Teaching at Slums

 

 

 

V4FK is seeking volunteer teachers to help pupils in Nairobi's Soweto slums learn to read English.  Volunteers with our slum reading program are trained in using a few basic resources (story books, flashcards, dictionaries) to teach English to primary school pupils in a Nairobi slum environment.  Coordinators support the volunteer teachers and supervise their activities for the first one to three weeks, until volunteers have been sufficiently trained to carry out their responsibilities unsupervised (albeit in the company of our small team of volunteers).  

 

Soweto is one of Kenya's most neglected slums.  It covers roughly three square kilometers, but inhabits between 100,000 and 200,000 people in that small space.  

 

 

Soweto is heavily populated by widows, single women, and children.  Prostitution and alcoholism rates in the slum are quite high.  By helping the children of Soweto learn to read, volunteers are opening doors for the pupils' future which would otherwise remain closed. 

 

With our program, volunteers will be given a set group of pupils (class one to four primarily) to work with at a time. They will drill these pupils using simple teaching aids to increase their vocabulary, and test them on short stories to help them improve their reading and comprehension. V4FK will provide all necessary materials. 

 

Since our slum teaching program is specific to teaching English, a basic background in English is required of volunteers. But not much else is needed in the way of qualifications - just your time and energy! For more information about volunteer opportunities in Soweto with V4FK, please write to us at: volunteer4freekenya@gmail.com. Thank you.

 

*V4FK is now discussing expanding it's slum school program to include another Nairobi slum from the summer of 2013.*