I work with the best specialist team a teacher could hope to collaborate with. This year we decided to join forces and contribute more than just books in the Books to Africa partnership. Since 2012, we have sent Thejane Malakane in Lesotho hundreds of books so his students could have more resources for practicing their English reading skills. This year we expanded the partnership to emphasize different aspects of learning - music, physical education and recorded books. Our music teacher Marty Kelly-Peterson gathered a set of gently used recorders and prepared music so Thejane could teach instrumental music in his classroom. His students helped him make videos of how to play the notes. Our PE teacher, Jamie Allott, prepared a frisbee unit with her students complete with frisbees and instruction cards on how to throw one. These were just shipped last week. In addition, our partner teacher, Karey Killian, a teacher librarian in Pennsylvania. Her students were able to fundraise and collect over 500 books to send home with Thejane. They took have Skyped with his students, giving the students in both countries a different view of life outside their classroom window. JoAnn Jacobs in Hawaii also supports his classroom with recorded books. When shipping books by mail became troublesome, her students came up with a different idea – recorded books. Now on our recorded book page you will be able to listen and view recordings by JoAnn’s students as well as my BTA club students. Three teachers, Heather Kirk, Rehl Christy, and Katrina Rachubinski together with their students at Wissahickon Middle School in Ambler, Pennsylvania wrote their own books. They were made with the program StoryJumper. All of the recorded books can be found on the Books & Stories page of this website and are open to anyone with internet access to read.
Our Books to Africa project is small, but powerful. If you would like to make a difference in improving Quality Education for students and teachers in rural Africa, please submit a Contact Us form and join our partnership. All it takes is a willingness to make a difference in the future of the next generation of leaders.
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Julie HembreeI am Julie Hembree, a teacher librarian in the greater Seattle area. I am passionate about providing children in need with quality reading resources. The opinions expressed in this Blog are strictly those of Julie Hembree and its contributors. They do not reflect the opinions or endorsement of any other entity. Archives
September 2017
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