Annual Report 2022/2023

IMPACT REPORT 2022/2023

UPLIFTING AFRICA THROUGH PLAY

WHENYOU CHANGETHE BEGINNING YOUCHANGE THEWHOLE STORY

OF THE STORY

LearntoPlayhasadiverseandrobust boardofpowerfulplaymakers.Eachof thesevenwomenareleadersintheir respectivefieldslendingtheirunique expertisetoinformourstrategyand decisionsfromallperspectivesofour internalandexternalenvironment.

Together,theboardprovidesinsights frompublichealth,publicrelations, legal,governanceandearlychildhood educationindustries

FROM

LEFT TO RIGHT:

Taazima Kala-Essack, Evgeniya

Troanska, Priyanka Handa Ram, Matshediso Kgamane, Karen Clune, Loungo Tibone, Lauren Mistry

THEDRIVINGFORCE BEHINDLEARNTOPLAY B O A R D O F D I R E C T O R S

MESSAGE FROM OUR CHAIRPERSON

It always takes my breath away to see our desert country of Botswana bloom in the rainy season Wildflowers magically appear from previously cracked dirt Pinks, yellows, reds, and greens erupt from their sleep. And with the blossoms come the butterflies eager to dance and play in the colors.

It’s proof that all plants need to grow and flourish are water and sunlight

Similarly, this past year, Learn to Play has bloomed with the help from new funding and strategic partners, such as Kwando Safaris, the US Embassy in Botswana, the Elma Foundation, Kids Collab, Deloitte, and the Dovetail Impact Foundation These partnerships catalyzed the launch of a new dedicated play center in northern Botswana, the start of one new playgroup and brought boxes of play to families across the Dukwi Refugee Camp and Soweto Moreover, we planted seeds in Uganda, Kenya, and Zimbabwe that we hope will flourish next year. These partnership efforts will bring our Rainbow Play Approach to more children on the continent. We are incredibly grateful for the numerous play heroes who accelerated our growth this year

They say that where flowers bloom, so does hope and perhaps a little play

Ke a leboga

Karen Clune - Board Chairperson

M E E T T H E T E A M

TEAMWO BEHIND EVERY SUCCESSFUL ORGANISA

MESSAGE FROM OUR FOUNDER

“We tell people to follow their dreams, but you can only dream of what you can imagine, and depending on where you come from, your imagination can be quite limited ” - Trevor Noah, Born A Crime

In 2022, we traveled to different countries in Africa exploring models to grow Learn to Play. The hardest moment I encountered was when we asked parents in Zimbabwe what dreams they had for their children, and they could not answer that question They had none

This moment, uncomfortable as it was, fuels me everyday

Our word for 2022 was “bloom” - for us as an organisation, but more importantly, to help children bloom. The children and families we serve live on the margins of society Most of them live in or have experienced poverty; some have gone through traumatic experiences such as forced migration, war and violence while others have experienced severe neglect or abuse. This picture can leave you feeling quite helpless and wondering if in fact, a 3-hour playgroup session can change these toxic patterns. If there’s anything we learnt last year, it’s that when you tend to a flower with nurturing care - the right mix of nutrients, attention, and understanding, it will bloom regardless of how many weeds surround it

We used these experiences to strengthen our parenting programmes, augment our expertise in social and emotional learning, mindful play and creativity - and oh how we bloomed! We watched children, their caregivers & educators engage at deeper levels; they told us how they underestimated the power of love and how it fuels learning.

As we move forward in 2023, we’re refining our programming, our measurement tools and strengthening our roots in Botswana where we are doubling our impact size and areas

We understand that for our flowers to grow in the direction of the sun, they need to be grounded in our soil first

Priyanka Handa Ram - Founder & CEO

3OUTOF4CHILDRENIN AFRICAFAILTOREACHTHEIR

POTENTIALINCOGNITIVE DEVELOPMENTBECAUSEOF POVERTY,POORHEALTH, NUTRITION,ANDLACKOF EARLYSTIMULATION

TH I S

OUR MISSION

LTP is a nonprofit organisation making play-based early childhood education accessible in Africa through playgroups, training and positive parenting programmes.

OUR VISION

Our vision is a world where quality early childhood development is not a luxuryfor EVERY child to have access to quality early learning whilst being nourished, protected & cared for.

OUR GOALS

Improved neurocognitive outcomes for children 0-6

Increase in caregiver confidence

Increased investment in ECD in Africa

Strengthened family-child relationships

Improved wellness and wellbeing of children age 0-6

Communities prioritising access to early learning

Dukwi Kacgae

Kavimba Bontleng

Nata

Gopong

O U R A P P R O A C H

Learn To Play’s playgroups follow a play guide with themes that are relevant, contextual and engaging for young children in sub-Saharan Africa. Mamapreneurs are trained as facilitators to provide guided play sessions that cultivate children’s holistic development. We've created a unique framework for early childhood development known as the Rainbow Play Approach which encompasses 6 key learning areas in the early years and are the basis for our play-based curriculum

Playgroups take place 5 days a week for 3 to 4 hours a day and are run by a minimum of three Mamapreneurs for up to 36 children, ages two to five. Children’s days begin and end with mindful play to strengthen their social & emotional skills, setting a calm and happy tone for the day All children who attend our playgroups are also offered a nutritious snack.

