By Masikhule
Masikhule is an NPO based in the Helderberg area of the Western Cape offering a wide variety of services in Early Childhood Development (ECD) within marginalised communities. Our range of services includes training and mentorship of community-based ECD educators. Founded in 2005 by Léanne Keet, an Occupational Therapist (OT), Masikhule’s training has developed over the years to integrate OT into their Early Learning Programs (ELPs).
Our dream to create an online App to make our unique Early Intervention-focused ELP freely accessible to all ECD educators, caregivers and parents was realised in late 2022. The reason we felt compelled to share our WCED-registered and -endorsed ELP for 0 – 5 year olds with a wider audience was due to the large numbers of children under the age of 5 years not having access to ELPs, especially in the marginalised communities:
“Using data from the 2022 General Household Survey, about 1.1 million children (31%) aged 3–5 years do not have access to any early learning programme (ELP). Of the 69% of children (2.4 million) in this age group that do attend an ELP, 45% participated at an early childhood development (ECD) centre, creche, or playgroup; and 23% were enrolled in primary school i.e., mostly Grade R. However, if one also considers children aged 0–2, then only 43% (about 3 million) of children aged 0–5 years have access to an ELP from a population of 6.9 million children. The discrepancies in access are large with the inequality gap affecting the poorest the most. For example, the attendance gap for children aged 3–4 years between children in Quintile 1 households (income quintile) compared to children in Quintile 5 households is 26 percentage points.” Jesal Kika-Mistry (August 2024), RESEP.
Thanks to our very generous donor, Upside Trust, in 2023 we started customising and converting our curriculum content (developed over many years and constantly updated to the needs of the communities we work with) to an online format that would be easily accessible and could be downloaded to allow use whilst having no internet access. We named our online, theme-based app MASKOT (Masikhule - Keep On Track), as ultimately our wish is for all children to reach formal schooling firmly on track.
What is MASKOT:
Throughout the year we created content and tested it with educators attending our ELP training and our mentors reported seeing positive results in the ECD Centres they visited. We expanded our a theme-based program for 0 – 3 and 3 – 5 year olds to include vital Early Intervention activities for Gross Motor Skills, Fine Motor Skills, Basic Concepts, Visual Perception and other early learning skills, plus Developmental Checklists.
By early 2024, thanks to the super-efficient Beeline (https://www.beeline.life/) – the online development company we partnered with - we had officially launched our online app: https://masikhule.org/maskot-online-program/ and hosted a number of successful onboarding workshops with other community-based ECD organisations.
What will you find on MASKOT:
In September 2024 we presented our Early Learning Program (ELP) and MASKOT (ELP online App) to the director of ECD in the Western Cape Education department. Our aim was to share the positive impact that Masikhule and MASKOT is having within the ECD community. We also had the opportunity to share clear evidence of how Early Intervention and Occupational Therapy are positively impacting and changing outcomes of early child development.
Ninety children aged 3 - 5 years were assessed in February and again in November 2024, with astonishing results. In February, less than 20% of children were anywhere near being on track in terms of their age, development and early learning skills, with 81 % of children behind in their development.
These poor performance scores affect all areas of a child's life - general independence, early literacy, early numeracy, language and communication, early learning foundations, self-confidence and self-esteem. But, with young children's brains being pliable, eager and ready for stimulation, and after 9 months of Masikhule's intervention programs, we saw a radical shift in these same young children being ready to face the next stage of development with competence and confidence. 72% of the children are now on track with only 7% of them experiencing marked delays.
Having Early Intervention strategies, which includes a variety of therapeutic modalities such as OT, should be part of policy discussions within relevant government departments to ensure ALL children are on track.
We are excited to report that over 600 users have signed up on the App - with free access to our Early Learning Programs, themes, activities, songs, books, posters and much more! We look forward to expanding and growing (Masikhule means “We are growing”!) in 2025 in order to positively impact thousands of children’s development and ensure they keep on track.
For more information about MASKOT and our organisation, please see our website: www.masikhule.org
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