By Selinah Mlambo | Director
Deaf children at Nzeve pre-school love story time. The colorful books with vibrant pictures open new worlds to them. The books enable the deaf children, their younger siblings and mothers who attend the preschool activities with them, to learn together and build their sign language vocabulary. But reading books are not easy for many schools and families to access in Zimbabwe. So when they move on the primary and high school, Deaf children and youth have little access to books to read for enjoyment.
Covid-19 upset the school terms resulting in delays to some activities. But it looks like things are settling down now. Nzeve staff and volunteers are busy getting the first sets of books ready for the new term. Nzeve supports the 17 Resource Units for the Deaf in Manicaland (special classes in mainstream schools) with stationery, and the books will be added to the pack.
Some very excited Deaf youth who are part of the Vocational Training at Nzeve are keen to get in on the reading too!! During their lunch break the youth get a chance to look through the books and share their thoughts about the project.
“Are all these books for the deaf? All of them?!” they asked. “I can’t wait to check out a book from this library, I’ve always tried to find books to read, but it’s hard to get them,” another youth shared.
And it’s not just the youth who are talking about books, parents are keen too! “This will be good for us, we don’t have books at home. Can we be included too?”
By Libby Foster | Fundraiser Nzeve
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