Lovedale Primary – 02 Jun16

Lovedale Primary, Kroonstad 02 June 2016

Arriving at Lovedale Primary outside Kroonstad in the Free State was a pleasant surprise. If Anglo American Platinum is involved one can be assured that there is something special about the school and it was a pleasure to be associated with the project once again.

Following learners to school at 07:45 is a good way of finding the entrance to the school as most of them reside in the neighbouring community on the outskirts of Kroonstad some 2 kilometres away. Sadly there is no learner transport system in place forcing all of them to brave the elements when crossing the veld.

I was met by Albert the caretaker who made me feel so at home with his broad smile and friendly face. He showed me where the office was and introduced me to the principal Mrs Cecilia Mohapeloa. Little did I know that Albert, even though he was the caretaker, was also a member of the School Governing Body. Here was a true gentleman who took such pride in his work as the grounds were well maintained from bricks demarcating small paths to patterns on the ground between the classrooms – no grass. He obviously took a great deal of pride in his work delivering a service to the best of his ability. I assume that it was through his actions that there was not a single broken window in the school.

A revised schedule was agreed to as many of the staff were absent for the day for a variety of reasons. The plan was to spend an hour with each of the Grade R, 1, 2 and 3 groups doing DUPLO training with the feeding scheme in between.

English is only introduced to learners in Grade 4 which meant that all the instructions had to be translated. This provided a unique training opportunity to place the teacher in front of the class and to train them on the job. I was pleasantly surprised to see how at least two of the teachers went beyond the DUPLO pedagogy to modifying the procedures to suite their own needs especially with respect to the music component.

I still have not learned my lesson to get out of the way when the boxes of DUPLO are opened. The eagerness of the learners is remarkable and they become so focused on opening the packets to get their hands on the equipment diving in, even if it means knocking me over. Teaching music was an effective way of bringing calm to an otherwise chaotic situation. The memory game also added another dimension with some of the learners taking the lead. The level of difficulty was increase to 4 coloured bricks in Grade 3.

The next exercise involved each learner taking only 10 pieces of DUPLO to construct something and then tell a story related to it. The Grade R and 1 groups predictably produced artefacts that were in two dimensions as tall towers. This is a feature that certainly warrants further research. Fortunately this trend changed with the other two grades. Four learners were observed to combining their 10 pieces to produce a more substantial project. This is the first time that I have observed such a phenomenon and am most encouraged by what I observed. I am confident that the investment in terms of DUPLO and time was well spent.

It was decided that the Grades R and 1 learners would not benefit from the energy demonstrations. The Grade 2 and 3 groups were combined for a session at the end of the day with one of the teachers assisting with the translation of some the words. The concepts were kept simple in the hope that it may have provided an essential spark amongst some of the learners.

It must be noted that the school itself is supplied with electricity from Eskom. A total of 34 houses around the school receive electricity from a Hydrogen Fuel Cell unit sponsored by Anglo American Platinum. This covers power for lights, fridge and a two plate stove. Matsikinyane Tshidiso has been appointed to assist with the management of the system together with supervision of a library (a refurbished container) and he assisted me for the two days and I commend him for his support.