South Africa Volunteer Experiences

School or Educare Assistance - Cape Town

Volunteers are placed in a school or educare centre in a disadvantaged community. Schools have 30 to 50 children per class and educare centres have between 5 and 50 children. Resources are stretched and teachers cannot provide attention to every student. Volunteers provide much needed classroom assistance.

Volunteers assist in daily running of classes and give one on one attention to children in need. No experience is necessary and volunteers are supervised by a teacher or co-ordinator, but will also have the opportunity to give lessons.

Project details

Project starts: every Monday
Location: Blaauwberg/Table View, Cape Town
Minimum duration: 2 weeks

About the educare centres

Volunteers are placed in schools in disadvantaged communities. We currently support or run the following schools and educare centers:

Dunoon Crèche: This includes two preschools in a township with Xhosa speaking children from the age of 1 – 5 years old. There are two containers where the classes are run out of for +_ 50
100 children. The main focus is teaching the kids basic English in the form of games and early childhood development.
TLC Wolverivier Educare: This is a very small class of 4 – 8 children that are Afrikaans speaking. The educare is located on a settlement. The classes focus on early child hood development and school readiness programs such as counting, colors and writing.
ACVV Educare: Based at a social services office, the children from the surrounding settlements are brought to the center for school readiness and early childhood development programs. There are +_ 30 – 60 children in the school from age 3 – 6.
Vissershok School: An Afrikaans farm school where children from the local settlement get taught grades 1 – 7. The children are from ages 6 – 15. Classes are between 40 – 60 children.
Volunteers assist with teaching computers and supporting individual children.

Project highlights

Working in a school or settlement educare center under the supervision of a teacher or volunteer co‐ordinator
Giving lessons and managing the class
Building great relationships with the children in your class and watching them grow
Learning about South African cultures and way of life
Making new life time friends

About the children / schools:

Most of the children can speak English yet their home language may be Afrikaans or Xhosa
The children live in townships such as Dunoon or site 5, these townships usually have 1 tap for many house to share and no electricity
Children in the program range from 2 – 14yrs.
School starts at 08:00 and closes and 13:30/14:30
Many of the children do not pay school fees so the schools funds are stretched and any assistance is welcomed.

Volunteer tasks

Volunteers will help in the daily running of the program and will be involved in:

Providing one-to-one assistance to children in the classroom
Giving lessons and managing the class
Running fun days and sports programs
Teaching computer skills
Giving lessons on life issues like HIV awareness, drugs, etc.
Running after school programs such as sports activities or homework assistance
Helping with other tasks in schools

Working days

Volunteers work 3 to 5 days a week, between Monday and Friday.
Working hours at the school or educare centre are between 08:00hrs and 14:00hrs or 09:00hrs and 12:00hrs.
After school, volunteers can run their own after-school activity with the children or visit one of our other programs.

Volunteer requirements

CV/Resumé
Police clearance
Minimum age of 18
Intermediate to advanced level of competency in English
Copy of return flight itinerary

Accommodation

Volunteer house

Shared rooms sleeping 2 - 4
Communal lounge and kitchen

Backpackers accommodation

Dormitories sleeping 4 - 10
This can be upgraded to private rooms

Meals

Volunteers will receive 3 meals a day. These include:

Breakfast: self help breakfast of cereals, fruit, yogurt, toast & spreads
Lunch: self help lunch of breads, fruit, cold meats & spreads
Dinner: a hot meal will be served every night. These range from a traditional BBQ, stews, casseroles, fresh vegetable etc.
Tea and coffee will be available all day

Also note:

All dinners will include a meat, starch and vegetable
A generous amount of food will always be given so no one will go hungry
All other drinks will be at own expense
A refrigerator is available for volunteer’s personal food

Important reminder: Participants must advise SAVE of their dietary needs

Transport

Volunteers will be met at Cape Town International airport and taken to their program
On project days the volunteers will be transported by private car or mini bus. The vehicles are roadworthy and have all relevant licenses and liability insurance