POSITIVE PARENTING PROGRAMMES

During COVID-19 when playgroups closed, LTP understood the need for parental engagement programs to strengthen caregiver-child relationships for child development Since then, this has become an integral part of LTP's model. LTP has conducted numerous multi-session workshops on parental engagement in communities and has now developed The Parent Playbox in collaboration with Kids Collab.

TRAINING & CONSULTING

Learn To Play has developed its own training program focused on play-based learning for ECD with a unique focus on social and emotional development, mindful play, creativity and imagination and child protection in addition to traditional key development areas In addition to training mamapreneurs to run playgroups, Learn To Play also runs professional development programs and training for existing ECD educators on playbased learning.

6 Communities

O U R I M P A C T

42 Mamapreneurs

775 Children enrolled

68 Parent Playboxes

90 Individuals trained

31 Parents joined Go Baby Go 1 Community ECD centre completed

P L A Y G R O U P S

OUR PLAYGROUPS

Learn To Play provides developmentally appropriate, playbased learning to meet milestones in the early years.

As our playgroups are community-driven, we follow a play guide with themes that are relevant, contextual and engaging for young children in sub-Saharan Africa. The Mamapreneurs are trained as facilitators to provide guided play sessions that cultivate children’s holistic development.

We've created a unique framework for holistic early childhood development known as the Rainbow Play Approach. This framework emphasises 6 key learning areas in the early years, which are the basis of our stations:

Group Games

Social and Emotional Learning

Sensory Play

Fine Motor Development

Language Play

Action Play

Playful learning

Creative play

Communication and Literacy

Gross motor development

Cognitive Development

Creativity and Imagination

P A R E N T I N G P R O G R A M M E S

THEPARENTPLAYBOX

In 2022 we joined forces with the brilliant team from Kids Collab to create the incredibly powerful "Parent Playbox" to support parents of young children. The playbox, inspired by our Rainbow Play Aproach, and Kids Collab's expertise on happy and active children, contains 24 different activities to encourage parental engagement. We did a pilot in both Duwki Refugee Camp, Botswana as well as in Soweto, South Africa, The feedback has been exceptionally positive and we are excited to scale this initiative in 2023 to engage parents of children 0-5.

"Other parents in our neighbourhood are seeing the way we play with the playbox and the love it creates between parents and children."

- Father from Dukwi

80%OFBRAIN EVELOPMENTOCCURS DURINGTHEFIRST3 YEARSOFLIFE GENESPROVIDETHE BLUEPRINTFORBRAIN EVELOPMENT,BUTTHE ENVIRONMENTSHAPESIT

R A M M E S

P A R E N T I N G P R O G

GO BABY GO

2022 marked another year of implementing our Go Baby Go / Gola Nnana Gola programme. We worked with caregivers around Botswana to promote nurturing care in the home environment to protect children and preserve positive cultural traditions for early learning. This year we impacted 27 families and we are thrilled with the outcomes after the programme was completed.

36%

Pre-trainingassesmentaverage

67%

Posttrainingassesmentaverage

OURVISIONISAWORLD

WHEREQUALITYEARLY

CHILDHOODDEVELOPMENTIS

NOTALUXURY-FOREVERY CHILDTOHAVE ACCESSTOQUALITYEARLY LEARNINGWHILSTBEING NOURISHED,PROTECTED& CAREDFOR

T R A I N I N G A N D C O N S U L T I N G

TRAININGIND'KAR

D'kar is a village in the Ghanzi Distric Botswana and is home to a predomin Bushman community, of the Naro and Dcui San tribes.

In August 2022, Learn To Play, completed training for the teachers and teacher assistants of Mosaico, a nonprofit preschool and the Village Preschool called Kaikagu, both based in D'kar.

In total, we impacted seven teachers and three teaching assistants who in turn work with approximately 120 children annually.

The training included the following

Early brain development and learning through play

fine Motor skills & sensory play

gross motor action play

Let's play literacy

Let's play thinking skills

Mindful play

LEGO playbox

Growing Our Team

The members of our team are integral to our programmes and impact. We now have 7 full-time staff members that work from our head office, based in Gaborone, Botswana.

H I G H L I G H T S

,

At Learn To Play our curriculum provides developmentally appropriate, play-based learning to meet milestones in the early years. We follow a play guide with themes that are relevant, contextual and engaging for children living in Africa.

Our Curriculum . HundrED Summit - Finland

We had the opportunity to present a workshop at the HundrED summit in Helsinki, Finland on learning through play, with a special emphasis on our community-driven & mindful play approach.

Dukwi Refugee Camp

2022 was our first year of opening and successfully running a playgroup in Dukwi Refugee Camp.

