Dorcas Wepukhulu
The African Storybook (ASb) website proudly hosts more than 4 000 unique picture storybooks which are available digitally, openly licensed and which can be freely downloaded. The ASb website features over 8 000 translations across more than 240 languages of Africa.
Proficiency in reading for meaning and using digital technology are increasingly essential for leading a socially and economically productive life. However, despite this importance, extensive research shows a concerning trend: the reading literacy levels of African children after their initial three years of schooling remain inadequate, with the vast majority unable to read for meaning. It is evident that the UN Sustainable Development Goal 4, cannot be realised unless children attain proficiency in reading.
Working in a region marked by severe digital inequality has necessitated the ASb Initiative to be aware of the range of vastly different contexts in which children live and learn. Together with our partners, we strive to develop appropriate modes of provision and formats tailored to diverse audiences and contexts. Essential to our approach is the ability for users to download and print materials, as well as being able to use our offline-capable apps.
The COVID-19 pandemic exacerbated the digital divide, particularly within African countries. For example, Children living in Nairobi’s Kibera informal settlement, deemed to be, the largest in Africa, faced significant barriers to online learning during lockdowns due to their inability to afford digital devices or data.
Class reading African Storybooks on school tablets, Kenya
Recognising this challenge, the ASb Champion in charge of the Kibera Library, which serves over 40 under-resourced informal schools, took proactive steps. They collected refurbished smartphones, them with the ASb Reader App, and loaned them to 22 families, enabling home reading opportunities despite the limitations imposed by the pandemics.
The ASb Reader and Maker Apps have generated huge enthusiasm among Community Library partners and the dedicated individual ASb Champions who promote children’s literacy across Sub-Saharan Africa. ASb Champions are enthusiastic literacy advocates who use ASb tools in their work and encourage families, schools and libraries in their own community to do the same. The ASb apps have also captivated children giving many of them the opportunity to engage with technology meaningfully.
The offline capability of these apps makes them particularly appropriate for use in varied environments across Africa where connectivity and electricity supply are constrained. The Reader App provides a unique opportunity for children to create their own library of storybooks, empowering them to read the storybooks at their leisure. They can ‘restock’ their library by swapping out titles or adding new ones, fostering a sense of ownership and continuous engagement with reading.
Group reading during an advocacy session in school, Kenya
While the ASb Maker App, offers a unique opportunity for people, including children, to craft their own storybooks in languages and on topics of their choice. The app allows offline creation of storybooks using images personally sourced. When connected to the internet, these storybooks can be published and be immediately available on the ASb website for viewing, by their creators and by the whole ASb reading community.
Children using the ASb Maker App to publish their own stories, Nigeria
The open licensing of storybooks encourages users to contribute to the digital repository by translating existing storybooks on the website into the languages of their choice or adapting them to suit diverse audiences. This includes creating picture-only versions or enhancing complexity to meet varying literacy levels. Users can also add interactive elements like questions to promote engagement and discussion.
The ASb website additionally enables users to create collections of up to 15 storybooks tailored to their literacy requirements. These collections streamline the process of discovering carefully selected and curated storybooks designed to address specific literacy or content needs. For example, users can access the ASb website to explore current collections covering various topics and themes such as Primary Math, Unity and Friendship, Color, and STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics). See Primary Math, Unity and friendship, Colour and STEM.
With the ASb digital publishing tools, various language communities have the autonomy to determine the content of the storybooks and preserve the knowledge they wish to pass down through storytelling. They can develop story manuscripts and enlist local artists to illustrate matching images and when ready, they publish their picture storybooks on the ASb website.
This process is wonderfully exemplified by the collaborative project between ASb and the Nuer Literacy Initiative which has empowered Thok Nath language speakers in South Sudan to publish 15 children’s books in Thok Nath, a language which prior to 2022, had never been published before. Dr Bond, one of the leaders of the Nuer Literacy Initiative, aptly describes ASb’s role, stating that it,
“Provides unique opportunities for groups to shape materials for their own needs, helps individuals develop their own technological skills, and inspires creativity in language communities.”
This partnership underscores the transformative potential of ASb in enabling linguistic communities to reclaim their narratives and promote literacy in their native languages.
Picture storybook anthologies printed and distributed in the Nuer speaking community in South Sudan
Dissemination of the ASb storybooks, especially across East and West Africa has increased exponentially as a result of the 28 ASb Champions working in Cameroon, Ethiopia, Ghana, Kenya, Malawi, Namibia, Nigeria, South Sudan and Zambia. Between 2022 and 2023, the Champions directly impacted over 15 000 children and over 3 000 educators. Through advocacy, they indirectly reached over 240 000 children and over 50 000 educators and other adults. In 2023 alone, the Champions read nearly 500 storybooks to groups of children using the Reader App.
Open invitation to our readers
We invite you to browse through some of the books on the African Storybook website https://www.africanstorybook.org/
Maybe you will even be inspired to translate storybooks into your language or use the ASb Maker App to create and publish your own story!