On the 13th of September, my volunteer year at Awarenet started. This volunteer year is done through the German government’s weltwaerts program. After a long and strenuous journey from Bremen, Germany to Makhanda, South Africa, I am happy to finally be able to start my work at the Joza Youth Hub with Awarenet. Since my arrival in South Africa and the start of my media work at Awarenet, I already attended a few programmes in the background and would like to share my personal impressions with you.
Latest additions to our robotics team
On Monday Thanduxolo – the Awarenet robotics coordinator started training our new members of the robotics team. By giving them various tasks on what the robot should do, the trainees coded the robot accordingly.
Having more trained coding specialists as part of the Robotics team means that Awarenet will be able to offer the robotics program extensively and allow more children to take part.
The Robotics and Coding Program is a fun way of introducing children to the world of coding and IT, we are therefore happy happy to welcome our new trainers.
Robotics at Makana Primary School
The Robotics and Coding Program recently recruited the youngest learners so far to the program. At the Makana Primary School, a group of enthusiastic and motivated 4 and 5 graders were introduced to the world of coding.
Together with the help of the trainers, they found ways to make the robot operate certain tasks like moving forward or taking a turn. Every learner was included and immensely passionate, which was heartwarming to see.
I personally know close to nothing about coding, so I was more than impressed to watch these young participants solving every task thrown at them.
Furthermore, some trainers of this Robotics class were new trainees our Awarenet Robotics trainer recently trained.
Maths training at Ikamva Youth
At the Olico maths training, 8 graders took part in a nationwide online maths competition. During the competition, the learners had to solve 15 multiplication tasks as fast as they could. Unfortunately, the nationwide record of 11 seconds was not broken, but I was still impressed by some of the learners results.
The maths training took place at the Ikamva Youth Computer Lab at Nombulelo High School. Learners of multiple schools around the neighbourhood and the host high school came together to attend the training.