Nadia and Abar are working on post-literacy material. There is a huge need for more material in eMwinika, but between home schooling, the teaching each afternoon and continuing to build relationships in the community, it was difficult to find the time! Finally though, we managed to carve out 2 hours per day to work on getting booklets translated or developed with the aim to print them as soon as possible.
We also hope to get the teachers who have been trained to get started in teaching their own classes soon. We can see God’s wisdom in this delay as we want these teachers to participate in the Bible teaching 4 afternoons a week first! By early next year we should be able though to get this going.
The long term goal of our literacy program is not only to teach people to read and write eMwinika, but also to see them get a head start in all areas of education. So for example we hope to develop a bridging course from eMwinika to Portuguese – the trade language of the country. This also open the potential for other courses, like a course in math that incorporates small business management principals. Developing a course to prepare kids for school is another huge need. There exists no pre-schools here. Most of the little ones entering school are not even able to speak Portuguese and have never held a book or a pen. They are completely unprepared to benefit from school and soon many of them simply stop going…
The economy in this country is booming, but most Mozambicans do not have the training or skills to participate or to benefit from it. The potential is huge… think about skills training in computers, carpentry, welding, agriculture… and more! All these courses and projects are still in the early stages as we learn and look for opportunities. Pray for wisdom, people to move alongside us in this venture, good use of our time and energy as we move ahead with the literacy program.