New Partnerships

Partnerships and collaborations ensure financial sustainability, strengthen our programmes and services to those we serve and improve our organisational efficiency and effectiveness.

Focused on play, not profit, REWA

Little Einsteins is the only not-forprofit preschool in Botswana that benefits the entire community. Every child enrolled at Little Einsteins simultaneously supports a cycle of sustainable early childhood education for those most in need, with school fees helping to fund child’s early years learning

at Learn To Play

L I T T L E E I N S T E I N S

PRE-SCHOOL

Little Einsteins is pioneering social impact for early childhood education. LE was founded in 2014 as a private preschool with a holistic and play-based approach to learning. Since LTP's founding, LE has served as the benchmark for quality early learning culminating in a merger between the two into a single social impact business in 2021.

The synergies between LTP and LE go beyond just funding. Children in LE and LTP follow the same playbased curriculums and are measured using the same assessments. This allows the organisation to benchmark learning in a high-income urban contexts with lowresourced communities,

TESTIMONIAL 46

CHILDREN ENROLLED

"

wish to express how very peased I have been with Litte Einsteins First, my daughter has been so happy at the schoo and came back every day ful of excitement ideas and stories to share Her curiosity grew and grew She oved her teachers but also the other staff aso appreciated the schoo’s overall values and ethos As a development worker, I particuarly appreciate that Little Einsteins is a non-profit social impact schoo where 100% of the profit generated from school fees go into providing free Early Childhood Development support for less privieged children across the country This is a briliant and inspiring mode where parents can give their kids the best start in life, knowing also that they are serving the wider population and helping to reduce inequalities wish to thank al the staff at Little Einsteins and Learn To Play for your valuabe and impactful work I wish you more success !

-Zia Choudhury - Resident Coordinator of the UN to Botswana

F I N A N C I A L S U M M A R Y

2022 brought a number of positive developments for Learn To Play's financial position from new funding partners to great strides into building a sustainable organisation.

Growth in both our earned income and grants & donations allowed for us to grow our team, complete key projects such as the LTP - ECD centre in Kavimba and expand to new communities. Through our earned revenue we were able to cover all staff, administrative and non-community related costs to ensure that 100% of grants and donations are dedicated towards community programming.

Furthermore, new funding partners such as the Dovetail Impact Foundation, Elma Philanthropies and the Deloitte WorldClass Initiative allowed us take steps towards building partnerships for future funding, growth and sustainability. We also continued to grow our relationships with local partners and we are proud to say that in 2022 more than P350,000.00 was invested into early childhood development by Botswana based corporates through Learn To Play.

62% Earned Income Grants & Donations

38%

TOTAL INCOME: P2,708,974

TOTAL EXPENSES: P2,356,015

N E X T S T E P S

1

Employer Supported Childcare

Through our affiliation programme which includes training, a play-based curriculum, operational support and quality assurance

Training in Africa

2

Educator training on learning through play, mindful play, child protection, social & emotional development and creative play

3

Playgroups

Establish four new playgroups in communities within Botswana

4

Team Development

Organisational growth, prioritising culture and cohesion

Finalise Monitoring & Evaluation

5

Accurate impact measure for each of our models.We're currently working on a school readiness measurement tool with our friends at Children on the Edge

HAVESOMUCHTODOW HOWTHENEXT80TU OUT" -BILLGATES

"THEFIRSTFIVEYEARS

WETHANKYOU HELPINGUSUPLIFT AFRICATHROUGH PLAY

FOR YOUR CONTINUED SUPPORT IN

P L A Y H E R O E S

Deloitte - WorldClass Initiative

Dovetail Impact Foundation

Elma Philantropies

First Capital Bank

US Embassy in Botswana

Handa Family

Ramesh Family

Sheela & Raja Ram

The Daily Grind

Ananth & Aravinda Raja Ram

Grant Thornton Botswana

Sidharth Ram & family

TS Anantharaman

Dinesh Textiles

Acumen Propery Group

Bohua

Century Office Supplies

Creative Culture

Ina Lebe

Kavimba VDC

Masterprint

Mr.Veg

Muchenje Campsite and Cottages

Mwandi View Safaris

REWA

Moralo design

Cheetah Conservation Botswana

Elephants without Borders

Pula Sports Development

World Vision - Go Baby Go

Rotary E-Club of Riddarfjärden

Kwando Safaris

Earth Warriors

Kids Collab

Beabond

Azzuro Diamonds

Edu Toys

Oodles of Caboodle

Sanitas

Panda Bricks

Chobe Safari Lodge

Nata Lodge

Mosha Spa

Goodhope District Council

Chobe District Council

Trifecta Group

The Eaton Family

Michaela Powell Rees

CONTACT DONATIONS

Gaborone Head Office

+267 3916741

P O Box 1172, Gaborone priyanka@learntoplay.org

Donations can be made through our website or EFT: www.learntoplay.org

Bank name: First National Bank (FNB)

Account Name: Learn To Play

Account no: 62773759918

Branch no: 282267