Services
“If anyone ever puts you down for having dyslexia, don’t believe them. Being dyslexic can actually be a big advantage, and it has certainly helped me.”
Services
Free Counseling services
We provide support to Dyslexics, Dyslexia support in the work place, learner motivation, learner self-esteem counselling and parental counselling.
An individual’s perception about themselves impacts their self- esteem and their self-concept Therefore we provide strategies to support self -esteem to Dyslexic students, parents and teachers.
There is need for reasonable adjustments in the work place, therefore employers need to be equipped about Dyslexics environments, so that they do not discriminate Dyslexics indirectly.
We offer free counselling. For counselling Book at ; admin@dyslexia.org.bw
We provide educational assessment services
We provide child assessment services for free of charge. Assessments normally cost P1, 500 per session in the market and we do it for free for those vulnerable children, orphans and disadvantaged children.
Vocational skills transfer.
We offer vocational skills training, where we identify dyslexic beneficiaries and we offer them training courses in carpentry, cooking, dressmaking, baking and electrical engineering, we then take them to government brigades for testing and certification. The beneficiaries are trained by practicing professionals in the market. The beneficiaries are then placed in companies and some are assisted with starting their own businesses.
We provide remedial classes
We have a tutorial center in Mmatseta village where we have 68 beneficiaries who attend our after school classes.
We provide teacher training.
We train teachers in various teaching methods for children with various learning disabilities.
For teacher training booking, click the button below.
Activities
Activities
Screening and assessment of learners (with parental consent)
Teacher Counseling
Learner Counseling and Dyslexia awareness
Community outreach- parents and teacher awareness
Why this work is important?
Dyslexia is at the root of child illiteracy
Dyslexia is a common challenge but often neglected. Learning disabilities affect 12% to 18% of all learners in schools and these kids are at a risk of not benefitting from the basic education system.
In Botswana, we have 752 primary schools in our country holding 368,301 students 18% to 22% of whom are suffering from learning disabilities. The truth of the matter is that, every parent wishes a bright future for their children, the challenge comes for the poor who may not have resources to support their children in need and difficult circumstances as these, but in developed countries like the UK, such children are inventors like sir Richard Branson, in the USA we talk of Albert Este in, Whoopi Goldberg, Oprah Winfrey, to name a few but in developing countries such children are cattle herders, people who could have changed the world had their education system accommodated them and their needs, instead it’s the teachers who are blamed for not teaching.
Effective barrier to learning. Learning difficulties and learning disabilities are an effective barrier to literacy which means if one does not get assistance at an early age they may end up becoming illiterate for life which may be a major
Contributor to youth unemployment.
A major driver of youth unemployment. Most of the children suffering from Learning difficulties and learning disabilities literally have nothing to pen down on their CV may not find space in the modern-day competitive job market, which puts these children at a high risk of being unemployable, due to illiteracy and having a bleak future.
However, we are engaging the relevant stakeholders to address these challenges facing our education system at the national policy level and at the community level we are bringing remedial solutions for immediate impact.
A major contributor to illiteracy in Botswana.
Being unable to read and write is a condition that accounts for the large proportion of all recorded illiterate people in the country. Efforts towards addressing learning disabilities will go a long way in addressing and improving literacy rates in Botswana for economic growth, and development and towards realizing the vision of 2036 of an educated and informed nation.
Problem Statement and the work we do
Problem statement
Basic education is considered a basic right for every Motswana child, as per the 1989 convention on the rights of the child (article 29), “LEARNING DISABILITIES IS AN EFFECTIVE BARRIER TO ACCESSING QUALITY INCLUSIVE EDUCATION WHICH POSES A RISK OF DEFEATING THE PURPOSE, DELIVERY OF BASIC EDUCATION FOR CHILDREN WITH LEARNING DISABILITIES IN BOTSWANA”
Training of school teachers?
The Need? In most schools in Botswana, there is a HOD for learning difficulties who oversees the affairs of children with learning disabilities or those with learning needs. These teachers need to be capacitated to teach children with learning disabilities in schools. This is a very highly specialized area with a huge skills gap.
High dropout rates for children with learning disabilities?
Our efforts are aimed at addressing the issues of school dropout rates among depressed and disadvantaged children with learning disabilities in schools. The number of children with learning disabilities and other physical disabilities recorded in all schools in Botswana is a fraction of the number of school-going children on the national census records, which indicates that a large portion and number of children who are supposed to be in school have either dropped out or they have not been enrolled. To this end, we conduct awareness campaigns on a mind-set change drive targeting parents, teachers and the students. We address PTA meetings in all schools nationwide. We leave posters on staff rooms, public places where parents easily access it and so much more.
Child or learner counseling services.
Our efforts are aimed at addressing the issues of bullying, drug abuse and child pregnancy common in children with learning disabilities in Botswana, who may have resorted to drugs and other misbehavior due to depression and failure to cope in school. To this end we provide counselling to children with learning disabilities.
Records and national database for learners with learning disabilities
We have 752 primary school in Botswana and over 369,000 children in these schools. 20% of them are suffering from learning difficulties and in worse-case scenario, learning disabilities. Our efforts are aimed at capacitating the ministry to get clean statistics and data of what’s happening in the schools to support decision-making at the ministry level. to that end we developed and donated a very simple to use but sophisticated to develop software to the Botswana government free of charge after we realized that decision-makers do not have access to clean data, up to date data for decision making, in fact, we had produced a report over what we found on the ground when we were conducting the EU funded dyslexia awareness campaigns in schools and we collected data as to the numbers of children who need to be assessed in order to get assistance if they learning disabilities.
Policy development
Our efforts are aimed at addressing the Botswana education system through contributing to the development of national education policies that address issues affecting learners in Botswana.
Capacity building in skills development
We have 752 primary school in Botswana and over 369,000 children in these schools. 20% of them are suffering from learning difficulties and in worse-case scenario, learning disabilities. Our efforts are aimed at capacitating the ministry to get clean statistics and data of what’s happening in the schools to support decision-making at the ministry level. to that end we developed and donated a very simple to use but sophisticated to develop software to the Botswana government free of charge after we realized that decision-makers do not have access to clean data, up to date data for decision making, in fact, we had produced a report over what we found on the ground when we were conducting the EU funded dyslexia awareness campaigns in schools and we collected data as to the numbers of children who need to be assessed in order to get assistance if they learning disabilities.
Free assessments
We provide free assessments to vulnerable children in Botswana. As we speak, if you book a child for assessment at any government facility to be assessed by an educational psychologist, they have to be on the waiting list for up to three years. The worst case is that, if a child is sitting for examinations and they have not been assessed, they may sit for an exam under a wrong set up. For example, if a child needs an exam paper that has large font, they would not be able to be assisted. If the child needs a scriber and reader, they cannot get it resulting in a definite failure. So we offer free assessments and these skills we need to advance in education and training besides the qualifications we hold.
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