PUKU.co.za

Puku Welcomes it's First Managing Director

by Nonikiwe - Editor on 14 May 2012   |   

The PUKU Children’s Literature Foundation is thrilled to announce that Bontle Senne will become its first Managing Director as of 14 May 2012. Bontle’s academic credentials, passion for children’s literature and education and demonstration leadership qualities make her the ideal person to take the PUKU initiative to the next level.
After matriculating with distinction from Fourways High School in 2005, Bontle went on to University of Cape Town (UCT) where she completed a Bachelor of Commerce (Politics, Philosophy and Economics) in 2009. She was one of only five candidates admitted to UCT’s Bachelor of Social Sciences honours programme from which she graduated in 2010.
While studying, Bontle completed an internship at feminist publishing house Modjaji Books where she made such an impression that she was invited to become a shareholder and board member in 2010. She also worked part time at PUKU.co.za on the blog and social network site management of WordPress, Facebook and Twitter sites. She also wrote, edited and published posts and articles.
As if this was not enough, she also worked as a tutor to groups of 15 to 30 students in management, philosophy and politics and was elected President of the Non-Profit Organisation (NPO) South African Schools’ Debating Board (SASDB). Other notable leaderships roles in NPOs include serving as Head of Internal Communications for Student Health and Wellness Services (SHAWCO) in the Education sector, Head of the Organising Committee for the 2009 South African Schools Debating Championship and Director of Sponsorship for Ubuntu’s Media School project in 2008.
Among her many achievements, Bontle was the recipient of the international AW Mellon Foundation Humanities Honours Scholarship in 2010, a National Research Fund (NRF) Honours Scholarship in 2012 and the UCT Commerce Faculty scholarship in 2007 as well as a Fuller Hall Academic Excellence Award 2007. She was on the 2006 Dean’s Merit List and in the same year she became a Member of Golden Key International Honour Society, UCT Chapter.
After graduating, Bontle worked as Sales Marketing and Communications Coordinator for T-Systems, South Africa while juggling freelance research work for other corporate and non-profit organisations. She has decided to take a pay cut to move to the PUKU Foundation because she will be able to combine her two passions – information technology and literature – and hopes to expand on the Foundation’s work to bridge the digital and literary divide throughout Africa.

Archbishop Desmond Tutu to Create Picture Book with Zondervan

by Nonikiwe - Editor on 04 May 2012   |   

Christian publishing house Zondervan has signed Nobel Peace Prize-winner Archbishop Desmond Tutu to collaborate with bestselling author and illustrator Nancy Tillman to produce a picture book telling the creation story from Tutu’s Children of God Storybook Bible.

Tillman will illustrate Tutu’s narrative. The South African activist first published the book with the Grand Rapids publisher in 2010. Zondervan holds world rights and plans to release the book in spring 2014.

RELATED: Zondervan announces 3-book deal with former President Jimmy Carter

The Children of God Storybook Bible rose to the No. 1 spot on the Evangelical Christian Publishers Association bestseller list and was published worldwide in 14 languages, including six African languages in South Africa. Zondervan has sold 50,000 copies of the Bible in the U.S.

• Read complete article

Book details

• Children of God by Desmond Tutu, illustrated by Various
  EAN: 9780310719120
  Find this book with BOOK Finder!

Call for Papers at Unisa's 4th Children's Reading Conference

by Nonikiwe - Editor on 02 Apr 2012   |   

4th Unisa Children’s Reading Conference
Theme: Social media and children

11-12 September 2012
Sunnyside Campus of the University of South Africa, Pretoria

“One in six children is failing to read books as they spend an increasing amount of time text messaging friends, sending e-mails and browsing social networking sites”.
Social media has become exceedingly popular in recent years, which is a cause of concern among many parents, librarians, teachers and other adults. Sceptics refer to disadvantages of social media such as the effects on children’s ability to concentrate; their ability to communicate; the lowering of literacy rates, etc. In the mean time, children happily find themselves sharing, using and understanding information in ways that were unimaginable a generation ago.
The changes brought about by technology, and social media in particular, in the lives of children should not be denied but embraced. Social media, as technology, should not be seen as a threat to reading and to books in particular, but.as a challenge and tool to introduce children to books and information via mediums other than traditional print.
Purpose of the conference
The purpose of the conference is to provide a forum for librarians, teachers, parents, caregivers, authors, publishers, researchers and academics and any other interested parties to share ideas and knowledge on the broad topic of children and social media.
Call for abstracts
You are invited to submit an abstract of between 150 and 300 words as an e-mail attachment to Prof Thomas van der Walt (vdwaltb@unisa.ac.za). Please include full contact details, institutional affiliation and a brief CV in paragraph format of not more than 100 words.
Presentations will be confined to 20 minutes plus a 10-minute question/discussion session. Your paper should address any of the following and related sub-themes:
• Social media/networking and reading: the impact on reading
• The use of social media/networking to promote reading
• Libraries/information centres and social media
• Marketing libraries as a partner in the social media context
• Utilising the school library as a social media platform in SA
• Social media and reading behaviour
• Moral aspects/ethical of social media and children
• Mobile technologies as enhancer of the reading habit
• Publishing and social media

