Teach 75 mothers to read stories to kids in Kenya

“We will tell people to come to the library and see our book but we already told our kids. They are even waiting for us to finish using the tablets so that they could also use!”

Dear Friends of Maria’s Libraries,

When we started working with groups of young, semi-literate mothers in 2011, many of them reported they had not looked at a book since they left primary school—and none of them had ever used a computer.  Flash forward two years later, when last month the mamas met to provide feedback on the first iteration of the digital book that they authored!

The Mamas were delighted and proud to see the fruits of their labor in digital form. They also brought a number of suggestions to the table. “We want audio for the book and animations like the ones in Harold and the Purple Crayon”, one of the Mamas exclaimed. Another Mama suggested the book have pictures of ground nuts so that their children would learn about local plants and foods. The user testing session was a great opportunity to get a sense of what exactly the Mamas wanted out of their digital book.

“We are interested in getting that particular book on our phones…Let those people design the book in a way that will enable us to access it from anywhere on our phone”

With support from the Beyond Access Library Innovators Award, Maria’s Libraries and Oregon State University have piloted Mama Mtoto Digital Storytime.  We are excited to continue to develop the digital book so that libraries across Kenya will able to offer quality local content through a number of platforms, including tablet, computer, and mobile!

We are currently raising funds to move forward with the next round of the book design. The development of this program would not be possible without your sustained support. As ever, your contributions are appreciated.

Asante!

Sofia