Solar MP3 players to educate Zambian children

The Learning at Taonga Market radio distance education directly addresses SDG#4 or the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goal to ensure inclusive and equitable quality education for all. Taonga has a great track record of teaching children to read and write, as advocated by Project Literacy. We’re thrilled to be seeing a renewed push for and focus on literacy, and see an important role for Lifeline Energy in this – providing a cost-effective tool that’s able to reach tens of thousands of children in remote and deprived areas, particularly in Africa. 

Primary school lessons in reading, writing and life skills training are loaded onto the Lifeplayer, allowing children to make up a missed lesson or to listen as often as they like.  Lifeplayers are placed in community-based schools as a priority, often called ‘radio schools’, where a literate adult or teaching mentor coordinates the classes and provides support to the learners.

Books and stories can be loaded as well. Many children in rural areas have parents who are illiterate and unable to read to their children.  The Lifeplayer provides an alternative voice.

Children in Taonga Market radio schools often score higher than in conventional government classrooms.  This is why the Ministry of Education is rolling out the project to a further 200 schools and community centres in eastern Zambia. With the fall in copper prices, which is the country’s main export earner, the ministry has had its budget cut.  They’re relying on us to provide the Lifeplayers and we’re relying on you, our donors, to help us.

Our CEO Kristine Pearson will be visiting Zambia this month to visit radio schools and plan the rollout with the Ministry of Education.