Tigo supports mobiles as learning tools

Joan Avit receives a dummy cheque of $25,000 ( aboutTsh41.2 million) from Tigo’s Head of Strategy, Edwardo Quiroga and Reach for Change CEO, Jacob Stedman, at the Tigo Reach for Change Winners announcement 2014, in Dar es Salaam earlier this year.

DAR ES SALAAM, Tanzania - Fay, who is two years old now, sits for hours swiping and playing games using his parent’s smart phones.

With no hustle or the need of an instructor to show him how to use the phone, he opens it and plays games, takes pictures, watches videos or even records people, doing whatever he wants whenever he wants.

With this recent trend children are more addicted and occupied with their parent’s phones than adults themselves! It seems like the easiest way to educate them is through things like this that keep them busy the most.

It is important to groom a child and teach them from the early stages when their brains are active and developing.

As innocent as they can be, children especially those aged between 3-7 years of age, are not the easiest when it comes to teaching; they need that extra attention.

For that reason, a parent or teacher needs to find fun and interactive ways to educating this age group.

With her heart dedicated to seeing children grow with that culture of learning, Miss Joan Avit, with the help of an idea that came from AGORA Research Centre in Finland decided to help Tanzanian children by building in them an interest and learning behavior from that early age.

She aims at disseminating GraphoGame, a game based, child friendly phone application that helps children of the ages of 3-7 years to learn how to read.

“We have focused on this age because it is at this stage that a child’s brain starts developing. Also early learning is important because it sets the basic learning principles for their development,” said Avit.

Because it is game based, it’s fun and easy to absorb and it enables them to learn at their own pace according to the levels within the game, she added.

Moreover she said, a research has shown that if a child plays this game between 5-10 hours a week they gain basic reading skills.

Avit’s plan is to disseminate the game first in Swahili as it is important for children to learn in their mother tongue.

Research shows that 80-85% of families in Tanzania use Swahili as their language of conversation at home. And according to research it is easier for a child to learn another language after they have mastered their own native language, she added.

This app is already being researched on in different countries around the continent including Namibia, Zambia, Tanzania and Kenya. “So, by disseminating GraphoGame Swahili we hope to reach more children in Tanzania,” Avit said.

At the moment GraphoGame Swahili has been tried in two Bagamoyo schools (Majengo and Kizuiani), the feedback has been really positive, in fact students have become motivated to go to school because they have something fun to learn and look forward to,” Avit said..

According to her, teachers have also agreed and said that it is an easier way to learn for the children. That is the beauty of having the game concept in learning.

The next step, after the organization has being fully registered, is to start disseminating the game into schools that have electronic devices such as computers, laptops etc, and have a distribution channel to reach schools with no devices.

“We also want to enable parents to download the game on their phones. The game can work on all types of phones, basic and smart phones,” she added.

In five years, Avit’s vision is to have every parent in Tanzania use this application on their phones so that they can engage and teach their children how to read.

“Children now-a-days love playing with their parents phones, so it is a way for them to enable their kids to learn anytime, anywhere,” she said.

“When I heard about Tigo Reach for Change Tanzania, I felt like it is an awesome opportunity to explore and put in reality what I thought could help children in our country learn,” she said..

Avit, who lives and works in Moshi Kilimanjaro, is a financial consultant for local NGOs and also had a dream of establishing her own organization.

“It was only two weeks to the deadline for the submission of the application form for the Tigo Reach for Change competition, and she didn’t hesitate to use the little time left to capture the opportunity,” Avit said.

As Ms Avit explained the process which they had to go through for applying for the contest, she declared that it was a long process which took about 3 months.

“We started out over 1000 people but were gradually downsized to 15 people. We were invited to a workshop where we were given some amazing insight about business and entrepreneurship from specialists from Tigo Tanzania and Reach for Change,” Avit said.

With amazing ideas from every applicant, there was no way of knowing what would happen, she said; adding that “In any case, I was confident that whoever would win will have definitely deserved it.”

Being a non-governmental association which began in Sweden, Reach for Change, envisions a mobilized movement that will help children in need, who have their own prospective future ahead of them by helping social entrepreneurs to put into practice their innovative projects, said Jacob Stedman, the Deputy CEO of Reach for Change, when he was announcing this year’s winners.

The two companies, Tigo and Reach for Change started the initiative in Tanzania since 2012, and came out with its first three winners in 2013; and from November last year the second competition was launched and three winners that include Ms Avit were found.

One of Tigo’s corporate responsibility policies is to invest in sustainable projects that will have a lasting impact; and the Reach for Change scheme provides a good opportunity to do so, said Mr Eduardo Quiroga, on behalf of Tigo General Manager, on the day they were announcing their winners.

“Most important investment one can make is in children as they are the future and that is why we have focused on solving their problems,” Quiroga said.

Additionally Avit has appreciated the opportunity that the Tigo Reach for Change initiative has brought; as it has enabled her to fulfill her goal of owning her own organization, and having the ability to help children.

“I want to thank Tigo Tanzania for realizing that children are an essential part of the population and that building a child is building a generation. It is my hope that through this new mode of teaching our children, we can build a culture that assists them to love reading and learning,” she said.

By Leonard Magomba, Monday, June 02nd, 2014


SHARE: