Pioneering Mobile Learning in Africa: A Partnership Worldreader

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Mobile learning holds immense potential for enhancing education and literacy in Africa. Recognizing this potential, Cambridge partnered with the NGO Worldreader to bring educational content to schoolchildren across sub-Saharan Africa. The initiative focused on utilizing widely available feature phones as e-reading devices through an innovative e-reading app developed by Worldreader.

The Challenge

In sub-Saharan Africa, there is a need for accessible educational content, especially for young children. While feature phones are widely available across the continent, they traditionally lack the advanced functionalities of smartphones. The challenge was to leverage these feature phones for educational purposes and provide diverse language content to address the needs of children from different linguistic backgrounds.

The Solution

Worldreader developed an e-reading app hosted on the cloud-based mobile application platform BiNu, transforming feature phones into e-reading devices. Cambridge recognized the ingenuity of this development, as it meant that anyone with a feature phone could now have an e-reader simply by downloading the BiNu Worldreader app.

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The Ulwazi Programme: Bridging the Gap with Digital Skills and Local Content

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The Ulwazi Programme, established in 2008 in Durban, KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa, is a pioneering initiative aimed at democratically co-creating cultural and historical information with local communities. Through training community members in digital media tools and web platforms, the program encourages them to contribute articles in Zulu and English about the culture and history of Durban and the eThekwini Municipality. I helped launch the project with eThekwini Municipal Libraries and ran it for several years.

Main Achievements

  • Established a digital library of local history and knowledge in English and Zulu, with over 2000 articles.
  • Trained over 20 fieldworkers in digital media management and digital skills.
  • Promoted digital and reading literacy by providing access to locally relevant resources in local languages.

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The Heart of the City

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(Chapter written for Undressing Durban book)

Inyanga, Warwick Triangle. Photograph by Roger Jardine.

I’m hopping about on one leg, in the middle of a busy walkway, obstructing morning commuters.  Directly across from me is the herb-sellers market, above me cars funnel into the city while below colourful aprons are strewn across stairs, the ladies selling them sitting on upturned crates.  “Is this the right size?” I ask Crops as I squeeze my foot into a cross-strapped rubber sandal.  “Sure, sure, stretch to fit,” he answers.  Crops makes and sells imbadadada (a home-made shoe or literally ‘someone who walks with an awkward gait’) from a small outlet on the edge of Warwick Triangle.  Pairs are lined up outside his shop, in rows based on style and size. The imbadadada is a thick, hard-wearing sandal, with two straps along the front and one along the back, originally made by Zulu tribesmen.  Johnny Clegg made these shoes popular with a wider audience in the eighties, dancing in a pair on stages across the world.

“I make these myself from the car tires,” Crops tells me.  “It’s an old design.  They first started making them in the 1950s.  The people buy it for the traditional dance or just to wear.  It is comfortable and they last a long time.   I am also making these new styles now, ones with the buckle and ones with Nike.”

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