Important dates
Submission of abstracts: 15 June 2012
Notification of acceptance of abstracts: 13 July 2012
Submission of full-text papers: 15 August 2012
Please note that that the submission of an abstract entails a commitment to attend and present the paper should the abstract be accepted.
For more information about the conference please contact Thomas van der Walt: vdwaltb@unisa.ac.za

Eastern Cape Parents 'Shut Down' 294 State Schools

by Nonikiwe - Editor on 27 Mar 2012   |   

Fed-up parents in Eastern Cape have “unofficially” shut down about 300 schools in their communities because they would rather send their children elsewhere to receive a better education.

It is reported that the state is to spend R657-million less on new schools this year as provinces battle to meet the demand for classroom spaces.

Yesterday, opposition parties, the SA Democratic Teachers’ Union and Equal Education lambasted the department for what they alleged was a string of failures.

They claim it has failed to provide safe classrooms, teachers, food, transport, textbooks and stationery for schools.

They were reacting to education MEC Mandla Makupula’s budget and policy speech to the Bhisho legislature on Thursday.

“Communities have unofficially closed 294 public schools in Eastern Cape. These are just being vandalised and the law requires that we’ve got to [hold] public hearings,” Makupula said.

The hearings would ascertain whether the department should close or merge the affected schools. The hearings, which will take place across the department’s 23 districts, are expected to result in the closure of many schools with less than 100 registered pupils.

The department reportedly indicated earlier this year that there were already 500 schools earmarked for closure because of low enrolments.

Makupula’s statement was made after DA leader and Western Cape Premier Helen Zille called Eastern Cape pupils flocking to Western Cape for a better education “refugees”.

The Daily Dispatch, The Times’s sister paper, reported last month that a Western Cape education department 10-day snap survey at the beginning of the year showed that about 8000 children from Eastern Cape had unexpectedly entered the Western Cape’s education system.

• Read complete article at Timeslive

University of Johannesburg Launches Maponya Mall Reading Programme

by Nonikiwe - Editor on 19 Mar 2012   |   

The University of Johannesburg (UJ), in collaboration with Maponya Mall and Sanlam, will be launching a fun new reading initiative aimed at pre and primary school children to encourage reading for pleasure inside and outside the classroom.
The three-fold mission of the Maponya Mall Reading Programme, to be launched at the Centre Court of the Maponya Mall, Soweto on Saturday, 17 March at 09:00, is to encourage and educate families about their important role in raising a reader; support schools in assuring that students read on grade level by the end of the third grade and to facilitate community involvement in helping young readers be successful.

UJ’s Executive Dean of Education, Professor Sarah Gravett, together with the university’s foundation phase students will jump-start the reading programme by reading selected books to the children and their parents in order to start discussion on issues from the tactical to the ethical and everything in between.

“Reading to one’s child is crucial to various aspects of development. From the womb through to the intermediate phase, reading to one’s child is essential. Reading is a very important way of activating and initiating the development of more complex thinking and linguistic literacy, which can prove crucial to the years of foundation phase schooling. The earlier reading is used as a tool to stimulate language development the better, since we never exist without language; we use it all the time,” says Prof Gravett.

According to Gravett selected stories can be used to teach a child something about society and the world. “By exposing the child to the right story, one is able to refer to the events and essential facets of narrative to teach them something about the world. For instance, a story that deals with friendship can be used to teach values and ideas accompany bonds of friendship.”

She concludes: “The question should not be whether I should be reading to my child, but what I should be reading and how I can use the reading experience to teach my child something about society. Even though the mere act of reading to one’s child is important since it stimulates the development of linguistic literacy, it should be accompanied by the deliberate attempt to teach one’s child something new. Your child’s success at school depends on what you are reading to them.”

• Read complete article at Businessnews

South African Puffin Imprint About to Kick-off

by Nonikiwe - Editor on 09 Mar 2012   |   

As from March 2012 all local children’s titles will be published under the SOUTH AFRICAN PUFFIN brand

“The Puffin imprint has a long and proud history within the Penguin Group and is synonymous with quality children’s publishing. It is with particular pleasure, therefore, that Penguin South Africa will now be publishing a range of children’s books by local authors under this imprint, titles that will sit comfortably alongside the international authors already published in Puffin.” – Alison Lowry, CEO, Penguin Books SA

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Franschhoek Literary Festival Launches Young Readers Book Week

by Nonikiwe - Editor on 02 Mar 2012   |   

The Franschhoek Literary Festival proudly announces the launch of a Book Week for Young Readers, to run in conjunction with the festival.

