Checking in the the Wild Coast Schools & Preschools Volunteer Program

2013 End of Term Assembly

Last term ended with a BANG in Chintsa!

Volunteer Matthias helping the learners to
organise their presentations in assembly

A celebration assembly at Chintsa East school was filled with songs, prezi presentations and certificates. This term we focused on Human Rights for our older learners in the Wild Coast Schools computer labs and Friendship and Responsibility for the younger learners in the foundation phase and preschool.

The end of term assembly also marked the end of Nuremburg volunteer Matthias’ last day teaching in Chintsa, having taught at the school for five months. It was a sad day for everybody at the school. It was also Maria’s last day at Bulugha.



The New Term in  2014

We have started 2014 with a brand spanking new topic – Hygiene and Sanitation.

Me dispensing glitter to the preschoolers hands!

With the younger learners we have been focusing on washing hands. We taught the children a song called “Wash Them Well” which teaches them that they must wash their hands using soap and water. Last week we did a fun activity which involved a lot of glitter, soap and water! To show our small students the importance of washing their hands, we pretended that the glitter (or stars) were germs - it took them a long time to wash it off, showing them how long they should actually wash our hands for.

Mama Phumla sharing out some more glitter

Trying to wash the glitter off!

Heading to the washing bowl and sink

Big smiles as we washed our hands :)

Grade R students washed their hands, with the help of pre-school volunteer Deyse. We also used their glittery and soapy hands to make part of our new wall display!

Experiment Fortnight - A Lesson in Science and Hygiene

We hosted a fortnight of experiments with the middle and older learners this term who put on their overall coats, and become scientists for two weeks. Children at both Chintsa East and Bulugha schools have been learning about tooth decay. It is difficult to explain the realities of tooth decay and what better way to learn about it than to do some experiments? Tooth decay is a very real problem in the townships of South Africa, where children have easy access to cheap sweets and chips and not necessarily toothpaste, toothbrushes and adequate dental care.

The Experiments

The enamel on an egg, is similar to the enamel on our teeth. To demonstrate the bad affects of drinking and eating sugar on our teeth, we left an egg in a cup of coke for a week to see how the egg would be affected. The students predicted what they thought the egg would look like and one week later we checked the result...and the learners weren’t so keen to drink coke anymore!

Pouring the coke in with the
hand-boiled egg

Checking out the results!

“It smells bad!” 
                                                    “The egg looks brown and bad”  
                           “It’s horrible”
...were some comments from our students.

The other experiment focused on two apples. We made a hole in one to signify a cavity in a tooth, whilst the other one stayed the same. We helped the children to predict what would happen to both apples, and one week later we were met with a very smelly and rotten apple.
                                    “It smells horrible!”
The results are being typed up in computer class as we speak.

Watch this space for another fun filled update about what we get up to here on project in Chintsa :)

Charlotte
VA32 Volunteer Co-ordinator