Manager, Mdebuka Mthwazi were the lead facilitators in this training. We had speakers from different circles of Early Childhood development. The partnership in the presentations with other organisation is to encourage the parents of Khayelitsha not to take Early Childhood development for granted but to understand ECD as a highly recognised intervention in early years. This training had three themes:
1. Health and Nutrition for babies and young children
2. Play and creative play
3. Children’s rights and responsibilities
Nomzamo welcomed the visitors and gave a brief introduction of her and the speakers expected. Mdebuka then followed by introducing the purpose of the workshop and also doing a reflection on the previous workshop. It came out that parents are starting to show active appreciation of their role in the development of their children. They told different stories of their participatory involvement.
Lindiwe of Ethafeni Day Care Centre made a presentation on nutrition and young babies. Parents listened with enthusiasm and asked a lot of questions on this theme. There was quite a robust discussion around this theme. They appreciated the new information that they learnt. One of the parents acknowledged that, she didn’t know that her 6 months old baby weighing 8, 3kg was obese. She appreciated the sharing and committed to follow the right dietary procedures. Most of the participants would like this session to be conducted with them again and also in ECD sites to makes the practitioners more of health and nutrition.
We also had another interesting session presented by the Centre for creative education. The parents learnt a lot about the importance of play and the different types of play like Fantasy Play, Imaginative play and others. One of the parents comment was that, she didn’t know that she deprived her child developmental opportunities when she refused the child an opportunity to play more especially if she is wearing clean clothes. She has vowed not to do that mistake again; she will give as many opportunities for the children to play.