Little kids are eager to learn to read, but too often the impulse wears off as they grow older. The reasons are many – boring textbooks, competition from TV programmes, sport and computer games, no books in the home. Worst of all, the vast majority of South African children have minimal access to books that are exciting, engaging and relevant to their lives.

This year, the Franschhoek Literary Festival aims to encourage all learners in the Franschhoek Valley to enjoy reading with our first Book Week for Young Readers from 7 to 11 May, the week leading up to FLF 2012. It is being keenly supported by local publishers and authors, as well as a new reading initiative soon to be rolled out country-wide by the Sunday Times Storybook Campaign.

More than 40 workshop facilitators and writers of books for children and young adults will visit every class (from Grade R to Grade 12) in seven Franschhoek schools, where they will talk to over 4 000 learners, choosing topics relevant to their ages and home languages. The young readers will also take part in readathons; poetry, comic and lyric writing workshops; and book and poetry competitions.

• Read complete article at Artlink

Storyteller Gcina Mhlophe Shares Tales About Preserving Nature

by Nonikiwe - Editor on 23 Nov 2011   |   

Popular and talented storyteller Gcina Mhlophe will be sharing tales about preserving nature in the coming weeks.

Mhlophe, best known for izingwanekwane (African traditional folk tales), is scheduled to perform storytelling sessions to teach communities about preserving the Earth at the two-week 17th Conference of the Parties of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (COP17) that starts on Monday.

African culture teaches children that they must not listen to tales during the day because they will “grow horns”, but Mhlophe has encouraged many storytelling enthusiasts, who are inspired by her zest for the oral tradition.

I recall waking up every Saturday morning and running to my hi-fi to hear Mhlophe tell the stories of The Princess and the Frog and The Singing Chameleon.

I was seven and it was music to my ears.

So it’s on the basis of my experience that I predict that this is going to be an electrifying experience for young children – and the young at heart.

Mhlophe is well known and respected for keeping history alive in the oral tradition.

Talking about the climate change conference, she said her role was to teach people about the importance of preserving nature.

• Read complete article at iol

Nine-Year Old Free State Twins Set to Launch Novels

by Nonikiwe - Editor on 09 Nov 2011   |   

WHILE most children under 10 cannot wait to get home after school to have fun with friends or play the latest TV games, twins from Qwaqwa are busy writing short stories.

Yuvadiya and Sonal Ranjith — nine-year-old Grade three learners at Harriston Primary School in Harrismith, will launch their books, Huvera and A Christmas Miracle, later this month.

Huvera, an eight-page book written by Yuvadiya, tells the story of a little girl who gains respect in her community through her own good efforts.

Sonal’s book is about a very sick girl who sees a star and makes a wish which is granted to her.

Surev Ranjith, father of the twins, said his daughters have always been different from other kids their own age.

He said his daughters’ books would be ideal reading material for other children “as young people easily identify with stories by young writers”.

The twins write about everyday events in their surroundings and also tackle issues that trouble young children.

“Furthermore, being a young author develops confidence in children who often find careers at a later stage that incorporate creative writing,” Ranjith said.

“The books will inspire other children to write and it also shows that you don’t have to be an adult to write a book.

“They are so confident that they are not scared to be put under the spotlight.”

From early on in their lives, they preferred to read children’s books or express themselves through drawings, the proud father said.

When he heard about the “Dancing Pencils Literacy Development Project” in Durban, a non-profit organisation which assists young authors, Ranjith knew it could be a chance for his children to make some history.

• Read complete article at FreeStateTimes

IEB Exams Get Going Around the Country

by Nonikiwe - Editor on 03 Nov 2011   |   

Today is D-day for thousands of the matrics who write exams set by the Independent Examinations Board.

Nearly 9000 pupils from 176 schools are sitting for the board’s exams. They include 8305 full-time and 523 part-time candidates.

The exams started on October 10 and pupils have already written several subjects, including German, Portuguese, consumer studies and tourism.

Most pupils, however, are writing their first paper today – 7911 pupils write the English home language paper and 453 the English first additional language paper .

The pass rate for the board’s exam last year was 98.4%. The state schools’ rate was 67.8%.

Education expert Graeme Bloch said the standards of the board’s exams and those of the Department of Basic Education were similar.

“The exams are all checked by Umalusi and I have a lot of faith in them,” he said.

Umalusi, which is responsible for quality assurance for all matric exams, said last month that it had moderated and approved 76 Independent Examinations Board question papers.

• Read complete article at Timeslive