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Here you will find Nal'ibali's latest news and updates. 

News & Articles

Nali'Bali in the media

BECOME A STORY CHAMPION WITH NAL’IBALI

Posted on
21 January 2021
This year the Nal’ibali reading-for-enjoyment campaign is offering children and caregivers the opportunity to become Story Champions by growing their own home libraries of South African children’s stories, thereby encouraging them to become regular readers.  ‘’All of us – children and adults alike – can become readers one book at a time,” says Yandiswa Xhakaza, Nal’ibali CEO. “Everyone can be a reader if they are...
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By Sindiwe Magona   Babies come into the world ready to learn what it means to be human, and it is the responsibility of the grownups into whose laps they fall, to teach them, just as their caregivers taught them when they first arrived on earth. All we know and all we will ever know, is what we have learned. Therefore, while we all lament the sad...
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“Reading and sharing stories with children is one of the most powerful gifts you can give them. Not only does it help to develop children’s literacy skills, but it also fires up those parts of the brain concerned with imagination, emotion and movement. Ultimately, it helps to create the neural circuits that enable sophisticated thinking and reasoning, helping children to do well at school,”...
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Yandiswa Xhakaza is an MBA graduate and the CEO of the Nal’ibali reading-for-enjoyment campaign. Having taken up her position just weeks ahead of the COVID-19 pandemic, she is using her business insights to steer the organisation through the recession. She offers tips and advice to other NGOs below. As a social activist, I understand all too well the mechanics and complexities of development work. There...
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My Child only Speaks English

Posted on
28 September 2020
Yandiswa Xhakaza CEO at The Nal’ibali Trust  I have heard parents aspire for their children to only speak English or they at least prioritise the speaking of the English language above all other languages, particularly not their own African languages. Why? I have often wondered why parent choices around languages often almost place English as superior to their own home languages. I have come to learn...
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Sindiwe Magona
Standard Bank has partnered with the Nal’ibali reading-for-enjoyment campaign to launch a special COVID-19 relief project aimed at helping select communities in Gauteng and Limpopo to navigate and alleviate the disruptions to the 2020 school year and beyond, through the power of stories.  While the pandemic has presented major challenges for most families, the partners have chosen to see the opportunity in the crisis and...
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SAVED BY LITERATURE AND LOVE

Posted on
13 August 2020
 Barbara Boswell
South African author and English associate professor Barbara Boswell says, as a child, she was saved by books and by the care and compassion of the female staff at her local library. She shares her experience of growing up in a home that endured gender-based violence, with the Nal’ibali reading-for-enjoyment campaign.  Late last year, on the day after my 47th birthday, I found myself for the...
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Debunking Gender Myths Through Stories

Posted on
11 August 2020
South Africa is sadly, a very patriarchal society with outdated ideals and habits which lead to issues of gender-based violence, unequal opportunities for women, the sexual exploitation of women and more. Every month, Nal’ibali – the reading-for-enjoyment campaign – focuses on a different aspect of literacy and literature and unpacks it to make it relevant for children and parents. This month the campaign is looking...
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After months of being told that home – away from friends and extended family – is the safest place to be, it is natural that children will be experiencing a range of emotions at the prospect of going back to school. From anticipation and excitement at the idea of seeing their friends to fear and anxiety at the possibility of getting sick or putting...
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When government talks about the re-opening of schools it is preoccupied with two things: the coverage of the curriculum and the conduct of year-end examinations. In other words, the planning for reopening, even a phased return to schools, frames children as cognitive machines which need to be oiled so that it can operate smoothly to deliver on pre-planned outcomes. If that metaphor sounds too...
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